Born Survivor

I walk through the car park and past the back door of the Taps everyday on my way to work in the morning (circa 7:30am). I do this because a. it’s a slightly more interesting (though longer) route than walking along St Andrews Road to the train station; b. because I always like looking at the Taps (if it’s possible to stalk a building I’m doing it); and c. I harbour the unlikely hope that one day as I’m walking past I might see people staggering out from an epic lock-in (I anticipate that those people would most likely be Gareth, Jade and Casey).

And were that to happen I relish the idea of pushing their drunken arses over and then running away to get on the train and go off to another day of dull drone person drudgery.

They wouldn’t even know what had happened. I can seem them now lolling around on the ground trying to get up and wondering how they'd got there in the first place.

The thought of it makes me chuckle.

[I mean how dare they have a lock-in when they know that I can’t go because I have to go to work the next day? In fact that’s probably the reason they had it in the first place. Sneaky treacherous sons of bitches.]

I quite enjoy my walk to work in the morning (I don’t enjoy getting up in the first place, but once you’re up you’re up, right?), especially when it’s cold and I’m all snugly wrapped up in my scarf, coat and woolly hat and my hands are firmly dug into my pockets.

And I play a game as I go where I think about where (and how) I’d sleep if I had to camp out overnight, at some point on my route to work, in the middle of a moderate snow storm. So obviously you’d need somewhere with a windbreak and you’d need some materials to fashion some kind of temporary shelter to keep the rain/snow off, and then you’d need to be able to collect some materials to cover yourself to try and keep warm and so on.

Honestly, it’s really quite fun.

There are lots of places in that little garden area next to the civic centre that might serve (especially near to the wall underneath one of the trees) and some places behind the houses that back onto the car park.

You should all try it.

Really, it's good.

 

It is.

Know Thy Place

hubris [defnition], hybris

n

1. pride or arrogance

2. (Literary & Literary Critical Terms) (in Greek tragedy) an excess of ambition, pride, etc., ultimately causing the transgressor's ruin

[from Greek]

hubristic , hybristic adj

And I shall dare, dare, and dare again will I?

Will I really, Richard? Will I?

 

Will I bollocks.

Oh what a fool I was. This is what happens when Taps Richard dares. Taps Richard doesn’t dare. Taps Richard settles. Taps Richard keeps his head down for fear the universe will fall on him if he doesn’t. Taps Richard is essentially the universe’s battered wife.

Taps Richard should know better than to dream of anything different just for one evening. Taps Richard should know his place. And that place is not daring to be free.

About half an hour after walking in to the Kings Head last night, who should walk in but Irena. Irena who’s supposed to be on holiday. Irena who supposed to be no where near Enfield Town. Irena who was not to know that I had gone to the Kings Head. Irena who was not best pleased.

Woe. Woe.

Oh, woe.

"I shall dare, dare, and dare again"

“Freedom lies in being bold.”

                              --- Robert Frost

Irena is on leave for the next two weeks. Dare I use that freedom? I think I shall.

The Kings Head for me tonight.

A Local Shop For Local People

Definition

local noun ( PUB )

UK a pub near to where a person lives, especially if they often go there to drink

The George is my local.

(Definition of local noun (PUB) from the Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary)

I enjoyed last night in the pub. It summed up for me that which defines the Taps as what it is: a small regulars local pub.

It being January it was always going to be quiet (although it being a Thursday it did eventually fill up with all manner of random people for the karaoke) – which as you know, is exactly how I like it. So Laura B and Irena were working and it was just myself, Daryl, Jade, Kings Head Sarah and my brother on the other side of the bar [and one bloke who sat in the middle of the bar all evening quietly drinking pints by himself. I rated him. I suspect he was nice] and we just spent a really pleasant couple of hours chatting about Monkey Island (it’s a real thing apparently...I know, who knew?) and hotels and Irena’s unique style of customer relations

[Customer on phone: Is the Manager there please?

Irena: No.

Customer on phone: When will the Manager be around?

Irena: I don’t know.]

(We’re assured that Irena is aware that she actually is the manager)

And, as I say, it summed up for me everything that is good about the Taps. A small local pub on a winter’s night where people meet for a few hours to chat and drink in a place as familiar to them as their own living room.

The Moon Under Water

This review of the Moon Under Water is hilarious.

I LOVE THE MOON!! its my 2nd home.
i love the staff.... except the fat girl... shes a bit mean and ugly... newer staff are too slow so u gotta go to the older staff who know what their doin!!
the bouncers are not as good or as totty as the admiral byngs.
always good to migle with everyone as its the place to be on a fri/sat night...
or week night.
the old pervy men are lovely and probably make the fat girl feel special.
the IT box is always fun... even though i never win :(
excellent jugs!! good to get nice and drunk!!
its goin a tincy bit downhill due to reeeeally chavvvy kids going there using fake ids or their sisters.... but my mate whos 24 got i.d'd!!! shameful.
where's gandalf the bouncer gone?
the food always looks good and ive been assured by kitchen staff they dont piss in it.
its a great place to chat up come fellas and get a free drink out of it.
the toilets are okie... not gr8 but who cares when you're only going to chunder in them!
its a great place to be to get wasted... but some of the chavs get too rowdy. they need to become lovers not fighters. its uncool!!!
the moon under water has provided many a good weekend, christmas, new year etc.... i love it.... and will see you all down there!!!

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natz - 12 Jun 2009 12:01

My personal highlight is ‘the food is always looks good and ive been assured by kitchen staff they dont piss in it.’

(Because that’s the kind of thing you want to be assured about right).

I want to meet Natz, she seems nice.

Broadsword calling Danny Boy

I opened up my email this morning and read a message from Graeme which simply said: ‘There’s Salmon for you in the Taps.’

That’s it. No hello, hi, how are you, bye, see you soon, take care, regards, sincerely, hail hail, Celtic are the greatest team in the world. Just: There’s Salmon for you in the Taps.

Now this wasn’t some kind of coded secret Cold War like message which I needed to decode, but was literally to be taken as that Graeme had left Salmon for me in the Taps [Graeme’s dad is a fisherman, and he catches and smokes his own wild salmon – and every year Graeme brings some back from Scotland with him]. Which just goes to show what happens when you miss a night in Taps.

You see, for me at least, one of the main things which keeps me going back to Taps night after night is the fear that I’ll miss out on something. Now, that something might be as relatively mundane as Graeme’s annual line caught smoked wild salmon delivery, or as implausibly unprecedented as someone leaning back against the wall and inadvertently pushing down on a lever to reveal a secret passageway leading down into the cold dark stony earth. But that childish concern that I might miss out on something plays quite a large part in my decision making process whenever I get off the train from work and decide whether or not to go in that night.

As it happens, last night, tired and depressed after my first day back at work, and influenced by the vague thought that it might be a good idea to start cutting back on my drinking this year, I gave it a miss – and look what happened: I missed out on the Salmon.

I see the same thing in my nieces when I stay with my sister. It’s not that they particularly want to stay up (at least not past a certain point), it’s that they don’t want to go to bed in case they miss something exciting or interesting.

And that’s often part of my unconscious thought process in deciding whether or not to go in that night when I get off the train along with what kind of day I’ve had, whether I’m thirsty, whether I feel like company and so on.

That thought whether tonight will be the night that I miss out on the strange guy (who periodically comes in with some odd money making scheme or another) selling his shoe box of possessions because his sister kicked him out, or another strange guy looking for a hostel because his [apparently] coke head sister kicked him out (there’s obviously something about horrible sisters in Enfield Town – not that my sister would do such a thing), or the shoe box of possessions guy coming back another time with a bloodied knife he’d apparently found at a crime scene and thought that the pub would be the best place to hand it in. Or just a particularly difficult crossword, a particularly implausible Spurs comeback, or just a particularly good conversation.

And thinking about it, that’s really not that good of a reason, is it? It’s a default position rather than a positive driver. Which is to say that I should really only be going to the pub when I have a positive reason for doing so, rather than just from the default position that I should do so in case I miss out on something.

It’s certainly something to think about anyway.

January Blues

Well then, [Hi ho, Hi ho] it’s back to work Taps Richard goes, and once more the greater part of my journey in the morning is spent hoping that my train will derail between White Hart Lane and Bruce Grove and I’ll be left with a fractured knee and a suitably handsome scar on my brow or cheek, which will keep me from work for a few weeks and earn me the sympathy and respect of my peers.

Of course the train never does derail and along with it the last faint chance that I might ever gain the sympathy and respect of my peers.

So there I sat today on the train with all the other coughing, spluttering and snivelling commuters, watching the slate grey world slide by stop by stop and station by station, and I could only think about how rubbish my Christmas was.

It started well enough with the Taps Christmas party which I enjoyed tremendously [I rolled out of Taps at 5:30 in the morning along with Casey, Charlie and Sophie (who is no longer my sworn nemesis after we bonded over our mutual love of High Society) – and I know that Gareth was there till past 6], and then Christmas Eve was all that I expected it to be, and Boxing Day was also very nice, but then I got ill and spent the rest of the time bed ridden, shivering, aching, coughing and hallucinating, which was deeply frustrating.

As most of you know, I don’t go anywhere on holiday, but instead use my leave to go to the Taps. By now this almost certainly doesn’t come as a surprise to you and I’m quite sure that I don’t need to justify myself to you either (mainly because by now you must have such low expectations of me that it would be pointless. I could say that I like to drink from the overflow tray and nobody would be surprised). Because that’s just what I like to do. My prefect day is spending all day in the pub while the world goes on about its business. And I was really looking forward to having a week off work to do exactly that.

Now, as you know, Christmas Eve is my favourite day of the year, and I really enjoyed most of it (from about 2pm-8pm) when it was just the regulars in, but from 9 or so onwards it got horribly crowded (I genuinely don’t begrudge people going out on Christmas Eve, but when you’ve got so many people in that you can’t move because of the press, you know that something’s wrong), although it did clear out as soon as midnight came around.

Boxing Day was nice as well. It was lovely and quiet during the day (with lots of football on) and for much of the evening before it suddenly got busy around 10:30, but by then we were celebrating Laura B’s birthday (i.e. drunk), and firmly ensconced in the Regulars Corner anyway

But both Christmas Eve and Boxing Day are events days in themselves and therefore already special in their own right. While what I particularly love is to spend random days in the pub. Days which have no significance or importance to anyone else. In fact for me that’s part of the enjoyment. The knowledge that everyone else is at work or looking after the kids – or whatever, while I’m on holiday. And I’d been so looking forward to it.

But, well, that all went out the window as I was laid low by the flu and didn’t get until Sunday just gone (after not having had a drink for a week – which, by the way, is the longest I’ve spent sober for a number of years – I was completely hammered by the end of the night and don’t remember going home)

And so there I sat on the train this morning thinking, ‘well what a load of bollocks that was. Barely a proper break before going back to this endless grind’ and it was quite depressing. Going back to work after Christmas is always bad enough but going back and feeling that I didn’t get the break I deserved it even worse. So I started to think about the Taps New Years Resolution list that we were making on Sunday, and which, as far as I can remember, broadly was:

This year we [a combination of at least five regulars and members of staff] will:

1. We will go to at least one gig.
2. We will go to at least one Spurs match.
3. We will drink absinthe[1].
4. We will go to a nice restaurant.
5. We will go for a drink in London.
6. We will go to at least one museum/gallery

Now, I know that I’m the person who is most likely to derail this process, but that list shouldn’t be beyond us should it? I mean these are things that normal people do as a matter of course. And that if we could commit to doing some of them it would be something to look forward to in the post Christmas January gloom.

So lets try and be a bit normal – if only for these first grim dark months of 2011. What do you say?

---

[1] I really don’t recall why this was included on the list.