As a kid I was occasionally handed a puzzle book with the general hope of keeping me quiet and from roaming the streets of the Gaer estate.

Tucked away between the pleasures of finding a pirate with his eye patch missing on the spot-the-difference pages, you'd be treated to a puzzle maze. The aim of which being to draw a line through the maze to the other end without encountering the dreaded dead-ends. Tricky, edge of the seat stuff.

What I didn't realise at the time was, by handing me a puzzle maze, my parents were in fact providing me with essential early training for driving around the Baneswell one-way system. If you are skilful enough to enter one end and come out the other unscathed, then the chances are that you've passed the Oddfellows & Foresters tucked away in the middle of a row of terraced houses on St Mary's Street.

The pub looks like a couple of houses knocked together to make a pub, so I strolled around there one night to find out if it was. And also, what an Oddfellow was? So, what's it like inside? If the 'Oddfellows' were a mathematical equation it would read: 2T + S - W + B = Oddfellows. T would represent a Terraced house, S a Sledgehammer, W the adjoining wall, B being booze and a bar.

I've been there a few times in the past, but it still represents someone's front room. Before you get me wrong, this is great. I'd have been disappointed if it hadn't looked like it did inside. In the decade of the cloned pub, Oddfellows was like walking to the corner of your room, ordering a pint, and sitting down and drinking it. It's like the novelty pub that was never meant to be - like keeping your Parker jacket from the 70s and eventually finding it's cool again. Before you know it, everyone's got a Parker jacket - so I'm assuming that in six months time Yates' will look like the inside of my auntie's house.

Why not stay at home if it's like your front room? Chances are you haven't got a fully-functional bar in your living room. If you have, maybe we could meet up with a view to long-term friendship.

Oddfellows also boasts a pool table, jukebox, dart board, Sky Sports and shove h'penny board. Where else could you see the ironing board through the door behind the bar?

This isn't a standing around in your white shirt, faded jeans, fading Magaluff sun-burn, gelled hair, black polished shoes waiting to pull some lovely ladies type of place. That's what makes it more relaxed and a little bit different to the norm.

What have they got that I haven't got in my fridge? The usual suspects are on offer. Kronenberg, Carling, Stella, John Smith, IPA, Strongbow, even the relatively recent phenomenon that's Magners.

Oddfellows passed my Stella Artois test with flying colours - it was good. Crisps and nuts are on offer too of course, but nothing more substantial than that. After eight pints, don't confuse it with your mother's front room and order fish, chips, followed by blancmange with Angel Delight topping - it ain't going to happen.

Forester? Person who practices and generally engages with the activity of felling trees, right? But Oddfellow? Two answers were thrown up. Firstly, an oddfellow is an eccentric or crazy person.

Secondly, and my preferred option, an oddfellow is some sort of freemason type character. A member of a secret order or fraternity formed for social enjoyment would you believe? In fact I bet you didn't know is that in 1875 when Newport's Alexandra Docks opened only seven bands of trade existed in Newport and therefore paraded on that day.

Two of them were Oddfellows and Foresters.

Why Oddfellows when I could walk to Baileys, The Engineers, Six Bells or the town centre in under five minutes?

The clientele and landlady are both fairly young. It's worth reiterating that Oddfellows is not an old man's pub - it's offering an alternative to what's currently on offer in any of the other aforementioned or town centre pub that I've frequented.

Prove to me that you've got a fully functional bar, jukebox and pool table in your house, and I'll send you a list of rubbish Newport pubs - Oddfellows doesn't feature.