Subcultural engagement for the 21st Century...
Barbelith is a new kind of community (find out more)...
You can login or register.

Underground > Conversation >

A situation

11:12 / 23.12.05

My sis, love her, was barred from the local about 9 months ago, because of the following:

A new landlord, who is, apparently, a bit of a twat, barged into a toilet cubicle that my sister and her friend were sharing. After "seeing a reflection of the friend putting something down the toilet" (she was - a piece of toilet roll as she'd only just finished doing her business) and then sliding his finger over the windowsill, and finding a powdery substance, he deduced in spectacular Sherlock Holmes fashion, that my sis and buddy were doing drugs, and barred them both.

Which was particularly upsetting, as they weren't (well, my sis definitely wasn't - I can't speak for the other, as haven't heard it from her personally, although my sis insists she wasn't either) and this local, has been our family local for as long as I can remember - My sis is 20, I'm 27, Dad is 50 and been going there since he was a George Best fan. This new landlord has been there since March.

Dad sent a letter, talking about leagal action. Landlord shit himself, and got the area manager to support him, adding that he had been trying to gain access to the cubicle to "change the toilet roll". Which is good enough justification, in the area manager's eyes, for barging in on a young girl using the toilet. Hmmh...

So, since then this landlord has told my sis's boyf that she's welcome back, only to turn them away when they DID go back. He is, all around, a bit of a twat. I'm going to pay him a visit tomorrow, (I want my sister allowed back in, becuase the local is where we all, as a family, have been spending Christmas Eve for as long as Mr Fantastic's arm on a Doom's day) and want to know what you think is the best course of action, verbal or otherwise.

Obviously I don't want to get barred too, but then, it rubs me totally the wrong way, that some young cunt with no respect for the regulars of this pub should be throwing his weight around and picking on my innocent sister as a result.

All Acting Regiment

11:24 / 23.12.05

All you can do is be polite, and don't be holding a drink when you talk to him. It's really the only way.

11:46 / 23.12.05

I'd find another pub. With all that festering resentment, someon's going to say something decidedly unfestive.

11:53 / 23.12.05

a pub lives and dies on its regulars.
a petition to allow her back in, signed by as many locals and regulars as you can get, would put the willies up the area manager for certain.
organise a petition signing party in another pub on a saturday night if you can, and promise everyone a free drink for turning up. you can always explain that you are taking his business elsewhere not to ruin the pub, but to make sure all your friends and family can be there.
demonstrate that the bed he is making is not very comfy, and your landlord may well change his mind.

make sure you dont give them any excuses to find your behaviour to be of the type that requires banning, and make sure you dont get drunk and make up songs about that time he went to nantucket.

12:22 / 23.12.05

The fuck is with Britons and their pubs? Drink at home and save yourself the hassle.

12:24 / 23.12.05

I´d go looking for another pub, too. I´m a bit of a paranoid person and I would assume, that the twat is spitting in my beer before selling it to me.

12:31 / 23.12.05

its not really about the drinking, jack. its about the whole vibe. its a wee bit different up here in scotch land, but the pub is the other church for a lot of communities.

its good for the soul, especially in winter, to be with everybody; not just your small circle of friends and family. we dont have many places outside the pub to go for that whole community kick when it isnt sunday.

one might say 'you americans and your distinct lack of pub', and lament for your loss.

12:40 / 23.12.05

I could never love a whole nation of people who didn't go to the pub. Sorry, Jack. It's just wrong.

13:44 / 23.12.05

I just wish we had pubs here in the U.S. The local social meeting place simply doesn't exist. Matter of fact, I think that the lack of pubs and prevalence of bars is symptomatic of what's wrong with America in general.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

14:19 / 23.12.05

The pub is all, Jack. It's like being in your own home except you get to leave the house. There are just so many things I love about going to the pub that cafes just don't have.

14:41 / 23.12.05

Maybe I'm sceptical, but I'd ask your sister again what she was doing there. Was she really watching her friend piss? There are special clubs where you can do that without getting in trouble.

The only times I've ever shared a cubicle have been to do precisely what the landlord was thinking.

14:47 / 23.12.05

It's just me, I guess. It's tied in, I suppose, with my ambivalence about booze and my notions about Home. "You get to leave the house"—where's the upside here? You're home: why would you want to leave? Home is the place you're trying to get.

Marriage maps onto this, too, in odd ways—doubtless this is because US bar culture is so tied to meeting and hooking up with sexual partners. The idea of a married couple going out drinking together just seems really strange to me. D and I did it a few times, when we were first married, and it felt... I dunno. Odd. Pointless. And if you're out drinking separately, it's even worse—shadows of infidelity, or avoiding going home to the rolling pin. Again: if you're happy at home, why don't you want to be there?

I dunno: I spent a lot of my twenties in bars, as a musician. I was working, so I wasn't drinking—and I had to stay from first shot to last call, and observe as the scene got blurrier and, inevitably, uglier. And there came a kind of epiphany. The company of drunken strangers is wearying when you're sober: Knowing this, I came to a point where I didn't enjoy it even when I, too, was drinking.

A party or a dinner or an in-home social gathering, sure. But drukenness, I feel instinctively, is a private affair, and ill-suited for a public house.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

14:49 / 23.12.05

I understand, Jack, and it was very well put and all... but if you ever decided to relocate to the UK you'd so flunk the Britishness test.

14:52 / 23.12.05

Wow. The thought that after marriage (or presumably finding the man I want to live with) I should stay home instead of going to the pub ... that creeps me out a bit, to be honest!

I love going out with my partner - it's part of what makes us, us. Home is great too, and we have lovely nights in, but I'd go nuts if we only stayed here.

But hey, each to their own.

And I have to stick up for the girls in the loo - lots of girls share cubicles. I don't do it but I know lots do, without their being any drugginess going on. In fact, I've seen a pub with two loos in one cubicle, catering for exactly that habit!

14:55 / 23.12.05

Jack, you'll just never know. Don't you worry about it.

Tits Win, why don't you just go somewhere else? Do you really want to be giving this landlord your money?

And you need to think about that username, if you want us to take you seriously here.

14:57 / 23.12.05

BOOBIES ROOLZ OK

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

14:58 / 23.12.05

Well, I mean I guess it all depends on what it is the tits are actually competing in, doesn't it? A "feeding babies" competition, I'd put money on them. Chess, maybe not so much.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

15:00 / 23.12.05

(although I did once get totally mashed at Pictionary by some buttocks. But I don't really like to talk about that).

15:01 / 23.12.05

Maybe the thing about going out is that sometimes you want to go where everybody doesn't know your name. I'm all for staying in, but being out is, as Stoatie sys, like being at home and being out. Depends on the place, obviously. A shitty pick-up joint is not necessarily where you want to go for a quiet drink. But a cosy local pub is like the living room you wish you had. People whom you don't really know but you've seen there before and with whom you can exchange a nod or a brief (or long) conversation at the bar or at the next table. And beer out of a keg tastes different to out of a bottle, and of course there are plenty of beers that you can only get at the pub, and often in the UK, there will be a beer on tap that only that pub has at that time.

In fact I think Ariadne and I might have to pop out to the local for a pint tonight!

15:22 / 23.12.05

i think a part of the perception problem may be that in america a pub is a rare beast indeed. doing many of the things i imagine doing in a pub in a bar would be ridiculous.

i wouldnt imagine a dog having a residency in a bar, for example. i wouldnt imagine going to a bar for lunch, taking my mum there to discuss a new job or going there to work.
i would go to a bar to get drunk and to hang out, and maybe to meet new and interesting people to fuck or talk shit with or both.

you know in cheers?
you know how noone really uses the pool room through the back? if that was a british pub show, there would have been a queue. there'd prolly also be a game of darts on the go, a telly on for the simpsons at tea time, and boardgames behind the bar for the kids.

its more like a social club you dont have to pay dues for, really.

15:32 / 23.12.05

am i the only one that isnt reading 'tits win'? as 'boobiez rool ok' or similar?

perhaps i am wrong, but my first assumption was a specific set of tits had in some way won something. wether these tits are people or real breasts i am not sure.

my tits win me the thanks of all my friends, for they provide a sumptuous head pillow for that after the dancin' phase of an evening. my tits win the favour of people around 5'6" more often than their taller friends, but their popularity is quite staggering.

15:57 / 23.12.05

Americans have diners. Not the same, but very living-room-elsewhere in the locals. Moreso around Sunday breakfast time.

Possibly this is why we're fat bastards.

16:00 / 23.12.05

...rather than drunks.
possibly also why many americans of my experience seem more easily surprised by levels of alcohol consumption, and more willing to cry alcoholism.

Kali, Queen of Kitteh

16:20 / 23.12.05

I mirror Mirror's longing for proper pubs here in the States. I mean, there are neighborhood bars here in Atlanta where one can go in and know the bartenders and the regulars on sight, and your drink is at the bar waiting for you, but as urban homogenization and gentrification creep like a fucking virus here in this city and elsewhere, you now run the risk of your neighborhood bar being run over by smug yuppie bastards and hipsters looking for the newest place to be seen. (If I sound bitter, believe I am.) Don't get me wrong, I don't mind drinking at home, but I get stir crazy and have to get out sometime. Sadly, of all the bars I used to like to go to here, only two make the list anymore. One is called the Righteous Room and it's dark and cozy, it has an amazing jukebox, and really excellent food. Of course, it becomes a no-go area on weekends after nine pm.

My solution?

If I have the afternoon off and nothing important pending the rest of the day, I saunter in there around four or so, book or NYT crossword in hand, and have a couple of pints. I get the interesting Bukowski-esque crowd, my choice of songs on the juke (always late 80s Cure/Echo & the Bunnymen/Joy Division), and no awful men hitting on me.

My advice: get a petition going for your sister. No bastard has the right to try and run you out of your pub.

16:34 / 23.12.05

But drukenness, I feel instinctively, is a private affair, and ill-suited for a public house.

I dunno - doesn't sitting at home alone drinking seem a little bit more problematic? Or is it just problematic in different ways?

Haus of Mystery

17:14 / 23.12.05

Drinking in the bath. Gets you pissed quicker. Best for everyone.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

17:52 / 23.12.05

And as if to prove a point, I've just been for a pint with TangoMango and Lilly, Stokey's premier married couple with child.

And there was a guy there who was like a cross between Kenny Rogers and Kris Kristofferson. Drinking at home, you miss out on shit like that.

Kali, Queen of Kitteh

19:27 / 23.12.05

There's a lot to be said for drinking alone, sleaze.

1. You control the music. So no requisite groaning when some crap song appears on the soundsystem (though this in itself is a good way to bond with your drinking partners).

2. You can smoke, if you wish. Invaluable as every day Big Mother tightens the purse strings of fun.

3. No lines for the toilet. And, depending upon your level of cleanliness, probably damn sight cleaner than most public restrooms. Ladies, no having to hover, am I right?

4. No waiting for a drink. Want another? Go ahead! Just carry yourself over to the kitchen, or counter, or home bar, and get to mixing!

5. It gives you a chance to commune with the dark twisted monkey that lives inside all of us. If you can't befriend your inner evil over a round of Jack on the rocks, then one day the little bastard will turn on you.

Wow. I think I read way too many issues of Modern Drunkard.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

19:38 / 23.12.05

Thank fuck for that. I thought I was the only one here who read it.

The "juicing on the job" article is a particular favourite of mine.

Regrettable Juvenilia

21:02 / 23.12.05

Reading Kali's first three points, it occurs to me that there really are few if any pubs in North America.

Tryphena Absent

22:20 / 23.12.05

A petition is a really bad idea. Not only will none of you be drinking in the pub but all the people who sign it will be gone within weeks (apart from a few toads who claim peer pressure). The atmosphere will change and eventually you won't want to go back. Leave it alone, if you want to ask about tomorrow then be kind and respectful and emphasise that it's an annual family gathering. This manager will be gone by next Christmas because the area already feels dubious about him- after all he couldn't hack something this simple on his own. The ban will then reset itself.

23:58 / 23.12.05

yeah I actually think you'e right, apparently they ran out of steaks last week, in a steak-sizzler pub, of alll places!!!

It's keeping my unclees at bay that is the problem...

05:56 / 24.12.05

I hope the manager suddenly regains his senses, Tits. Bastard shouldn't ruin a family tradition.

Kali, Queen of Kitteh

06:06 / 24.12.05

Stoatie, I agree with the voddy option but that shit just eats through paper cups...