Cunts in the pub

[thecuriousorange]

The new relaunched more honestly titled version of Skeptics in the Pub?

I thought the they were forced to give "Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps" a more honest title under the Trades Description Act.

[PlanktonSideburns]

Then I left the Quaker meeting aahh.

Is anyone here old/confident/familiar enough to occupy a stool at the bar for an evening?

I've always wanted to see if I could do it on my own from 7-11pm, same stool all night, just making occasional conversation with bar staff and anyone who turns up next to me. Or is it the province of cunts, bores and lechers?

Worked in a bar with an old guy who did that, once a week he would be in for a perch. Mostly young people in the pub, was an easy going chatty guy. Was much loved by staff, was told to look after him, and he got a complimentary Baby Guinness at the end of the night

[steve98]

A "Baby Guiness" eh? Not heared it called that before.

[PlanktonSideburns]

What can I say he always payed his tab

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

Is anyone here old/confident/familiar enough to occupy a stool at the bar for an evening?

A few times while abroad alone this has been effective to strike up conversations. I have been occasionally pleasantly surprised how willing people have been to segue from what they were perhaps expecting to do to chat with me in their 2nd language, even more when they have been drinking a lot.

The weirdest occasion was, via the bar staff and two members of whatever the equivalent of Polish CAMRA is (it was called Piwni) meeting sci-fi writer Ian McDonald in Lublin, who was there for a convention and being very well chaperoned. I spent the following afternoon tagging along with them as he was shown around Kazimierz Dolny, a honeypot town for day trippers from Warsaw, then a further evening in the pub U Fotografa getting smashed on good Polish craft ale and warmly embracing everyone, staff included as we were thrown out about 2am.

Pleased to say Mcdonald appears to be a nice left-leaning anti-Tory type.

That all happened organically as well, so a good example of the good things that can happen from lingering on your own by the bar in a pub. Probably best to be somewhere they aren't really expecting you for the novelty factor.

Similar, though less dramatic things have happened to me in Gorlitz, Kaunas, Brno, Vilnius, Wrocław, Liege, Furth, Cologne, Trieste, Ferrara, Debrecen. Lots of less touristy cities there, so perhaps a bit more interest in an outsider. (I think most people could probably do ok around Cologne though, it's a hypersocial tolerant city.)

[El Unicornio, mang]

Then I left the Quaker meeting aahh.

Is anyone here old/confident/familiar enough to occupy a stool at the bar for an evening?

I've always wanted to see if I could do it on my own from 7-11pm, same stool all night, just making occasional conversation with bar staff and anyone who turns up next to me. Or is it the province of cunts, bores and lechers?

This is the default thing to do in the US. If there are free stools at the bar, you sit at them, whether you're alone or with a group. It kind of speaks to the different way Americans socialise, where it's about each person talking about themselves and then the next person does same rather than the group banter that happens around a table in UK pub culture. You never see people sitting alone at tables in American bars, they're always on a stool at the bar, chatting with the bartender or whoever might sit next to them.

Does make getting served that bit harder though, on busy nights you always have to squeeze your way between two people who are chatting to each other.

[Lisa Jesusandmarychain]

Threads with titles you can sing to Supergrass's debut single.

[Psybro]

This is the default thing to do in the US. If there are free stools at the bar, you sit at them, whether you're alone or with a group.

Yeah I'm antisocial but when I was travelling solo in the US I could just sit at the bar in a place to get served quicker and perfectly ordinary people would strike up conversation with you. A lot of the bar workers were a similar age to me and saving up to do the same kind of thing I was. 

Women will actually approach a single man for conversation too, there were occasions where I probably could've pulled if I wasn't sharing a dorm with half a dozen strangers.

I think the US equivalent of UKIP Bloke Down the Pub actually hates society enough to drink at home.

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

Women will actually approach a single man for conversation

Someone could have told me this about 15 years ago.

[steveh]

My hairdresser was recently telling me about his son who does security for a chain of home counties pubs and how with nightclubs being closed they've had a growing problem with coke dealers trying to set up in their premises. They've been trying to clamp down on that as fast as they can because they don't have the people needed to deal with the extra hassle that coked-up punters cause.

[Gurke and Hare]

And presumably having loads of coke dealing going on in the pub could put their licence at risk?

[El Unicornio, mang]

Women will actually approach a single man for conversation too, there were occasions where I probably could've pulled if I wasn't sharing a dorm with half a dozen strangers.

Yeah, I had a few lone women sat at bars get chatting to me when I was sitting alone, one who looked like a blonde Bella Thorne who I couldn't quite believe was actually hitting on me and ended up dating for a bit. Get yourself to America guys and sit at a bar, if I can do it so can you. One of them passed me her phone number on a napkin at the exact moment a guy who I assume was her husband/boyfriend by the way they reacted walked up to her to tell her they were leaving...

[Lisa Jesusandmarychain]

So that scene from " Love Actually" with Myfamily is actually quite realistic?

[Jockice]

Threads with titles you can sing to Supergrass's debut single.

Which is why I've had it in my head for the last half hour.

[phes]

Then I left the Quaker meeting aahh.

Is anyone here old/confident/familiar enough to occupy a stool at the bar for an evening?

I do this on most pub visits. It's great but you have to pick pubs that are designed to encourage it. Last week I got chatting to a guy who delivered flowers up and down the road that we were drinking on, and it turned out that we had all sorts in common going back to the days when DJ forums were popular. We both planned to just stay for a drink or two and we ended up spending the whole evening. Now I know someone new to go raving with, who knows the local scene! This stuff just doesn't happen when you're with friends.

A lovely story came out of that: about 10 or 15 years ago he recorded a very niche drum and bass mix for a DJ forum (as a bedroom DJ), which got a handful of listens. A while back his hard drive failed and he went looking through old links to see if he could find one that wasn't broken and download it. He found that somebody had uploaded it to YouTube and it had 40000 listens!

[steveh]

And presumably having loads of coke dealing going on in the pub could put their licence at risk?

Yes. What I meant was the sooner in the day they could evict a dealer then the easier things would be for security as the evening progressed.

[Flouncer]

In The Fat Cat in Sheffield 2 weeks ago a man talked about how the left wing were "more right wing than the right wingers", and how Owen Jones was "more right wing than Hitler".

Coincidentally, left The Fat Cat after one drink about a week ago because I was stuck next to a table with a guy blathering on and on about his Record Deal, and how he would be 'supporting Oasis' at an unspecified time. Abject ear-slime.

A bloke pulled a knife on my grandad in the Fat Cat back in the 1950s - a whole other level of pub cuntiness. If he was spouting off about how his band was going to be supporting Kenny Ball and His Jazzmen he would have deserved it, like.

[Mrs Wogans lemon drizzle]

Then I left the Quaker meeting aahh.

Is anyone here old/confident/familiar enough to occupy a stool at the bar for an evening?

I've always wanted to see if I could do it on my own from 7-11pm, same stool all night, just making occasional conversation with bar staff and anyone who turns up next to me. Or is it the province of cunts, bores and lechers?

I used to enjoy doing this when abroad on my own at a conference.  I've ended up having a wild night at a dive bar in Barcelona where I just got chatting to locals and one thing leads to another.

[Hobo With A Shit Pun]

The vowel sound is basically the same as a Black Country pronunciation, it's really not that exotic. You can take my word on the similarity.

I went to school in North East Scotland, and had a chemistry teacher from Canada. Only years later, when South Park drew our attention to it, did we realise she hadn't just been benignly mocking us the whole time.