The good thing about having a friend or relative to visit is that you can visit all the culturally significant places you don’t think to go to as a resident. You can explore the museums, the galleries, and the historical points of interest. I say you CAN, or you can spend all day in the pub as you normally would which is pretty much what Dad and I did.
To be fair, we did visit the Anglican Cathedral which is always a pleasure. We took at trip up to the top of the tower too which I’ve done a couple of times before but always find fascinating. It’s an obvious point, but when you giddily make your way up the inside of the bell tower you can only wonder who the hell it was that was tasked with the responsibility of laying the millions of bricks needed whilst sitting on a plank hundreds of feet above the ground being buffeted by wind. People were made of different stuff back then.
Although, come to think of it, the cathedral was only finished in 1971. So people were made of different stuff in the early 70’s? Yes, yes they must have been. I think that was well proven in ‘On The Buses’.
At the top of the tower was a volunteer who’s job it was to kindly offer help and information to visitors wishing to know what certain landmarks were or learn about the history of the building. This is a pleasant service, but when he came over to Dad and I, it was clear that his flies were undone and he was slightly too friendly and tricky to shake off. He was that most dangerous of social animals – the lonely do-gooder. I ignored his trouser situation and certainly didn’t begrudge him rather forcing himself on us in a whirlwind of good nature, but he did commit one of the more tiresome crimes that quite a lot of people in Liverpool can be guilty of.
He asked us where we’d already been today and I truthfully said that we’d had breakfast in Alma De Cuba. Now, the breakfast Dad and I both chose was Cuban Eggs which is an excellent start to the day as it consists of a bed of rice, two fried eggs, and a spicy tomato dressing. It also only costs £4.95, which is cheaper than most greasy spoon fry-ups. But our choice of breakfast met with a flurry of exasperated indignation from Mr Trousers who said “You must have some money! Going in there! You must have money!� I know he’s only trying to be jovial but it’s not the first time I’ve been told off by strangers for supposedly spending lots of money when I’ve not been in the least bit extravagant. It happens quite a lot in my local Spar shop. I’ve been told off by the cashier for buying stuff in there before because you can get it marginally cheaper in the supermarket. It’s an odd one.
So I said to Mr Trousers, “The breakfasts were only £4.95 each� but in doing so I felt like I was defending my right to sit in pleasant surroundings for a bit of scram and realised that he’d won. Even though he was completely wrong, he’d still made me defend buying an excellent breakfast that costs less, as we’ve established, as a rubbish breakfast bought out of a filthy caravan on the A40. You’ll be very proud of me though, I didn’t let him ruin my day. I am mature.
Dad and I did have a great day. We went to Peter Kavanagh’s. We went to the Lion. We met Trevor and he and Dad got on like old army buddies. We did a bit of a crawl and then had a drunken dinner at Sapporo, which is always an entertaining place to eat – the atmosphere was amazing tonight, something approaching a circus.
I can imagine Mr Trousers having a heart attack though. “You went to Sapporo! You must be an oil baron! Good God! Are you related to that Irish woman who won the European Lottery?�
Then, by pure good fortune, we bumped into a group of four girls from Northern Ireland who are friends of K and H. So it was straight into The Swan and then onto Korova. There’s an excellent point made in Frank Rich’s ’86 Rules Of Drinking’ that reads ‘Our parents were better drinkers than we are’. This is absolutely true. Dad’s not only got an iron belly, he can also turn on the charm when sloshed whereas I can only turn on what I presume to be charm but is, in fact, undiluted nonsense.
We didn’t take advantage of the new 4am opening hours and were home for half two. The new laws will take some getting used to and I hope they prove popular and profitable because bars will probably extend them further to 6am or even 24-hour, which is available upon application. The reason this would be good isn’t so much about the extended drinking time available, but the flexibility it would introduce to your evening’s plans. It would be quite nice to head out for a night on the sauce at 1am. The best solution to insomnia ever? Bars could run advertising campaigns along the lines of ‘Can’t sleep? Then come down for a few cocktails, friend.’ That would be amazing, really it would.
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