The Lemon Fool

Ye gods, thank goodness it's July, and I can stop being a teetotaller again. Yes, I've settled into a routine of going on the wagon every four months, partly because it's good for me and partly because it's just kind of nice to know that I can. And June was one of those months.

Except that a dry month in the summer seems to be harder than a dry February or a dry October...… Not for me, you understand, but for my friends, some of whom were giving me a bit of stick that I really hadn't quite expected.

* "Haha, so you're on the homeopathic mineral water again then?"

* "Okay, you can tell me, what's the doctor been saying to you on the quiet?"

* "That'll be a cheap round for you then, won't it?"

* "Oh come on, it's no fun if you don't."

* "Got to wait till the antibiotics have finished, have we, eh, nudge nudge, eh?"

Eyebrows raised in the pub (where I'm hardly a regular anyway, maybe once a month). Near neighbour who was really quite offended that I wouldn't touch the liquor at his wedding anniversary do. (I eventually slipped a soft drink into my Pimms glass and hoped he wouldn't notice.)

Flipping heck, I don't mix in boorish beer-swilling circles, and I don't watch the rugby in the pub, and I thought I knew these people better than that. Am I, perhaps, frightening them? And why?

BJ

These are *exactly* the things that got said to me when I gave up the grog for four (long) months about 40 years ago.

People are scared by these sorts of changes and want you to fail because they feel inferior for not being able to do it.

Nowadays I have two months a year off, don't tell anyone that I am off, and drive everywhere I would normally have a drink, except home.

I'm slightly sad though that things haven't really moved on in the last 40 years, especially given that we are drinking so much less beer than we did even a few years ago.

DM

dionaeamuscipula wrote:
I'm slightly sad though that things haven't really moved on in the last 40 years, especially given that we are drinking so much less beer than we did even a few years ago.

I think they may have moved on, but perhaps not for our generation...

The volume of beer sold in Britain has fallen by more than a third in 12 years, with young people driving the popularity of alcohol-free drinks, a new report has revealed.

In the year to March 2019, on-trade beer sales dropped to 3.6 billion pints from 5.7 billion pints in January 2007, according to the British Beer and Pub Association.

The report, conducted by Marston’s, the brewers from Wolverhampton, shows that there has been a 30% growth in no / low alcohol beer since 2016 and some 40 new product launches in the last two years.

The popularity of alcohol free products is being led by 18-24 year olds with almost one in 10 (nine per cent) having already switched to sobriety, and those aged between 18-34 being the most likely age band to consider turning to alcohol free drinks (22 per cent), according to the Portman Group.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/0 ... opularity/

Cheers,

Itsallaguess

A lot of young people have switched to 'skunk' judging by the whiff.
They could also be lying.

Plus, the % of muslims is a lot higher in younger age bands

Itsallaguess wrote:[
The report, conducted by Marston’s, the brewers from Wolverhampton,

wolverhampton? Burton on Trent !!

didds

No, not these days, part of Banks's /Wolverhampton and Dudley [ edit, who renamed themselves 'Marstons'...]
Founded in Burton of course