Pint Sized

This is the latest blog brought to you by the Birmingham Post. Over the coming days, weeks or months I'll be searching for the top brew in the pubs, clubs and bars of Birmingham and the West Midlands. No beer mat will be left unturned, no pub guide unchecked, no bartender or local blearily unexamined in the quest for the perfect pint.

So Shakespeare walks into a pub right? And the landlord turns to him and shouts: "Oi, get out! I thought I told you, you're bard..." Okay, I'm sorry, you've heard it before and it's not that funny anyway, but I'm sure even the Bard of Avon had his days off.

Up The Junction on a wet and windy weekday night, in one of the more salubrious corners of town, home to an old school friend lucky enough to have recently moved Birmingham.

And also home to the Junction, a curious club sandwich of a pub, jamming together a diner, bar and even a heated garden, although the less-than-tropical climes of Birmingham this evening forbids taking a look at that.

Just a short one this time. The OC, as it is known affectionately by at least some of its locals, is a spankingly-restored Victorian bordello of a pub drawing in workers from the surrounding offices.