Saturday 30 October 2010

Who says snoozing is a waste of time and what pubs truly have to compete with ...

According to the Press Association "lazy Britons waste 91 hours per year by hitting the snooze button" - and with all the air-borne bomb scares and such - was it really that slow a news day?

I would like to say a couple of things about that:

a) isn't it time we all "wasted" a little time in our rush, rush, hurry, hurry lives?

b) isn't it just the most delicious thing, that warm, comfy half-asleep, half awake feeling?

... and talking of delicious things ... it finally dawned on me what pubs really have to do to be successful and lure us and our ever-decreasing discretionary income into their environs.

Last night (a blustery, autumn Friday) 5 friends convened in a domestic kitchen and this was what was on offer:

aperitifs - cointreau, single malt Scotch; Moroccan style chicken, cous-cous with fine green beans, the last of the garden's new potatoes; a selection of Turkish sweets, upside down ginger & pear cake; a fine pale craft brewed ale from the cellar below the kitchen; espresso and frothy milk; great chat, subtle lighting, eclectic mix of music in the background

we worked it out (ex-capital and overheads) cost to 5 of us twenty-five quid-ish

until pubs and other licensed venues can do that for, say, sixty/seventy-five quid (£12 to £15 a head for you Saturday morning readers) then I fear that we will ultimately only be left with the managed chains churning out their bland, homogenised mediocrities ... not exactly firmly in "Cooking Lager's" camp but I begin to understand what he's on about a bit more.

oh and tomorrow, despite having an extra hour in bed, I shall be hitting that snooze button at least once ... happy hallowe'en!

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