I want to be entertained

Police have started preparing for christmas party season, warning against drinking too much:

“If you think you’ve had too much or a friend tells you you’ve had too much, listen to their advice. Get a ride home, use a designated driver. We don’t want to have a tragedy around the holidays”

The Police also warned against the temptation to drink and drive, stating

“We will have DWI patrol cars out there checking for DWI, but not in any particular check points. We will be in bar areas and we will have increased foot patrol as well”

-Its good to see that the Police are going to be prepared i guess.. Does anyone else think its a bit overkill?

Alistair Darling has been banned from a string of bars and pubs in Sunderland after their owner has decided that he has had enough of Mr Darling’s VAT cuts that don’t affect pubs. I guess he has a point. The recent cuts in VAT will only aid the Supermarkets dicount drinks (which pubs and taverns are already strugglig against) but will leave pubs and taverns without any kind of reduction at all.

The posters, stating “We hereby give notice that Alistair Darling, Chancellor of the Exchequer, is barred from this pub until further notice”

I’m not too sure that Alistair will be visiting Sunderland anytime soon anyways, but its the thought that counts I guess..

So we had some of those promotional coupons for Wetherspoons the other day that are supposed to give you money off beer and burgers and all sorts of other bits and bobs. I would just like to say that they are the most pointless thing in the world. For starters, you only get a maximum of about 10p off the price of a drink. 10 pence. That’s it.. Lets ignore the fact that you look like a complete tramp ferreting around for a bit of magazine paper that you have to tear in half down the scissor lines while the bar queue builds up around you. When you work it out properly and it means it you drink about 20 pints, all using the vouchers.. You have saved enough money to buy a whole extra pint. Rubbish.

I didn’t get the chance to see what the food ones where like, but I can imagine they are probably just as bad. Don’t get me wrong, I like Wetherspoons food.. If you manage to get a good chef, the mixed Grills are brill, curries are good… Just don’t bother with the crappy vouchers unless you like looking like a complete cheapskate.

I would definitely advise that if you do receive the vouchers, throw them away immediately.. or stick them on eBay or something. Seriously, those eBay people will buy anything.

So I had the opportunity to pop down to Birmingham over the weekend. We ended up going to the Carling Academy for a night of mosh pitting. This sort of place in not generally my thing and after a night there I can safely say that the place is just about the nastiest place on earth.

From the mountains of empty plastic beer glasses that pile up around your feet as the night goes on to the stickiness of the floors and the angry teenage idiots that seem to frequent such a place I cannot think of a single good point about the place. I guess the music was OK, but there is only so much B grade metal I can listen to before I need another decent song.

Oh, and by the way, I still feel ill after the drinks in there.. If you do have to go, bring a hit flask or something

So, in as few words as possible, I hated it.

Carnage UK is a massive drinking event where thousands of Students pour onto the streets in search of a huge drink filled night (and morning) of drunken Carnage. The even which takes place in Guildford has sparked massive controversy and there are calls for the Police to intervene

Police licensing officer Graeme Cheetham said: ‘Police have met with all the participating venues and indicated that although we do not support this type of event, there is no legislation available to prevent it taking place.’

Surely there is something that can be done about the sheer amount of people taking part. Licencing laws should be altered to prevent this sort of thing happening. I agree that it must be a good night, but think of the poor Guildfordian, up all night while their poor town get quite literally torn to shreds.

I know its old news and everything, but I thought it was an interesting article back in 2005. The secret behind beer goggles is appaently not just due to the beer. Other factors included are lower light levels, poor eyesight late at night and the smokiness of the room.They all add up to make an ugly look prettier..

They even made a handy formula:

An=number of units of alcohol
S=smokiness of room (rated 1-10)
L=luminance of person of interest (how light the area around target) in candelas per sqare inch (1 is pitch black, 150 is normal room lighting)
Vo=Snellen visual acuity (6/6 is normal, 6/12 just meets driving standard)
d=distance.

Some recent research seemed to show that louder music makes customers drink more alcohol and drink it faster.

When the music is turned up, conversation drops giving people less of a chance to talk. Louder music also kick starts the brain into a more lively state, where people are more likley to be in a better mood. Admittedly the results don’t sound that impressive, but the French University of South Brittany said that an average rise of roughly 1 drink per night is a lot.

The research has led to a bill being put foreward to turn down the music in pubs and bars in an effort to cut down on binge drinking. The bill also calls for and end to drinks with suggestive names such as Sex on the Beach.

What will the fun police think of next?

I mentioned in a previous post that anti-ageing beer was being created from a yeast called reservatol that was supposed to be much healthier than normal beer and could even prolong your life by preventing Alzheimer’s, cancer and diabetes.

Unfortunately, it turns out that beer brewed with this type of yeast tastes horrible. Apparently the Texan researchers are all below 21, which makes it illegal for them to taste the beer themselves.

Thomas Segall-Shapiro, one of the researchers told The Sun:

“No way would anyone drink this until it tastes better”

..You can’t make this stuff up..

I saw the other day that the record for most beer carried was taken the other day by an Australian born restaurant manager. The  guy managed to carry 20 mugs for 40 yards without a drop spilt. This prompted another record attempt by a German barmaid. Unfortunately she failed as the 21st mug toppled and spilt beer.

this prompted me to have a look into some more drink related records:

• Fastest beer drunk: 1 litre of beer in 1.3 seconds way back in 1977
• Most alcohol in blood: .55 Turns out that this is about four times the amount needed to kill you (about 4 litres of vodka). Police arrested the woman for drunk driving.
• Fastest beer opening: 300 bottles in 1 minute 47 seconds
• Fastest beer mile: 5 minutes and 40 seconds. A For those who don’t know, a beer mile is where you run a mile on a track. For every lap you do, you have to neck a pint. If you throw up, you have to do extra laps.
• Most pint glasses balanced on chin: 75. The guy that holds this one is also has the record for the most records taken.

On a somewhat more technical note than usual, Google, the search giant has recently released a product that goes alongside their Gmail service called Google Goggles that makes you answer a series of maths questions if you try and send an email at the weekend, late at night. The idea is that you save yourself the embarasment of sending drunken emails after a late night.. The questions are quite difficult and I would probably just give up and send it from my Hotmail account instead, but its a pretty good idea though. It might at least make me think twice before sending anything.