Drinking in the open air

Back in 1998 I was a columnist in GQ on the joys of living in the countryside, which was more Withnail than a man standing in a hedge with a pair of bins in his hand. This was my first one, which was all about the joys of getting drunk in the open air — note the mention of Old Freddy Walker, which was one of my favourite tipples then (and the old bloke after whom the beer was named was still alive then). I went onto write about sex in the countryside, selling cider to hippies going to Glastonbury and shooting at (but not hitting) wild ducks. It was great fun and I even got commissioned by then editor James Brown to write 3000 words on West Country cider, which set me off writing about cider for about 12 years until I got bored with it (that makes me feel like the man who turned down the Beatles). Anyway I thought it would be fun to put the column up as this was all done when magazines were strictly binary (or whatever the word is).