Get your kids out of my alehouse - NOW

That'll be £19 please

Some dingbat tweeted this today: "Hither Green people: DECENT LOCAL PUB ALERT!! The Lord Northbrook near Lee station. Completely refurbished & familyfriendly. It's lovely!" 
I feel compelled to respond.
Take your children, your buggies, your piles of fucking toys, your colouring in books ('oh Josh and Hetty are so creative!' 'Yes, so's my Jacasta. Don't pull Max's hair, darling') and sod off.
It's a pub - it's for grown ups. I don't bring a bag of cans down the nursery. Hardly ever. Because it doesn't fit. No one wants to hear your precious little angels until they have developed something approaching an indoor voice. Kids have two settings - loud and off. They are unsuitable for public consumption.
No one cares if they can walk or talk or play the recorder or ride a bike or do joined up writing. We can do all that for ourselves. 

You sit there all smug with your JCB prams, taking up the corner - yes, you always wodge yourselves in the corner - with your ghastly 'work in progress'.

All the lads have long fucking hair - you think it's you allowing them 'personality' but singularly fail to grasp that you're schooling them in conformity. These uniformed little toy soldiers are racing up the same track as their vapid parents. 

You with your Sunday papers and your friends all sitting there, dead from the neck up, desperately looking round the table for something, anything to tell you this is all worth it, and wondering which one of them you could fuck.

Sandals and shorts in the summer, Gola fucking trainers and scarves in the autumn - coalition-tolerating, dribbling halfwits. 'Family friendly' pubs are an abomination - they should be WIPED OUT! You gave up fun for kids, why poison the rest of us?
You've had it your own way for long enough and it's about time we pushed back. Next time you see this shower, plonk yourself down in the middle of them and swear and fart as if your very sanity depends on it. Because it just might.

Had to include this emailed response from a chum: 'A local cafe near me has felt the wrath of the mumsnet crew as well. The cafe put up a sign saying that the regulars were being driven out by screaming kids running about the place. All they said was ‘you can come in but you need to ensure that your kids are kept under control for the sake of other customers’. From the reaction of the parents you’d have thought the place had arranged a sex offenders coffee morning. Bellends.'

 

Limehouse Basin to Islington - a trudge

Gas thing

Went for a mooch on Sunday in the pissing rain because that's how I roll. Mrs Biff's insistence that i detach myself from the nerd box was the catalyst, and the promise of pizza for tea, changed at the last minute to curry, sealed the deal.
Got the DLR from sexy Lewisham to Limehouse then walked the path along the Regent's Canal. It's about 4.5 miles to Angel but we bailed at the Rosemary Branch pub because I used to live near there and hadn't been in for a while.
The pub's the same as ever - good selection of beers, normal-ish punters. There was a fella playing the piano, who appreciated Mrs Biff's slight inclination of the head and single clap as he rounded off his set.
Everyone in there seemed to be having some kind of laptop-off with each other, greedily snaffling the free wifi. Best of all though was the lad behind the bar brought out a tray of leftover roasties and Yorkshire puds (they do roast dinners in there, which look ace) and a pan of gravy for dipping. It was manna from meff-food heaven.
As for the walk itself, it's better doing this sort of thing in London than, say, the Lake District because there's none of that awful hello-ing or even worse the half-nod-with-a-smile-rising-to-a-sort-of-peer-out-of-an-imaginary-hole as you pass someone.
You just power on knowing that if anyone so much as looks your way you can lash them in the canal and be done with it. Cyclists especially. Bunch of wankers - slow the fuck down, this isn't Amsterdam. A ring of the bell doesn't make people vanish.
It's quite a nice walk but it got a bit chokka where the Shoreditch festival was on - it looked terrible, incidentally.
Best bit was a barge full of lesbians going up in the lock. I assume they were lesbians as there were three of them all together on one boat. Incredible scenes.

Dunno

A path for walking on

This is not art

Someone tied a load of meff Tesco bread bags to a rail

Evil Edna

The crud list

Five pounds please

Because not everything's ace. These things are crud:

Stubbing your toe
EastEnders
Oasis (since 1995)
Watching football on 'the Norwegian'
Watching football on the snide internet sites
That awful Miranda programme
Wet cuffs
Wet socks
Riding your bike in the pissing rain
Secret fucking Santa at work
Trying to find out my fucking birthday at work
Other people's fucking birthdays at work
Leaving cards
Christmas cards
Birthday cards
Get well soon cards
Sorry you've got aids cards
Works chrimbo dos
Sitting next to your boss at the works fucking chrimbo do
Low sugar jam
Piccalilly
Pubs charging over four quid - FOUR QUID - for a pint and putting that little tray down with the change in: They're saying 'I don't even want to touch you but give me your money'
Self-service tills
Warm toilet seats
Ross Noble - get to the point, fatty
The Champions League
The Premier League
People not coming to work because it's snowing. A bit
Umbrellas
All foreign language films
People who do all the flicks on nerd togger - just fuck off
The smooth-chops one off Peep Show
X-Factor
Adidas Forest Hills
Most of Adidas' recent trainer output
Paul Smith - abysmal quality
See also Lacoste, in all but the polo shirts
The fella who hates me in the post office - you fat prick
Those fuckers on Question Time who don't ask questions but make statements aimed at getting applause
Their expression as they sit back to the sound of said applause
Those UKIP bellends
Those coalition bellends
Teams taking 20 minutes for half time
Goalies hanging on to the ball for over six seconds - I'M COUNTING
Extra time in night games
In winter
Then penalties
Going out on same
Papers putting rugby and cricket before football in the sport bit
Reporters who take football, and especially the England team, so seriously
Zane Lowe - relax, you squinting spastic, it's pop music,
Alan FUCKING Green
Phil Thompson saying '...and everything' on Sky's Saturday goals thing. And what, Phil? And what!
Meetings
Pre-meeting meetings
Post-meeting meetings
Tripping over
Drivers who think a red light means 'speed up now'
Bus drivers
'Can I get'
'I'm good'
People leaving one biscuit in the pack/tin
People who take the last of the milk and put the bottle back in the fridge
People who don't wash their hands after going the toilet
People
Corrie at the mo - honestly, John Stape? No one fucking cares
G2 in that horrible smugfest The Guardian
Cheap socks
Britain's Got Talent
People not giving 'the wave' when I let them through in me car
People not giving 'the wave' when I let them through on me bike
'South Park smiles' at work
Being post shower but pre clobber in winter
The boiler breaking
Orange's phone signal
People bleating about the snow
Alan Titchmarsh
That nob who does the interviews on Sky Sports News, can't remember his name but he's dead tall and clearly no one likes him
Own brand beans
Under-done toast
Under-done chips
Deep-pan pizza
People moaning about Tube strikes - walk, lazyarse.
People who aren't in a trade union
People who used to be in a union but aren't now
The red and brown sauce they use in cafes
Easter eggs
The squeak at Goodison from the corner when a poorly-supported visiting team score
Getting to White Hart Lane
Getting away from White Hart Lane
Anyone wearing any of this lot - scarf, flip flops, three-quarter length kecks, sandals, sunglasses - in the pub
People not offering one of the recognised forms of thanks for a door hold

I hold these truths to be self evident. What about you?