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Hardly.

The Beehive: A Short Review

Our review will consist of several scores out of ten covering the main areas of service provision followed by a short qualitative comment. The challenge instigator shall be allowed up to two follow-up questions.

1. Having a Beehive: 10/10. Indeed there was one.
2. Cake References: 7/10, all from the jukebox. Even though there were only two, it was more than can be expected from a Grantham pub on a Wednesday evening.
3. Décor: 8/10. Classic pub orange with painted slogans making little to no sense.
4. Quality of patronage: 6/10. Unremarkable save for the man who smiled at us when MacArthur Park began playing.
Snacks: 6/10. Kudos for the 3 kinds of nut, but no Mini Cheddars to be seen.
Accessorising: 8/10. Stuffed bees, pictures of leaves on the menus, tropies and handled pint glasses all on display.
Music: 10/10. MacArthur Park as already mentioned, Lay Lady Lay, Handbags and Gladrags, and well intentioned if inaccurate promises that the sun ain't going to shine henceforth. All accompanied by an ever-changing display of photos of dead people on the jukebox screen, including Kennedy and James Dean (not the real one).

Over all, not outstanding but really not bad at all.

Challenges, challenges

Well, the second leg is about to get underway as we prepare to leave Kettering. At this important stage in the events, it seems only appropriate to report back on the status of some of our ongoing challenges.

Find the town with the worst haircuts: This is undoubtedly, certainly and absolutely Kettering. Despite having not yet visited the delights of Bedford, Rushden, Luton, Hatfield of London, we have seen enough beauties here to be able to state confidently that Kettering is it. Some of the photos should have arrived by now - others will be here soon. Great fun has been had sneaking around Kettering taking photos of strangers.

Photo of us with the person with the biggest mutton chops Oh, boy, have we succeeded in THIS one. You will shortly be seeing this photo appear, the man in question posing proudly with us for the photo. The picture, incidentally, was taken by his wife Alison.

Eat230 has been progressing apace. Since yesterday we weren't on our journey, we didn't include yesterday in the project. It will, however, recommence today. Expect a drastic reduction in photo sizes, though, as we had a message from Virgin Mobile informing us that the first week's worth of photo uploading was approaching £100...!

North-South Divide - we are confident that we have located the North-South Divide and crossed it. It was somewhere around the Linconlshire/Leicestershire border. Due to a technical difficulty the photographic proof isn't quite available yet, but will be soon.

Obliterating Nottingham - A work in progress, but almost complete. Evidence soon.

The Beehive, Grantham - duly visited and assessed. We shall submit our review later today.

Wicksteed Park - visited, photographed and most marvellous indeed. We shall have the photos printed shortly.

Dogs - We have sighted a dog who had very recently swum, and also a dog with its head near an open car window. As yet, though, nothing that quite meets the criteria.

Grantham MFI - Sorry, Kevin, but we didn't see this challenge until we'd already left Grantham before we saw this one.

York university hooded top - Cam, we're very sorry, but this was just more than we could possibly carry. We considered posting it to London but that really wouldn't have been in the spirit of it. We humbly apologise.

Still to come:
Bedford angel
Luton Town memorabilia
Southern sheep
Watford gap
Cricket match

And, Kate, we shall give your Rushden challenge our utmost attention... provided you tell us why we should. After all, we still somehow think Corby was your fault.