Posts by tag
booze
A Better Type of Buzz
Frank Sonderborg receives a phone call from an old work colleague who is currently in jail for robbing a string of post offices alongside a group of French thieves. Drink, drugs, and Euro-hijinks galore. Some buzz…
Cocktail Night
From friendship to growing up, Esther Hope Arthurson gives us a snippet on life on cocktail night.
How to Sell Wine
Not everyone who drinks wine has any idea what the fuck they’re drinking. I sell wine and these are the things that piss me off about the job.
Broken Saturday Night
Wet, half-sober, tired and bored. The meaninglessness of Saturday night for a disillusioned thirty-something.
Stupidly, I Knowingly Broke Quarantine in Spain and was Instantly Apprehended by Police
Robert Locke, a temporarily unemployed travel company representative, woefully disregards government quarantine regulations and takes to the streets in his adopted home of Malaga, only to be arrested almost immediately.
In Search of 53 German Student Girls
The dance that night was in a converted cinema. We sat in the front row seats and watched the natives giving it, like it was 1919. Country and western was big in the hinterlands back in the day. Sugary sweet songs of the poor emigrant Paddy in his bed-sit in London, pining for his golden haired girlfriend and his silver haired mother while he drank himself into a stupor.
How Black Was My Thumb?
I finish my £8.30 pint and head for where I used to live. Why? I’ve started writing now, I might as well go. It’s an ex-council block. East London thick brick. Rubicon cans on the stairwell, faulty lifts. A kid called Abdi that tries to sell you weed every time you see him, even though you tell him that you don’t smoke weed. It was him that I thought I saw walking past the pub. He’s got a dog. He told me that it is was rare for a Bengali to have a dog. I wonder if he’s still here?
Ice Cream, Whiskey, and Rain
My vacation condo’s washer/dryer combination is tiny and inefficient, so I launder my comforters ten miles away at the decrepit Maple Fuels Wash-a-Ton. The old-school machines don’t take credit cards, only quarters. It takes a lot of quarters to wash a pile of gamey comforters. Since my mortgage and HOA fees are high, I have to rent my place to overnighters through Air Bnb. The guests are often careless, spilling wine and body fluids willy-nilly on the bedclothes.
The Stabbing Factory
He slashed at me a few times – I can’t say for certain how close he got, but when you can feel the air move because of the swipe, the blade is too close – but mostly he stood in place making these hesitant jerking jabs. He kept saying, “Come on, I’ll stab you. Come on”, as if it were somehow my responsibility to move closer to him. Perhaps that’s the way things work, I don’t know, this was my first knife fight, and frankly it was a bit unfair, I didn’t have a knife.
Talking Soup book reviews ‘Fiesta: The Sun Also Rises’ Ernest Hemingway
So far, complex titles ranging from the heart wrenching narratives of Baldwin to the mind-expanding prose of LeGuin have been met with such turns of phrase as ‘it was alright’ or ‘it was good’. Now, given that the English language is prone to the kind of linguistic flare afforded to it by an unequalled vocabulary and system of expressions, I feel I could do more justice to these totemic works of literature than my long-suffering missus has hitherto been privy. Clear? Then on with the show.
Back to the Football #5 Horta vs CE Europa
From a global perspective, living in a world in which absolutely nobody seems to be able to agree on anything, it is in fact quite reassuring that one thing in life remains unilaterally recognised. I’m not referring to the the Geneva Convention or the Unilateral Declaration of Human Rights, fated as these are by the capriciousness of feckless dictators and ardent populists. No, the world can tear itself to bits, yet one thing will remain constant, from Santiago to Sydney, that being that the referee is, and has always been, a wanker.
The Hangover
I sit up in bed with my hand over my eyes. The shards of sunlight, shining through the open window and the scream of a scooter from the street below make me wince. Through my fingers the black and white poster of the singer Morrissey looks down on me with pity from the bedroom wall. I return the look with remorse and regret.
Greece: There and Back on the Magic Bus. Part 1
Lesson learned. When dealing with the Island Greeks, they’re lovely people, but they’ll take you to the cleaners given half a chance. This deflated our egos for a few nanoseconds. We saw a family out back refilling plastic water bottles from a well. If the silly tourists want bottled water, we’ll sell them bottled water. This was the Greek idea of keeping the tourists happy.
Back to the Football #3 Sants vs Hospitalet
Since the last entry, the boys of UE Sants have gone through something of a revelatory experience. What I mean by this is that they have won, twice in fact, including a comeback 4-3 victory against the adorably monikered Poble Mafumet, a performance reminiscent of the 2005 Champion’s League Final, or so said some throaty drunk bloke.
Do You Remember Friday?
Do you remember Fridays? The indescribable feeling of utter joy that signified that thankfully school was over for another two days. The misery of sitting in a classroom against your will was to be alleviated and replaced with the respite of resentment from parents who didn’t know what to do with you. Yes, Friday was a fine time. Friday represented hope a brief, fleeting window in which anything was possible and the misery of school, with its press-gang style education was exposed for what it was, finite.
Mile End to Clydebank
In a heroic attempt to watch Scotland lose at football, Laurence visits an East-End boozer and encounters one of his Scottish compatriots.
Goodbye yellow brick road
Frank Sonderborg goes back to 1973 and the dawn of Ireland in the E.U. An opportunity to work, drink, screw and smoke abroad proves a great draw in Europe.
An evening among the condos
Pursuing potential sexual relations in the vast suburban sprawl of middle America is far from easy as our hero gets lost amongst the condos.
Boys, Booze and Bathrooms
Laura Smith documents the “living for the weekend” lifestyle in middle America in a tale of boys, booze and bathrooms.
The Ultimate London Pub Crawl
Two friends and one 23 year long quest; to get drunk in the vicinity of all 270 London underground stations.
Giving up Alcohol
I stand for a while with the glass in my hand, and then I throw it against the wall. Giving up alcohol is tough but I’m one day off four months sober.