News in Brief #42

Will not get you drunk. Honest

Low ABV Drinker Feels Virtuous

Drinker and serial barstool occupier Dave Smugbucket today sat in his local, sipping a half of 3.1% beer while basking in his own innate goodness and unimpeachable behaviour.

"See this lot around me?" internally monlogued Dave "They're all drinking the stuff that's 4.5% and above. Those are the ones who give pubgoers a bad name. Not me. I'm sensible."

"I'm not here to get worse for wear, or even to feel the effects of alcohol on my system. I'm better than that. No, I'm here to be part of the community in an important British institution." he continued to himself while sat alone on the end of the bar.

His reverie was broken by the barmaid "Another pint of Dogwater Pale on your tab, Dave?"

"That'll be seven on it if you do."

"I'm curating an ongoing dialogue between liquids and glassware"

Hipster Gets Regular Bar Job

Shoreditch cliché and Crafty type Luke Lumberjack-Shirt last week began his new job as a part-time barman at The Green Dragon, Whitechapel. "I'm, like, waiting for my new bean-to-bar chocolate 45rpm record company to reach it's crowdfunding target. It's to help ends meet, man."

"I turned up for my shift at 7pm, and this red faced old guy came up to me and asked for a pint of 'bitter'. I, like, panicked for a minute." confided Luke "Thankfully the Landlord told me it was the second handpump on the right."

"I had no idea anybody drank bitter anymore, man. Nobody I know drinks it anyway. It carried on all night. People ordering, like, Lager and Guinness and even looking as though they enjoyed it. It's a completely different world here. You'd never guess it was EC1." he incredulised

"I mean, dude, it's almost as if flavour and awesome trends weren't the most important things about beer for some people!"

They'll put RFID chips in our BRAINS next

Campaigner Stashes Away Cash Reserve

Living anachronism and dog-with-a-bone opinion type Mudgie Mudgington yesterday slammed the increasing tendency for drinkers to pay by contactless card. "To do so in pubs is folly" he claimed "You never know how much you're spending."

"I once forgot to bring cash to a session" ranted Mudgie "And I ended up drinking the pub out of bitter that night. It's no wonder Landlords like contactless. They want you to spend more money."

"Also," he continued while shaping a roll of bacofoil into a shape reminiscent of headgear "if your money is all electronic, the Government will know what you spend it on and have you taken away for 'Re-Education' by Health Fascists if you dare to even buy that third pint. It's a slippery slope we shouldn't be going down."

"This will lead to the Prohibition Gulag. History will tell you that!"

Meanwhile, government record keeper and GCHQ snooper Clive Wiretap told us *Mudgie? Yeah, we know about him. We patch into the CCTV at Wetherspoons. We've no concerns about him. He appears to spend all his time Tweeting about the forthcoming death of everything he holds dear."

"And looking at cat pictures, obviously."