Correction

I was in Taps on Saturday afternoon sat at the bar with Gareth talking to Irena, while Adam and Graeme were sat behind the hatch watching the Celtic match on the big TV in the middle. Well I saw Graeme and Adam, but Graeme was watching the Celtic match and Adam was trying not to fall asleep.

Now, I can’t remember exactly what it was that prompted her to remark on it (some random pub banter[1] of some sort no doubt), but Irena noted that the Taps was something of a family.

Now, as you know I’ve been banging the drum for the Taps as community idea for some time now, but the Taps as family? It’s an intriguing thought, although even the most cursory of reflections tells you that it’s not.

Or that if it is, it’s bloody dysfunctional one.  A really, really dysfunctional one.  One in which the children should have been taken into care years ago and the parents locked up for all manner of negligence and abuse.

But what the Taps is, is a community. A small little social village (I don’t know why, but I always imagine that the Taps is a 17^th Century pilgrim community in North America, struggling against the elements and the odds to survive through a long bleak winter – but hey, that’s just me) functioning according to its own set of social norms.

It’s a community of people who inhabit the same space, and who, for the most part, and to greater and lesser extents get along and on occasion even like one another. But it isn’t something that you can depend on (or at least I wouldn’t advise it).

---

[1] I really hate that word. Banter. It’s horrible. Even before this whole Andy Gray and Richard Keys thing kicked off it was a horrible word. Banter is just a substitute for ‘having an unfunny conversation’. People don’t banter. They talk, they discuss, they have a chat or a laugh. They assuredly don’t banter.

A Change Will Do You Good

In an odd reversal of the normal state of affairs, The Taps was full of women last night, which is not to say that it was packed, which it wasn’t, but that the people who were there were almost all women. Hardly a bloke in sight.

It was slightly strange, but in a good way.

I mean while having to endure innumerable screeching versions of ‘Like a Virgin’ and ‘Papa Don’t Preach’ all evening wasn’t really anyone’s idea of fun, at least there was no trouble, nobody stole my stool or tried to do my crossword and they mainly just went about their business without any fuss.

That their business was shrill and inane still made it infinitely better than coked up and rude.

Forbidden Planet

Believe me, I know that I’m a broken record permanently stuck on complain, but I can only write about the things which occur to me. And those are mainly driven by the notable things that happen in the pub. I’m a hostage to circumstances in that respect. And if sometimes I’m overly critical, misanthropic and inappropriately bombastic it’s only because I’m a bit of a spanner and I can’t help myself.

So, if Saturday afternoon felt like watching an unbroken procession of complete and utter twats come in the pub it’s difficult not to comment on it (especially after Thursday’s events). I swear it must have been a full moon or something because On Saturday as one random nutter/wrong ‘un left, another one would immediately arrive to take his place. It was like a Jeremy Kyle relay team.

Now there was one bloke in particular who came in who was just a horrible piece of work. Drunk, obnoxious, coked up and just spoiling for a fight. I mean literally this guy just wanted to bash somebody (anybody) up and he wasn’t even bothered about trying to manufacture a spurious reason to do so beyond walking up to random people and saying ‘oh, do you want a fucking fight then?’ – to which of course the correct response is, ‘not right now thanks, I’m fine for the moment.’

But the worst thing about this whole situation was that his friends knew what he was like before he started any of this.

Adam knew one of the people he was with (who himself was about a 7.6 on the wrong’ un scale) from Primary School, and I was listening to Adam talking to him about this bloke and this guy kept on saying of him that he was a lovely bloke most of the time except that when he got drunk he got aggressive and could be a bit naughty (which I assure you is his word and not mine).

Now Gareth was working [and this is the reason that I could never work behind a bar. I’d just be too scared being on my own. I mean I’ve  seen grown men shout and swear at the girls behind the bar (who as you know are absolutely lovely) before so you can only assume that such scummage wouldn’t have any compunction about doing something far worse to a bloke who asked them to take their hat off or refused to serve them because they were too drunk] and these guys kept going outside with their drinks (when they quite clearly knew that they weren’t allowed to) and Gareth had to keep going to get them back from them, and this one particular guy (the utter wanker) kept singing Spurs songs really loudly and just in general being an obnoxious twat.

So Gareth eventually goes over and asks him to keep it down and this bloke (Adam’s old friend from school) turns to Adam and comments, ‘he really wants to be politer about the way he says things to him.’

[It goes without saying that Gareth had immediately clocked that this guy was a complete wrong ‘un and that being the case if anything was being even more polite, genial and friendly about the matter than he normally would have been].

Adam asks him why and this bloke just shrugs and goes, ‘well because he’s likely just to grab him.’

Unfuckingbelievable.

Look, I’m sorry to keep saying it, but I just don’t understand some people. They seriously might as well come from a completely different planet from me for all that I understand their thought processes.

I mean, here you are. You know that your friend, when drunk, will want to beat up people for no good reason, so what do you do? Well of course you go out drinking with him, let him get really drunk and then just stand around (and indeed, casually discuss the matter as though it was no big deal that he might just kick off on some poor bloke just doing his job), watching him do it as though it were normal.

What manner of pure human shittage must you be that you think that’s a reasonable thing to do? I mean seriously, you know that if this bloke gets drunk he’ll beat someone up, so what do you? You get drunk with him and then calmly stand there watching him trying to start a fight with every random person in the pub (while saying what a lovely bloke he normally is).

I’m just at a complete loss of what to make of these people. I don’t know what planet they’re from but I wish they’d stop visiting ours.

Pub Advice #1

Don't trust anyone who drinks Budweiser. I guarantee you they’re a wrong ‘un.

 

An Open Letter

It’s you.

I know you don’t believe it, but it is. It’s you. You’re the common denominator. You know how every time you go out, no matter where you go, you always end up either getting thrown out, barred, beaten up or, worse, beating someone else up, right?[1] Well the reason for that is you.

It’s not the aggressive doormen or the stroppy staff or the out of order customers who are doing it.

It’s you.

Really, it is.

You’re the reason you ended up being choked by some bloke (who, unfortunately for you, happens to spend his weekend evenings working as a doorman at Bar 108) and left unconscious on the pavement[2].

You.

I mean, really, do you never wonder why these things keep happening to you? I mean surely you must do. The very thing which defines us as sentient beings is the capability for self awareness, so surely you must have thought about it. You must at some point have thought, ‘now hang on just a second here, why do these things keep happening to me? I mean I have to say that it strikes me as being a little bit odd that I keep getting barred and beaten up all the time. I mean statistically speaking you wouldn’t say it’s really normal would you. Now I’m just spit balling here, but could it be that it’s because I’m a total dick? I mean could that be it?’

Because you know what, as soon as you and your equally scummy friend walked in, and I mean the very moment, everyone knew exactly how your evening was going to play out. As soon as you walked in everyone knew the exact trajectory that your evening would follow.

                          Meeting of Random Enfield Scum

                                      Thursday 20^th January

                                    Taps Irish Bar, 2100-1130

                                Silver Street, Enfield, EN1 3EF

                                               AGENDA

General Business

Step 1. Get drunk very quickly.

Step 2. Take lots of drugs

Step 3. Be loud annoying obnoxious scumbags all night

Step 4. Get in either a fight and/or be chucked out/barred

Any Other Business

Evening Out closes.

Everyone knew it just the moment you walked in. And you know why?

Because it’s you.

I’m fed up of trying to understand people like you. I’ve just got to accept that I don’t get it. I’ll never get it. You’re beyond my scope and comprehension. It’s just not healthy to keep harping on about it, so I give up. Do what you will.

[Although the conversation you had with your scumbag friend outside afterwards where you were loudly talking about how differently things would have gone if he had been outside with you when the incident occurred did make me laugh. In fact it made everyone who was listening to it laugh.

Because what actually would have happened if he had been outside with you is that you would still have got choked out and he would have just stood there.

And you know why?

That’s right, because it’s you.]

---

[1] I’m assuming here. It just seems impossible to me that this kind if thing doesn’t happen to these jokers every other week.

[2] Basically, what happened was that this bloke kept walking around deliberately knocking into people and then if they didn’t immediately apologise (although most people did just by dint of a. being English and b. being nice) he’d offer them outside. Until he bumped into the wrong person…

Pub Rules

Having worked behind a bar for what seems like forever there are certain behaviours that I simply cannot abide. So from time to time (and in no particular order) I will be laying down the law, as it were, with some basic pub rules. Here are the first batch;

1. If the pub is busy and you're in a large group, know what you want before bellowing at the staff to serve you. Morons like you who order one drink at a time are the reason it takes ages to get a drink.

2. Just because you know a member of staffs name, and have the ability to shout it repeatedly does not mean that you must be served next. 

3. If you order the wrong drink, you have to pay for a new one.

4. If you drop or spill your drink, you have to pay for a new one.

5. If you leave your drink unattended and someone else takes it, you have to pay for a new one.

6. Waving money only attracts strippers. Stop it.

7. If you see someone carrying two crates of beer through a crowded pub and you are in their way - move.

8. If the bartender asks you if you want anything else and you say no, then your answer is final. Once you've paid for your drinks, that transaction is over and you go to the back of the queue. You had your chance.

9. If you walk into a pub after last orders, you will not get served. It doesn't matter how quick you'll be or how long you've trudged in the snow to get there. You will not get served. So take that idiotic 'I thought this place shut at 5am on a Tuesday' look off your face and leave.

10. If you're such a pathetic drinker that you have to vomit up all that booze that you paid for. Go outside. In fact, go home. No one wants anything to do with the bile soaked remains of the Spag Bol you had for dinner.

Blink And You'll Miss It

I hate standing up in the pub. I absolutely can’t stand it (if you’ll forgive the pun). Basically, if there’s nowhere to sit I’m leaving. I mean the very idea of standing up for hours on end is ridiculous. We’re not animals. We’ve travelled far enough down mankind’s evolutionary pathway to have invented chairs to sit on haven’t we? And that being the case why would you stand up? It’s a crazy act of lunatic defiance that I’ll have no truck with.

None.

I also hate sitting at tables. When you’re in a pub you should sit at the bar. That’s the rule. Sitting at a table is just wrong. There’s just something horribly claustrophobic about sitting at a table with a group of people. Even if you nominally like those people. Which I almost certainly won’t.

You’re just stuck there. Trapped in a round [I also hate rounds. I want to drink at the pace I want to drink at. I don’t want to have to hurry my pint because everyone else is drinking quickly anymore than I want to have to linger over the last dregs of one for ages just because everyone else is drinking slowly. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that rounds are a bad things – they obviously make sense for the bar staff, but I just prefer not to be involved] and at the mercy of whatever conversation is being held.

But at the bar you can jump in and out of conversations as you like and nobody will care. You can read the paper or do the crossword for a bit if you want. You can stare into space and zone out. At the bar you are free.

If you did that at a table people would think you were mental.

Equally, the bar is where all the action is in a pub. It’s where the regulars sit and the staff are. If you’re not at the bar you’re really not involved.

If I go to a random pub by myself (something which I haven’t done for years actually – unless you count the Kings Head – which you really can’t [the last time I was in the Kings Head Charlotte and Sarah were working and Manchester Simon, my brother and Lee were in there drinking]) I’ll always sit at the bar. It’s just more interesting. You get to listen in on the conversations and watch the interactions. If you harbour ambitions of becoming a regular in that pub the bar is where you need to sit. It’s where you learn people’s names and the regulars getting chatting to you.

Thinking about it, the process of becoming a regular is a peculiar one (and something which I intend to think about in more detail). For staff it’s really quite easy. They work in the pub for a while and then if they also choose to drink in Taps they’re just de facto regulars from the state, e.g. recently, Charlie (or is that wrong? Is he actually a regular at all? Thoughts, please). But for everyone else the process is more indistinct. For instance I don’t actually remember how Daryl became a regular (I know that in many ways he could be considered to be a regular more than everyone else in that he was a regular when the place was Browns). But I absolutely don’t remember how or when it happened, although to be fair it was several years ago now.

But that said, I do remember when and how Graeme, Ray and Colin became regulars.

Isn’t that strange?

I remember when Adam used to come in with Gary and the rest of that lot, but I don’t remember when and how he became a regular in his own right.

This needs to be studied in more detail. Hopefully I can count on you all to help.

Enough

There’s a woman at work who I absolutely despise. I genuinely can’t stand her. She makes my skin crawl.

I hate her embarrassingly obsequious attitude to her manager and her unearned condescension to her colleagues. I hate how she has to give a running commentary on every single thing she does no matter how mundane it might be (‘so I emailed him, and you’ll never guess what, I only went and got an out of office reply. Can you believe it? Well then so I had to contact his deputy to get the information, so I sent another email and then he replied to me with the information I need. Ooh what a day), and how she has absolutely no sense of humour. I hate her whining accent and her Dennis Taylor glasses. I hate how she spends half the day talking about her stupid fucking choir. I hate how fricking dumb she is. I hate how short she is. How completely bloody useless she is.

[sometimes I can’t decide whether I want to kill her or myself]

Now I don’t mean this to seem like one of Taps Richard’s periodic and slightly idiosyncratic rants about people who stand up in the pub or people who talk too loudly in the pub. Because in this case everyone else hates her as well. It’s not just me. She’s one of those people that’s just completely obnoxious, and who everyone within literally four minutes of meeting her hates her.

And this reminds me of some of the people that you’ll sometimes meet in the pub. There are one or two people (in fact at the moment I can only think of precisely two people who fit this description) who everyone hates. Every single person who’s ever met them hates them within a couple of minutes.

And this quite literally isn’t an exaggeration. Every single person who has ever met them hates them.

Now, as you all well know, I can hate people I’ve only just met at the drop of a hat (I mean it, don’t drop your hat). Sometimes (alright, mainly) just walking in the door is enough to do it for me, but that isn’t the case when it comes to regulars. Regulars get the benefit of the doubt from me. In fact, it’s probably fair to say that I’ve erroneously, due to an overly romanticised view of my Taps comrades, attributed positive attributes to some regulars which, when all’s said and done, aren’t really warranted.

Which is to say that regulars (and semi regulars) get a lot of leeway from me. I mean they’ve really got to be pretty damned unpleasant for me to say that I hate them.

And certainly in one of their cases (no, I’m not going to name him – except to say that it’s a bloke [well spotted] and that he’s a semi regular), he’s completely unaware of the feelings that he arouses in people.

Seriously, when he walks in the door people actually groan and/or hide because they know that their evening’s just been ruined. And that’s everyone’s reaction – staff and customers.

By which I’m trying to convey the fact that these people are objectively obnoxious.

(The other person I'm talking about manageed to get themselves barred in the end for being so obnoxious, and can currently be found being equally obnoxious in the Kings Head).

What I’m trying to convey then is the fact not that these people are scummers or wrong ‘uns, but just that their personalities are so toxic that no-one can bear to be around them for any length of time. They are, in other words, wholly unpalatable.

And I don’t understand why. They’re both intelligent people, reasonably well educated and used to socialising in normal society. So why? Why fricking be so fricking annoying? There’s just no call for it.

And I’m fed up with it. I shouldn’t have to deal with these people if I don’t want to. Isn’t life hard enough already doing stuff that I don’t want to do, but that I actually have to? I mean why should I have to endure them just because they can't be bothered to be decent human beings? They’re not my boss, my bank manager or my family. I mean really, what obligation do I actually owe them? Why can’t I just be one of those people who’s able to just say ‘sorry, just stop talking to me, you're a leech draining me of my will to live, please leave me alone.’

Really, why not? Why can't I be that person?

Why the hell not?

I mean aren’t our lives already full with real actual obligations and duties? Real commitments to people and things that actually matter to us, so that we actually don’t have to waste what little free time and energy we do have enduring these obnoxious people? Come on, aren't they?

This my friends is an epiphany.

I'm drawing the line: here and no further.

Here. And. No. Further. 

July 14th 2011

Dear friends

Just a short note letting you know what to get me for my birthday

Many thanks

Taps Richard

Le Pub

Apparently the French want to export the traditional English pub experience to France as a compliment to their current cafe style drinking culture.

This article asks for votes on the pub v. the cafe debate.

You already know where I stand. How about you guys.

(nb - the comments below the line are quite interesting to read. It's amazing how many people hate pubs. That's practically un-English)

I'm Innocent Guv

I’d really quite like to blog about something which happened yesterday, but unfortunately I can’t.

[You can always just ask either myself, Jade or Adam about it in person if you want though]

Because one of the principles which I try and abide by in my posting is that I won’t say anything that might be either misrepresented or misunderstood and thus be potentially damaging to the reputation of the pub.

[The other main principle that I try to abide by is that I won’t say anything negative – unless in affectionate jest – about anyone either by name or in such a way that it would be easy for those in the know – i.e. regulars – to work out who I’m talking about. I just don’t think that would be fair.]

However, I’m led to understand that some people read some of my posts as being unnecessarily critical of the Taps. Which really couldn’t be further away from my intentions. I just like to think that I’m realistic about things.

I have absolutely no doubt that I love the Taps more than anyone else in the entire world, but love really doesn’t necessarily have to be blind. Nor does it have to be unconditional. What love should primarily be is realistic.

And that’s what I am. It’s not negative to note that sometimes on a Thursday night we often get some undesirable people in. Love only really exists when you love someone or something as they really are. Not the way you want them to be, or the way they were, or even the way that they have the potential to be. But the way they are.

That I happen to be a grumpy bugger who can find negatives in most people obviously doesn’t help, but I just wanted to make clear that it’s never been my intention to slag off the Taps. Indeed, as I’m sure you’re aware, as far as I’m concerned it’s the best pub in the world (admittedly I don’t really go anywhere else very often), it’s just that sometimes I’d quite happily shoot half the [regulars excluded of course] people in there.

Some bloke took my stool last night. He saw I was going out for a fag and he knew I was coming back, but he obviously thought to himself, ‘I want to sit down, I’m great, I deserve whatever I want, therefore I’ll take this guys stool.’

And when I came back he just looked at me. Sat on a stool in the middle of the pub (which was smart by the way) in front the big tv on the wall with his friends, he just looked at me wondering what I could possibly want from him.

Why is this strange bearded man starring at me like that? What could he possibly want? I mean here I am sat on this blokes stool right in the middle of the pub, what could he possibly want?

Now it’s not slagging off the pub to say that, it’s just pointing out that some people are just scum. That’s not the pub’s fault. It’s their mums’.

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!!!

Report this for removal

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?

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