Robert McNeil: Drink up as last orders are predicted at the pub

Men I ken are at the age where many admit: “I don’t really like pubs.” No point in me going anyway as I’m not allowed beer now (gout), but I don’t have particularly warm memories of any one pub either.

Too loud, too hot, too something never quite right about them. I think perhaps they’re better at lunchtime. I remember the sun shining in through the windows of one on Leith Walk when I was on holiday (which certainly dates the experience). Having been in this boozer many times before and after footer games when it was mobbed, I enjoyed it more when it was half-empty and relaxed.

I guess the Abbotsford in Edinburgh’s east end was pretty decent but it was spoiled last time I was in by a rich Oriental female visitor taking exception to me and my mate occupying free seats in her vicinity. Just because he had vomit down his shirt.

Looking back, I can’t remember ever being served by a smiling or friendly barman. Is that just a British thing? Scottish? The only nice barman I recall was in Bergen, and the Scandinavians aren’t exactly “Hail fellow, well met!”

Lonely men go to the pub for company, but what’s the point? They just sit there on their own. Some are gantry-starers, occupying the same stool all night, running fantasies through their heads of being heroic chaps getting glamorous gals. In reality, they’re sad failures. My people. They don’t converse beyond: “Same again.”

You don’t talk to strangers in pubs, even in Glasgow. If you went up to someone and said, “Well, the weather’s quite average for the time of year, isn’t it?”, they’d move away swiftly. If you approached a woman-person and said, “Are these your own teeth?”, you’d be arrested and lose your job.

If you tried making conversation with the barman, saying “Beer’s a jolly nice drink, isn’t it?”, you’d be barred for life.

A football match on the television might afford the opportunity to turn to your neighbour and say, “Do you like footer? I know I do.” But these would be the conversation’s last words.

It was the same when, actually at a match and tiring of the partisan singing, I tried uniting all the fans with a neutral chant of “Soccer tournament, cha-cha cha-cha-cha!” But nobody joined in. If it had been the 1950s, when people were more pleasant, they definitely would have.

In the past, in Scotland, you were frowned upon if you asked for food. You were there to drink. Today, you’re frowned upon if you don’t ask for food. You’re there to eat. They’re just slightly more informal restaurants.

But pubs are a rite of passage, plucking up the courage to go in for an under-age pint and watching a grim, sadistic man pour you slops from a tray, knowing you won’t complain.

A few years ago, before a soccer tournament, my mate and I found ourselves in a small pub full of “casual” hooligans. I’d a corking hangover so, rather than order a pint, I asked for a gin and tonic. Whole place went quiet. When I asked for the same admittedly effete libation in a dockside pub in Liverpool, the barman poured a tiny splash of gin into a half-pint glass. No ice, no lemon. And he called me a pervert.

That’s the pub for you. I’m well out of it.

School for scoundrels

MORE money madness: designer fashion brands are selling £835 backpacks, £670 coats, £350 boots and £220 scarves for schoolkids.

Gad, as it were, zooks. As with concert and footer tickets, they only do this because they know there are pillocks who’ll pay. And there’ll be peer pressure.

I went to school once. As with pubs, I’ve no fond memory of it, and the selection of whiskies was poor. I believe I’d have been a more rounded person if I hadn’t attended secondary school. Call me what you like – all right, that’s enough – but circular I ain’t.

True, I enjoyed primary school, despite the playground bully twisting my ear. But at least we were all fellow scruffs in a socialist nirvana of relative poverty and food shortages.

But secondary school, with its specialisms and folk with doors on their houses, was a different kettle of haddock. It was the pre-comprehensive era and this joint was thought one of Edinburgh’s two “good” state schools. Latin. Teachers in gowns.

As a poor person, I was quite intimidated. First day, I turn up with my haversack (actually an old gas mask bag from the army and navy stores). To my horror, everyone else had briefcases. So I persuaded my poor old mum to do more overtime down the pit and buy a briefcase for me. By which time everyone had decided my haversack was cool and had ditched the briefcase, making me look a right poltroon. Which I remain to this day.

Everything is awesome now

First time a waiter remarked “awesome” at some simple menu choice, I genuinely thought I’d done something well. Then came equally insincere “perfect” and “amazing”. Such over-the-top expressions have drawn the ire of radio host Adrian Chiles. Good man. On ordering “with extra chips”, I’d prefer the waiter to say: “A wise choice, sir.”

Xmas greetin’

Got your Xmas tree yet? John Lewis reports its artificial efforts are already selling like cakes, as folk worry how much the cost will have rocketed by December. Punters also anticipate their first “normal” Xmas after Covid restrictions, with family get-togethers and similar sybaritic tomfoolery. Already, I wish the whole thing was over.

Saucer dropped

Another symptom of our civilisation’s decline: Marks & Spencer is ditching teacups and saucers in its cafes in favour of mugs. I’ve no dog in this fight, as I’m not a cafe person, and just use mugs at home. But I like to know saucers exist, used somewhere by someone in a genteel manner. Their demise demeans us all.

Bad-natured

The last “nature” documentary I watched, many years ago, featured a terrified calf cowering behind its mother before being ripped apart by wild dogs. Now, film-makers have admitted their horror at watching killer whales hunt seals, eagles butchering chamois calves and bears mauling ox calves. Snowflake-style trigger warnings are needed before these disgraceful, nature-noir programmes.

Hold tight

Though I have worn a groin guard – never know when you’ll encounter a reader – I’ve never worn a jockstrap. They’re tight underpants worn to keep sportsmen’s gonads safe. A French study says that, by lowering the sperm count, they’re an effective contraceptive. Well, yeah, if you don’t take them off they are.

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