Friday, June 09, 2006

End of an era

They preserve eyesores by having English heritage listing them so surely there should be preservations orders on sites of cultural significance. More specifically, there should be preservation orders on places that I have been going to for years, that are woven into my life and the removal of which causes trauma.

For instance, George Lucas should not have made Phantom Menace etc. and he sure as hell should not have re-edited Star Wars - Han fires first goddammit! Tell me George, are there any other areas of my childhood you’d like to piss on. Perhaps you’d like to re-write Wind in the Willows and have Toad as a pleasant character, or introduce Jar Jar fucking Binks into the story.

Out beering in town last night. A quick one in the Sanctuary, then an ill-advised one on the Tattershall Castle (what a bloody stupid idea, putting a bar on a boat, when the floor moves up and down and you feel a little bit sick you have to think ‘is this beer really good, or are we just riding a swell?’

Then meandered towards Poons. For Chinese. Specifically, for a bucket of hot and sour soup, some duck, beef in ginger and chilli sauce and a couple of Ting Taou.

Poons is gone! We pitch up and the restaurant has changed its name and there’s hardly anyone sitting there. The place used to be packed. Okay, staff are the same, let’s give it a go. Order beers. Open menu.

No hot and sour soup. What the hell is going on? Has the world gone mad - you come to Poons and you have your hot and sour soup. Paid for beers, closed menus, drank beers and fucked off to a noodle bar. Which was…nice, but where were the rude waiters? Where was the dishes so good they made your nose run. This place was like a Disneyland version of an Oriental café, by which I guess I mean Japanese instead of Chinese. The staff were young and friendly. No! They should be obvious illegal immigrants that have just made the journey from Canton, sealed in a container for eight weeks been pitched up in Soho and told to start slinging soup to hungry Brits. They should have far too many teeth and no grasp of English apart from ‘you pay now’ or ‘service not included’. There should not be merchandise on sale, there should be mayhem in the kitchen, at least one loo out of order at all times and the certainty that even if you have drunk, for the sake of argument, a little too much, the soup will see you right and so you will avoid what I had this morning, which was a four-piece jazz band tuning up in my head, what appeared to be a square of pub carpet for a tongue and a strong urge never, ever to drink again. Ever.

1 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

I think you're more entertaining when you're hungover...or angry?

2:24 PM  

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