Beer, just not as you know it

What's your favourite beer?

Maybe you'd say lager, or stout, or mild. Maybe you'd plump for a brand name, but I bet you wouldn't say a powdered beer.

"A what?" you cry. Yes, a powdered beer that you just have to mix with water to enjoy. I must admit that an exclamation was my initial reaction also when I heard about the concept. That can't be right, or good for that matter. I had to do some research to find out more.

German brewery Klosterbrauerei Neuzelle has perfected the powered beer that just needs to be mixed with water to turn it into a lager. The omens are good if the standard of German breweries is anything to go by. 

The reasons for the powdered beer are environmental. According to the brewery, it will reduce its CO2 emissions between 3-5% in Germany alone. Instead of large and heavy bottles and crates, the beer would be delivered in powder packets. What's more, if the beer's rollout was mirrored worldwide, CO2 emissions could be halved.

If this all sounds too good to be true, well it is! The beer is currently alcohol free, but the brewery has plans to develop a range of alcohol filled beers. They say, 

“We want the complete beer taste. We have the foam and already have the beer taste. We want to add carbon dioxide in powder form. We want to add the alcohol in powder form. We can do all that with powder.”

Call me old fashioned, but I'll stick with my initial reaction. I wouldn't touch this beer with a bargepole. Not only does powdered beer fail the high standard of Germany's brewing industry, but it doesn't provide the effect of drinking alcohol. What is the point of that?

S Club 7 becomes just S Club again

OK. I confess. I'm a secret S Club 7 fan. Why secret? Well as a male in his early 40s, it seemed inappropriate to watch six singers, who could easily be the same age as my children, smile and dance to their latest smash hit. There's little doubt that their good looks made it easier to like them, but that wasn't all. You can have the best looking bandmates, but if your music isn't up the much, you won't get far. 

Thankfully the songwriting team behind S Club 7 knew precisely what type of music to produce for them. Call it lightweight if you like, but there is no denying that it fitted the group's persona perfectly. What's more, it appealed to a wider demographic than just the teenage age group. I should know!

To really be a music fan, you need colour and contrast to be able to find a piece of music to fit an occasion. You wouldn't normally play Led Zeppli's "Black Dog" to walk down the aisle to, but neither would you play James Blunt's "Your Beautiful" if you wanted to let your hair down. Good music is good music.

I don't buy the argument that one music genre is better than another. It's important to have a wide musical appreciation to be a well rounded individual. Take my music collection as an example. It features everyone from AC/DC and ABBA to Ward Thomas and Yes. There's jazz, heavy metal, garage, dance, classical, world music, and even some spoken word in there. There's something in there for any occasion. 

The death of Paul Cattermole recently at the young age of 46 was incredibly sad. As a former  member of S Club 7, he'd come of age in the media spotlight. A shy individual, his life didn't seem to fit well with the glamour of pop stardom. Financial problems later in life were the result of not being able to recreate his success as a solo singer. Not even his relationship with fellow singer Hannah Spearitt would last.

Yes poor old Hannah. It must be a particularly difficult time for her. They'd known each other since school, although it was only after they joined S Club 7 that their friendship turned into something deeper. When they broke up, they remained good friends so Paul's death must have come as a bolt out of the blue.

There are many questions regarding Paul's passing, but most should be left unanswered. It is not for the likes of me to ponder the circumstances of his death, especially at this time. The only question I'd like to get answered eventually is whether the planned S Club 7 reunion concerts will go ahead. I'd totally understand if they didn't, but the disappointment if this were to happen would be testimony to a group and it's music that has touched music lovers around the world.

n last year S Club announced a series of reunion concerts. What will happen with those now is anyone's guess.

Who'd be a Wimbledon fan?

Supporting a football team can be one of the most depressing and soul-destroying experiences life can throw at you. To illustrate this author Nick Hornby once said, 

"The natural state of a football fan is bitter disappointment, no matter what the score." 

Well, he is an Arsenal fan! In all seriousness, the occasional euphoria gained after a 96th winner is put into perspective by too many heavy defeats at home to a team at the bottom of the league.

As an AFC Wimbledon fan sucks at this precise moment! Today we drew away at Harrogate. Normally you'd be happy with such a result. A long away trip against a team who are no better or worse than you, a draw is arguably a fair result. The trouble is that having been 2-0 up today with 86 minutes gone only to draw having conceded two late goals, it feels like a loss.

Unless you're a Premier League team owned by a conglomerate with deep pockets and an insatiable appetite for success, your team has to expect the odd, "Oh FFS!" result. It is part of the price for devoting all that time and money to follow your team. After all, if you won four or five nil every single week, the thrill and excitement would soon disappear. The real reason we do it is that we enjoy the misery of not always winning. It gives us a reason to moan and cry into our beer with our friends.

Of course, there are limits. We Wimbledon fans know all about limits. The hiatus of the club's move to (cough) Milton Keynes in 2002 is precisely why we exist as AFC Wimbledon today. It is also why that football team in Buckinghamshire is despised by the football fraternity well beyond London SW19.

We're near one of those limits this season. Some fans think we've already gone well past it. What limit is that? Throwing away games from winning positions. We've dropped more points from winning positions than any other side in the EFL. Just how many points is that?

71!

Yes, that's right. 71 points would normally be enough to reach a playoff place at the season's end. It's also head and shoulders more points that we've lost than any of the other contenders. It beggars belief.

We fans are struggling to explain why the team seems so incapable of winning a game after leading by two goals. What is especially galling is that more than a few of the recent capitulations have happened in the last five or ten minutes. Is it poor game management, tactics, or inexperience?

Whatever it is, can it please stop? It's boring now.

Maori culture: Alive and well in New Zealand

"When one chief disappears, another is ready to appear."

This Maori proverb perfectly sums up the handover of New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern to her successor. It was smooth enough not to warrant any newsworthy comment of note outside of Australasia. Perhaps that's fitting for a woman who closely mirrors the New Zealand stereotype. 

Her last speech in parliament - click on the image to hear it on the BBC News website - was also an example of how to bow out with grace. Not only was it honest and emotional, but it was also self-deprecating. How often do you hear that about someone in politics these days?

What struck me more than anything else was the nod to the Maori people and culture. Not only did Jacinda wear the traditional cloak, but she also finished her speech in the Maori dialect. That in itself isn't too surprising as children are taught it at school, but still. Then there was dancing in the chamber. Such a nod to the Maori culture demonstrated that whilst not everything is perfect in New Zealand, they acknowledge the original inhabitants of the islands they inhabit.

Their neighbours in Australia could do well to learn and learn from their near neighbour if it is to address the issues of Aboriginal rights.

The prize for best Parkrun April Fool goes to...

1st April. It's a day to be on the ball from the get-go. Wake up with a fuzzy head, and you'll be caught out by someone playing an April Fool joke on you. The days when the main threats were our TV current affairs programmes or newspapers are long gone. These days the real danger comes online.

It seems like our friends at Parkrun UK encouraged local Parkruns to have some fun today judging by the sheer number of events playing jokes on unsuspecting runners and walkers today. Surely my fellow amateurs wouldn't be taken in by such sleight of hand.

The bar was set high by Parkrun UK themselves on Twitter who declared, "NEW PARKRUN WORLD RECORD ALERT. Huge congratulations to Ace Celerate who this morning set a new Parkrun world record at Woolacombe Dunes, with a time of nine minutes and 58 seconds     #loveparkrun"

The name Ace Celerate was a bit of a giveaway, as was the location of Woolacombe Dunes. It is a Parkrun almost entirely on a sandy beach, making a world record time virtually impossible. The real clincher was a time under 10 minutes. We don't know Ace's gender, but the fastest ever 5km run was 12 minutes 35 seconds. Running over 20% faster on sand would be quite some feat.

But who won the prize for the best April Fool?

Admirable mentions go to:

• Redcar Parkrun for changing the rules of Parkrun by asking participants not to wear brightly coloured clothes or trainers for fear that they upset the wildlife.
• Bath Skyline Parkrun who informed participants that the National Trust had added 13 additional steps to the course.
• The original Parkrun at Bushy Park offered a treat for any runners who'd injured themselves in training. Why not hop around on one leg to keep it in good condition. They also offered "a special treat for April, refreshments will be served at halfway. Anyone stopping will be entitled to 2 mins off their time."
• Eastville Parkrun tried their best to confuse finishers with, "We've just had news that a recent update to the Parkrun virtual volunteer app has a glitch that's been discovered in testing. This glitch means that barcodes must be presented ndsıpǝ poʍu for scanning at today's Parkrun." Why they just didn't get the volunteers to stand on their heads I'll never know!

But today's winner goes to Southport Parkrun who announced that, "Finish tokens would be handed out randomly and *not* in finish order, so every participant had a chance of coming 1st in their age group or even being 1st finisher." Coming to think of it, this is a great idea and really in the Parkrun spirit.

My own Parkrun fell foul of the unseasonable weather. The team put out a tweet informing us of a waterlogged course. Shame. I was looking forward to getting my exercise fix today. Oh hang on. Was that an April Fool too?