Funds, Ladies and Gentlemen, what are they?
Like memories, I don't have them.
The above jokey statement in fact belies a foul, nidorous cataclysm of financial ruination that hangs above me like a cloud of crying, near dead, children. Whilst that statement is slightly over-exaggerated, it is however by no means easier to manage than its un-exaggerated reality....
Funds, as we know, are essential to life, essential to drinking and of course to paying debts. Funds are limited. Funds are scarce. Funds, for me, are a far forgotten dream.
This post is, therefore, not an exploration of the cost of buying beer. It is in effect a statement. Not a pious cry for help, not a whinging moping mardy about whose fault everything is, instead more an honest reflection. Am also not going to use this blog to make rash and unlikely predictions about my abilities to sort out and likelihood of solving my funding problem, which we may also refer to as debt - that would be reckless. I am however going to admit, dear readers, to you, what has mostly caused this situation.
Its me.
My debt is mine. I caused it. My lack of funds stems from my own reckless, wilful, degenerate over consumption of ale in fine public houses the land over.
For clarity, specifically, nobody else:
Forced me to go to the pub almost every day for the last 5 years;
Held me at knife-point and poured delicious real ales and keg beers down my capacious throat as if liquid itself was going out of fashion;
Made me buy numerous bottles of beer that one should maybe only buy now and again as an expensive treat;
Compelled me to spend my existing funds and many many more travelling the country with friends and family to visit amazing unspoilt pubs.
No.
All of the above actions undertakings and happenstances took place with my consent, under my own yoke. Alas the weight of those decisions, mistakes, tribulations, misdemeanours and rash actions, has caused me to wither. Just a little. Maybe a lot. So I have to stop. I have if nothing else to think of these effects on those that I love.
Before Sheffield publicans begin contemplate suicide, I am not giving up drinking. Too much it seems, I love the social hub-ub, the sparkling marriage of the hop and the malt, the listening in on jocular, absurd, nonsensical and moving, in equal quantity, conversations in pubs, and the joy of finding that near perfect beer, good enough to sate you, perhaps fully, but not enough to stop you wanting to continue your search for the very best, to stop.
I will however be cutting down significantly.
So, like I said, the above is a statement. Maybe part proclamation, part paean for positively overindulging. Its where I am.
Your very good health
Wee Beefy
Showing posts with label Alcohol consumption concerns. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Alcohol consumption concerns. Show all posts
Thursday, 8 December 2016
Monday, 12 January 2015
Keeping it moist
Hello there,
it may seem an unusual position to adopt, given my attempted (and almost entirely failed) "Dryvember" experiment, and the fact that we are nearly half way through the month, but I wanted to write today about the campaign for people to not drink alcohol in January. What I want to say is: "don't". Or possibly "do". Let me explain.......
Dry January is a campaign run in the UK by Alcohol Concern. For those rebels among you, here is a link to their registration page, and other sections including a list of corporate supporters. Dryathlon is slightly more hip in it's approach, and is undoubtedly* going to stop babies and kittens dying of cancer since its run by otherwise admirable organisation Cancer Research UK, as shown here. All the newspapers have written articles about "going dry" this January, (although using my usual rigorous level of research I haven't read any) and as always, there is much medical opinion flying around to support it. So who can resist?
Well, I can for one. Why? Because I used to work in a real ale off license. December was far and away our most profitable month, whilst in January it was hardly worth being open. So as to restrict the level of impact on sales figures it was often necessary to combine, for our own records at least, the earnings of both and divide them in half. January was the only month we ever had a week where we didn't sell a single pint of real ale. January was a millstone round our necks.
This phenomena continues to exist outside of pressures on pub attendance such as the smoking ban, drinkers preferring to stay at home, and previous vast increases in the price of beer. January now even more so, haunts pubs like a jaundiced spectre of temperance led regret, that seeks to undermine the hard work of the year before, and start the new year off on a low.
A friend of mine recently said he was giving up alcohol for January. He wasn't doing it as part of a charity campaign, but he noticed his friends were doing it and wanted to join in. I'm not for a second suggesting that my pub and bus stop learnt medical acumen stretches to doubting the benefits of a dry month, but I do know that January is not the month to do it. Someone who works in one of Sheffield's numerous real ale pubs said he had friends who'd made the same threat, sorry, promise. His response had been "well, I wonder if there's some way I can go and fuck up your business in January as well". He was joking, of course. Sort of.
No-one is suggesting you should, say, drink to excess at Christmas and then carry on a booze fueled orgy of over indulgence into January. What I am saying is, do continue to go to the pub, and keep money running through the tills of the places you would expect to drink in, or outside of, when the summer sun comes.
Last year we had the counter campaign of Drinkuary, this year possibly something like Tryuary or Dampuary exists. In truth, all we need to do is drink in January as we would at any other time.
Cheers!
Wee Beefy
*this is an example of exaggeration. And you are more likely to contribute to closing a pub where a cancer patient drinks by not drinking in it.....
it may seem an unusual position to adopt, given my attempted (and almost entirely failed) "Dryvember" experiment, and the fact that we are nearly half way through the month, but I wanted to write today about the campaign for people to not drink alcohol in January. What I want to say is: "don't". Or possibly "do". Let me explain.......
Dry January is a campaign run in the UK by Alcohol Concern. For those rebels among you, here is a link to their registration page, and other sections including a list of corporate supporters. Dryathlon is slightly more hip in it's approach, and is undoubtedly* going to stop babies and kittens dying of cancer since its run by otherwise admirable organisation Cancer Research UK, as shown here. All the newspapers have written articles about "going dry" this January, (although using my usual rigorous level of research I haven't read any) and as always, there is much medical opinion flying around to support it. So who can resist?
Well, I can for one. Why? Because I used to work in a real ale off license. December was far and away our most profitable month, whilst in January it was hardly worth being open. So as to restrict the level of impact on sales figures it was often necessary to combine, for our own records at least, the earnings of both and divide them in half. January was the only month we ever had a week where we didn't sell a single pint of real ale. January was a millstone round our necks.
This phenomena continues to exist outside of pressures on pub attendance such as the smoking ban, drinkers preferring to stay at home, and previous vast increases in the price of beer. January now even more so, haunts pubs like a jaundiced spectre of temperance led regret, that seeks to undermine the hard work of the year before, and start the new year off on a low.
A friend of mine recently said he was giving up alcohol for January. He wasn't doing it as part of a charity campaign, but he noticed his friends were doing it and wanted to join in. I'm not for a second suggesting that my pub and bus stop learnt medical acumen stretches to doubting the benefits of a dry month, but I do know that January is not the month to do it. Someone who works in one of Sheffield's numerous real ale pubs said he had friends who'd made the same threat, sorry, promise. His response had been "well, I wonder if there's some way I can go and fuck up your business in January as well". He was joking, of course. Sort of.
No-one is suggesting you should, say, drink to excess at Christmas and then carry on a booze fueled orgy of over indulgence into January. What I am saying is, do continue to go to the pub, and keep money running through the tills of the places you would expect to drink in, or outside of, when the summer sun comes.
Last year we had the counter campaign of Drinkuary, this year possibly something like Tryuary or Dampuary exists. In truth, all we need to do is drink in January as we would at any other time.
Cheers!
Wee Beefy
*this is an example of exaggeration. And you are more likely to contribute to closing a pub where a cancer patient drinks by not drinking in it.....
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