| Around the Wirral - Day 53 |
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 The 17th March can only mean one thing. St Patrick’s day. The one day of the year excluding Christmas where it is perfectly acceptable, no, customary to drink alcohol before midday. Every landlords dream! The day where people far and wide adopt shaky Boyzone accents which eventually turn in to Australian and paint shamrocks on their faces and in their pints (ok, just us then?!) The only day where raucous drinkers identify themselves in no uncertain terms by donning novelty Guinness hats and slurring to folk songs. It was ironic that our watering hole of choice for the biggest knees up on the Irish calendar turned out to be in the most English sounding pub on the Peninsula The George and Dragon, Birkenhead - dressed up to the nines for one night only in green flags and friendly leprechauns. In keeping with the craic, we adopted Irish aliases which raised a few eyebrows. Our clan consisted of Five Fingers O’Finnan, Twitter O’Keefe, Junk in the Trunk O’Donahue, Fanny O’Leary, Moneybags O’Flannaghan, Underpants O’Neil and Muffin O’Malley. Despite being a Tuesday night, the pub was already filling up on our prompt 4pm arrival and it didn’t take us long to get in to the spirit of things thanks to the feel good background tunes and the prospect of a traditional bowl of stew. Not before embarrassing our very own birthday boy though. Having taken the day off to celebrate his 21st birthday we felt it only fair to give Buz baby little Cris (Irish alias for the night, Muffin O’Malley) a delayed fuss and forced the pub into a chorus of the Happy Birthday song complete with a cake and sparklers the moment he burst through the door.  It was also the birthday of joint manager Lorraine who shared some warm up drinks with us and introduced us Buzettes to a pink shot which was a lot more toxic than the pretty colour would suggest. As the evening wore on and word got round about Kelly’s homemade Irish stew, so too did the queue. None of this flimsy, watery nonsense. This was good old fashioned thick broth with giant vegetable and floating sugar puffs (which turned out to be pearls of barley). The perfect lining for a night on the Guinness with donations collected for every bowl going to Claire House. Once the party atmosphere was in full swing and the bar was packed to the rafters the resident Monday night singer Leo took to the stage. Paddy’s night wouldn’t be Paddy’s night without live music and a sing-a-long. Cue a whole host of folk classics complete with staple inclusions of ‘the Fields of Athenry’ and ‘Whisky in the Jar’ topped off with a few star turns from the ladies closest to the stage. This little bar is like a window in to the past. Before pubs turned to wine bars and became trendy this is what they used to be. Relying on banter with people hopping tables to socialise and first name terms all round. Since taking over just 18 months ago Kelly and Lorraine have fought tooth and nail to bring the pub back to its traditional best but admit they’ve had to overcome plenty of uncertainty. Kelly told us ‘When two thirty year olds were rumoured to be taking over the George and Dragon, regulars envisaged two for one on alcopops and Jagermeister galore but they’ve been pleasantly surprised that we’ve stayed loyal to the pub’s roots’. There are no plans for any big upheavals, just to solidify and improve what the pub does well, acting as a social spot for regulars and welcoming all who step over the threshold. Being so close to the centre of town it’s great as a stop gap before, during and after a shopping trip whilst the weekend unite the younger drinkers with the golden oldies. Get down and witness the time machine for yourselves. 
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