WHETHER it's true what they say about early to bed early to rise, it has long been the column's preferred lifestyle.

For years, in truth, the practice was to fall asleep in front of News at Ten, to be woken - truculently - at 10.35 and to be tucked up ten minutes later. It's a scandal that News at Ten was marginalised, though Messrs Horlicks probably wouldn't agree.

For that reason we prefer to eat no later than eight o'clock. The Three Tuns at Osmotherley, however, could only offer tables at 6pm, when we're barely back from lunch, or at 9pm when the sandman's starting his shift.

Once known locally as the Mousehole, the Tuns has been expensively refurbished by Steel River, a Yarm-based company which embraces everything from house building to a souped-up motorbike shop in Newcastle.

Their PR lady had been trying to talk us to Ossie for some time, though like the third little pig - another early riser - we'd not let on. In the event, a letter from Tom Stafford in Eaglescliffe - Arsenal fan, good bloke - proved altogether more persuasive.

"First rate, classy decor, outstanding food, thoroughly recommended," wrote Tom. The Mousehole, it appeared, that roared.

We arrived at 8.35, aghast at once to discover that while the Tuns clearly cares about wine, has sections for ports, sherries, cognacs, armagnacs, liqueurs and very likely dandelion and burdock an' all, it no longer offers real ale.

We left again at 8.36, savoured a pint of Nick Stafford's Stud at the Golden Lion over the road, returned for the nine o'clock table.

The menu records that the Tuns has been a haven of good food and drink for more than 400 years, that its re-invention is influenced by Charles Rennie McIntosh and the Glasgow art nouveau movement - we'd thought it said Ronnie McIntosh, The Boss was appalled - and that it is "stylish".

What would have been truly stylish would have been for them to send a waiter over the road for another pint of Stud, compliments of the myopic management, instead of the meretricious mish-mash on offer.

We were seated next to the toilets, unsatisfactorily since other tables were free. Tom Stafford's wife reckoned the ladies "an experience in itself"; The Boss agreed, though we declined to seek details of the plumbing arrangements.

Tom also thought that The Boss would like the smoked haddock risotto and couldn't have been more greatly mistaken. Perhaps because as a bairn she sat too close to the fire, the lady needs breathing apparatus just to be in the same room as two ounces of smokey bacon.

What she did choose from an imaginative, modern English, strongly piscine menu - asparagus tips, lobster salad, a melon concoction transferred from the starter list to the finish - she considered unequivocally excellent, a midsummer night's dream.

We'd started with mushroom soup, £3.95, perfectly pleasant but barely enough to fill a pipsqueak's paddling pool. The bread selection was good, too.

The Angus steak and kidney pudding was terrific, its gravy bravely bullish, a perfect suet that could be cut with the edge of a fork and not the blade of a Swiss army knife.

Main courses came with either "strawberry salad and rosemary potatoes" or "baby vegetables". We ordered a bit of both - the vegetables, particularly the corn, were carefully cooked and wonderfully flavoured, manifestly from the top of the market.

Sulking over a Coke, we finished with what the pudding menu called hot chocolate brownie with banana crisps and banana ice cream. For "hot" read "barely tepid", for "crisp" read "soggy" but the ice cream was lovely.

The church clock chimed quarter to eleven as we emerged, the temptation to have a nightcap in the Golden Lion narrowly overcome. Once again it was time for bed.

l The Three Tuns, Osmotherley, near Northallerton (01609 883301). Open seven days; dinner for two £30-£40, without drinks. Walkers' menu. Difficult for wheelchair users.

NO particular place to go, we settled a couple of Saturdays back at the Four Alls in Ovington - now sub-titled the Maypole Village - in Teesdale. A first visit for ten years, perhaps.

Just three others were present, a chap drinking brandy on a tab and a couple who appeared not to be speaking to one another.

We bought drinks, ordered rabbit pie and stuff. The landlord, perhaps influenced by some higher or more fearsome authority in the kitchen, returned shortly afterwards to ask if I were Mike Amos. "I'm sorry," he said, "I can't serve you." "Why ever not?" "For ridiculing all the pubs around here." We asked which ones - a difficult question admittedly and one which the gentleman seemed wholly unable to answer.

The Four Alls, at any rate, symbolises the concept of I Govern All, I Fight for All, I Pay for All and I Pray for All. To those may now be added a fifth All, to represent both what we had for lunch that day and what the wretched pub scores for hospitality. Translated, it means nothing whatsoever.

AN altogether more cheerful lunch at the Sandpiper in Leyburn, formerly run by Peter Swan who gained an ornithology degree (honest).

Now it's owned by Jonathan Harrison, York lad originally, and his family. Jonathan won a Roux brothers' scholarship. We wrote of him last October.

Since it was Yorkshire Day, we had Yorkshire gammon, with chips and a couple of sunnily fried eggs. The other chap ordered "Omelette Arnold Bennett", named after the Potteries writer (1867-1931) and featuring smoked haddock with a cheese glaze. "Something to do with the hotel at which he liked to stay," volunteered the barman. But why should Arnold Bennett lend his imprint to an omelette? And while we're about it, who on earth was Gordon Bennett, an' all?

LAST week's column reported that Castle Eden Brewery had won a national Tesco competition for speciality ales, declined to give details but hinted that the new product was where the future is.

Darlington Drinker, the Camra branch's admirable newsletter, now reveals that for next month's Rhythm and Brews festival - Arts Centre, September 14-16 - the Sunderland-based Darwin Brewery is producing something very special.

It'll feature a "touch" of orange and will, says DD, be "unique". Hmmm.

MR Ron Hails, transferred from the Backtrack column for a substantial fee, has a complaint. The column, he says - and not alone - uses too many long words.

"Eponymous" presently troubles him. Mrs Hails typed it into something called a Crossword Wordmaster, which made a rude noise and went upstairs to lie down.

Ron vainly tried his computer thesaurus, turned unsuccessfully to Collins Dictionary, finally enjoyed more luck with his New Gresham English Dictionary - "well" he says, "it WAS new back in 1920."

What it said, probably, was that "eponymous" relates to someone who gives his name to something - like, say, C Northcote Parkinson and his eponymous law. Or Krimo Bouabda (last week's column) and his restaurant on Hartlepool Marina. That's it, in short.

...and finally, the bairns would like to thank the anonymous reader who send a card to illustrate last week's cat-a-meringue joke, the card altogether more splendid than the joke.

Thus inspired, they return to their all-time favourite, about what a Frenchman has for breakfast.

Huit heures bix.