The Moose: Archives - Forgotten Pub Post

I know I originally wrote this post becuase of the football player mentioned below. What I don't know is why it languished in my drafts folder for years without being published

I'm convinced I did publish it, as I remember some comments on it, but I could be miskaken. I may have just repeated some of it in another post, as it's a topic I often used to talk about (How great a barman I used to be)

Published or not, it's two aspects of pub life that were true to me then as I suspect they are now. The link no longer works and I don't know what happened to the footballer. Probably paid off the judge of something...

Just kidding

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For those of you who don't know much about me I have a long history of working in pubs and restaurants. I don't work in them now, I have a desk job as most of the pubs have been closed due to the ~~smoking ban~~ cheap supermarket booze.

I got my first pub job when I was eighteen and went into the trade full time when I turned twenty four. I lasted eight years until the industry went tits up and I opted for respectable employment.

I've done everything from collecting glasses to management. I've even worked as a doorman and a kitchen porter.

In my fourteen years in the licenced trade there are two things often talked about that I have never seen.

The first is an unprovoked assault.

There are many stories in the media about so called unprovoked attacks. It seems there's as many as one a week in our local paper, things must be pretty bad oop north.

I have seen many fights in my years in the trade. I've seen girl on girl bitch fights, girl on boy, chav on chav and full on group rumbles. I've seen people use home made weapons, bottles, chairs, pies. I've even seen a group of people trying to tip a police van while the coppers were inside.

No matter how much stuff I've seen, I've never seen an unprovoked attack. The 'unprovoked' stories you read in the paper are either someone who's allowed themselves to be drawn into trouble that has nothing to do with them or someone who has tried to play 'peacemaker'.

I have often seen some chav who's giving attitude turn to someone not involved and say something like, "WTF are you looking at?"

At which point I always think, walk off and let us deal with it, but they don't, they respond along the lines of, "STFU or I'll knock you out!"

When they end up getting decked it goes in the papers as an 'unprovoked' attack. True enough this person didn't provoke originally, but they let their young male ego draw them into the fight when they should have turned away and avoided a beating.

Then there's the peacemaker. There is nothing worse, when you are trying to split up a fight, than some pissed up kid coming over saying, "calm down Trev, he's not worth it", and putting their paws all over everyone.

Advice to everyone when drunk. If someone gobs off at you, forget the ego and walk off. If some people are fighting leave them to it.

If you absolutely have to get involved in a scrap only do so if 1) you have spent some time learning self defence 2) you are not pissed up 3) you are definately not pissed up

(Extra advice to nurses, male in particular. You are no help to us when you've had ten Jagerbombs. Please do not offer assistance)

The second thing I've never seen in pubs is a drink that's been 'spiked'.

Like this one:

Blackburn Rovers boss Steve Kean’s legal team may claim someone spiked his drink on the day he was arrested for drink driving.

Contrary to popular belief, folk do not walk round pubs dishing out free drugs and booze to random people.

The 'my drink was spiked' claim is used primarily by young girls who have drunk so many Jagerbombs, it's made them puke.

I've heard the claim many times but never once was it any more than excess alcohol. I've even had, young girls in particular, demanding that I phone an ambulance or even the police because someone has had a drink spiked. I've never done that once and no one has ever come back in the morning, having sobered up and contacted the police themselves.

Fortunately none of these 'spiked' people have ever died choking on their own vomit. That would not have gone down well. "Officer, I asked the landlord to call an ambulance but he told me to fuck the fuck off".

I sincerely hope that Steve Kean does not invoke the defence of the sixteen year old girl. If he does he will lose all credibility, and so will Freemans Solicitors who are representing him.

You got caught. Fess up.

(Note to anyone reading this who is about to comment, "But my drink really was spiked". No it wasn't.)