I've been to a few of their events previously and always find them to be enormously stimulating, not least because of the cast lists they assemble. There can be few places where your dining companions include a professional poker player, a young female Church of England Vicar, a National Lottery Commissioner, a whistle-blower on Ken Livingstone's administration, and a Scottish Chieftain. Oh, and Trevor Philips as the after-dinner speaker.

In trying to define what it meant to be British, all the usual hackneyed definitions were wheeled out by conference delegates: "if you can explain the rules of cricket and sing Jerusalem, you must be British" being my perennial favourite. Well forgive me, but being brought up in Scotland, neither cricket nor 'England's green and pleasant land' was high on the curriculum choices at my school.

I think it's something to do with the bus being the middle ground, not the romantic freedom of the car, nor the regimented closeness of the long distance train. Buses are always just that one step up from Shank's pony, and bus stops don't get names so there's isn't even a Mornington Crescent type game to play.

We didn't have a car when I was a kid, and for one reason or another I'm just not bothered by them, trains were always expensive (they were competing with the fabled 2p fares on the bus, remember) and still to me seem a middle class way of travelling I'm not totally comfortable with. So buses are where it's at for me culturally, not that I get aroused by a shapely MCW Metrobus or even a Gardner engined Daimler Fleetline (I am however quietly obsessed with the 11 route, the local network in general and harbour fine memories of the tracline 65).

The interweb, of course, is nothing if not home to the nichest of niche content so, along with the bus-spotting and the tiny sites I've made that track people using twitter on the bus, there is something genuinely interesting and bus-related happening.

Mayday...mayday...mayday... just an old hack's cheap trick to grab your attention, but as the sun sinks slowly over the building blocking the view from my officestrokebedroom (I think it's a former shoe factory now turning out cardboard boxes), it's time to be reflective over a fine holiday weekend.

Quiet and calm, with the Dr Who trailer probably the most pulse-raising moment - although the troll chasing kids through tunnels in The Spiderwick Chronicles certainly got the attention of this pensioner and his two young charges.

Up until a few years ago I had a season ticket in the main stand at St Andrews, and was in the habit of meeting the guys I went with around two hours before kick-off in The Sportsman on Garrison Lane. A few pints in a pub shorn of all its furniture to pack more people in, at least I assume that's what happened -- I never went in when there wasn't a game on so the pub could possibly just have had no chairs or tables at all.

A combination of Brady et al deciding to evict a section of the people that sat in the main stand, in favour of people who could pay for padded seats and access to a bar offering us much worse tickets as replacements, and the spiralling price of watching poor football meant that I stopped going to every game. Once out of the routine it's difficult to rouse yourself to go and watch on a cold Tuesday night, or a cold Sunday at four o'clock especially when the game is on TV. Much of my footballing budget was transferred in to watching England more regularly, and while I'm not sure the standard of play was any higher (and the frustration levels are much the same) at least I got to go to Frankfurt or Barcelona rather than Small Heath.

I still go to St Andrews and in truth it probably costs more to do it the way I do (£40 to watch us throw away a two goal lead against Liverpool, £40 to watch Agent Ridgewell put through his own net against the Villa), but this year I've seen almost every game home and away -- through a combination of pixelated internet feeds and darkened rooms in pubs.

No more the 'swift half' turning into a pint, then two pints, and so on in a self-propagating Fibonacci sequence of drinks leaving you at best hung over, or at worst asleep, at your desk come 4pm.

We're all professionals now - or at least we have to pretend to be. So it was a treat to be out on a training course earlier this week when suddenly a window off opportunity presented itself. A reasonable lunch break, the sun was shining, the hint of summer was in the air. Where to go? Why a darkened pub and a pint of warm beer please!

For over 30 years now the last Sunday in April has been bluebell day for the Langley clan. We think of a wood we know where acres of bluebells grow as more or less our own.

It's reached by an unmarked footpath besides fields and then through Forestry Commission tracks, and I've no intention of telling you where it is. It's only been such a well-kept secret because it is inaccessible by car.

It's close to where we used to live when we first decamped to the Midlands from Suffolk, and we've moved a couple of times since, so the annual pilgrimage now involves a bit of travel.

Of course it's more likely to be turtlenecks and goatees than the facial privet hedges and thick-knit Arran sweaters beloved by us ale-drinkers, but the principle stays the same.

But enough of such silly stereotypes. I'm just suffering from beard envy anyway. Check out the baby-smooth chin under that pint glass on my picture over there. I couldn't grow so much as a George Clooney style fashion fuzz without a few months' notice.

Kevin Spacey may be seeing red over it, but by the time I first sampled I'd Do Anything I had turned purple.

Perhaps I mean Purple - for I saw the show on the big plasma screen at a new Birmingham hotel, branded, like many trendy things these days (think bullring and brindleyplace) without capital letters.

The purplehotels chain is a self-proclaimed "no frills chic" brand launched by the Real hotel company (some of that may be capitals as well, but I've given up trying to sort it out). The company line is that they want "to bring a touch of style and cool to a hotel sector previously only defined by price".

Hell no. Amongst the revelations over dinner were that Crosse & Blackwell baked beans were better than Heinz, and that Sainsbury's on Broad Street offered better networking opportunities than Spar in Brindleyplace.

Although I've never heard a better argument for work/life balance (guys, you need to stay in more and learn to cook), it's wonderfully refreshing to have such normal conversations with the people driving forward our city economy. The fact that they can gather around a single table and are happy to share such personal information bodes well for Birmingham's future.

But if an army truly marches on its stomach, Birmingham's professional services community won't get far on Pot Noodles and Ginsters pasties.

Food parcels at the ready girls...

As a seasoned (or at least partly pickled) journalist, I've got used to this over time. But in a personal first, this time I've actually been ordered to go down the pub. Being ordered to do something you were going to do anyway is a gratifying, but mildly unnerving experience. It's as if you were a squaddy woken up at reveille, to find your drill sergeant bellowing at you to stay in bed and have a bit of rest.

Now I normally restrict myself to beer when out at the pub, to avoid making a spectacle of myself - it doesn't always work.

But this is is the grand re-opening of The Crown, and as it's larger than an envelope, naturally I'm there. And it would seem unfair not to have a glass of champagne while enjoying my first trip there.

We're off to see what promises to be a great piece of modern theatre. So what's the first priority?

Clothes.

No, not as in dickie (dicky?) bow and pashmina. No one dresses up for a show these days, unless it's Rocky Horror or something equally camp.

Warwick Art Centre, bless their hearts, are bringing in another terrific production - you must keep an eye on warwickartscentre.co.uk. Some of the best shows I've seen in the past couple of years have been there.

This time it's the Shared Experience production of Tolstoy's classic War and Peace first staged at the National in 1996. It's being revived in a joint venture with Nottingham Playhouse and Hampstead Theatre. Tickets on 02476524524 or online.

Why can't Birmingham's retailers cope with something similar?

Yesterday was International Women's' Day, a celebration of united global action for equality and change. 100 years ago, 15,000 women marched through New York City in 1908 demanding shorter hours, better pay and voting rights; all women living in the free world owe them, and countless others, a great deal.

A few weeks ago I visited a wonderful exhibition at BMAG charting the flourishing artistic community in Birmingham at the end of the 19th and early 20th century, and the links to BIAD. Unfortunately I went on its last day so you can't see it now - sorry.

Something on one of the interpretative cards has really stuck in my head. There were a fair few drawings and paintings by women artists, including the wonderful Florence Camm and the Bunce sisters. Beside one of their paintings it said that they were fairly typical of middle-class women of that era in that they largely pursued art for personal rather than professional reasons.

This struck a chord with me as I'd spent the previous Friday afternoon in the President's Suite at the Chamber of Commerce, marvelling that, since the Chamber's foundation in 1813, there had not been a single woman elected as President.

As with the arts community, I'm sure that there were many women involved in the Chamber over the years, but none rose to the heady heights of being the elected front man (the redoubtable Sue Battle being a paid officer). I gather that this nearly two hundred year male chain will be broken next year by Bridget Blow, which will be a momentous occasion indeed.

When we think of the history of this city, there are very few prominent women: Louisa Ryland and Dame Elizabeth Cadbury being the two which sprung to my mind.

But surely this will be different in the future? There are many women currently shaping the future of our cosmopolitan city, as one would expect for a welcoming world meeting place.

By the centenary of International Women's Day in 2011, will we have a representative business, political and civic leadership in our 'global city with a local heart'? Let's hope so.