Yeah, it's free, don't worry, sit there. Just let me move my stuff. Yes it is busy. Starts to get that way now. Be different later, the seams will be popping when the football starts. Need a shoe horn to fit people in then and it'll be an absolute madhouse to get to the bar.

Why am I laughing? ... I could n't help it...heard you muttering... what you said about warm beer. Every American, its the same thing; you were expecting cold, and you got a mouthful of unfiltered river bed instead.

And you're clearly not English, you've none of the warning signs: not fat, no tattoos or tongue piercings, you don't have the skin complexion of a cheese and onion crisp, and, of course, there's that full set of teeth. You stand out. Observe the contrast. Just look around...be discrete...see what I mean? The real population of this country should be about two million, not sixty...look at us, the ugliest nation afloat. No wonder we're an island. Quarantined to protect the global gene pool. Christ, I don't how we breed.

That's the thing with this pub, every conceivable mis-shape and some that are off the spectrum, are in here...it's like that bar in Star Wars with the wookies and God knows what else.

Ok, that's my little rant over. By the way, the pub is the spiritual home of the outburst. Take it as it comes. You'll hear all sorts of stuff in the pub. Usually low-level bitching but occasionally there's something worthwhile

So, how about you... why are you here? Studying ? Tourist? Ah..a pub experience, that's what you want. OK. Fair enough.

This place is n't too bad. Actually it's one of the better places. Food's good. Yes, that's correct, you heard right; the food in England is good now. Forget what ever you've read. It's edible, it has taste, it can be successfully digested. Look, see what's on the menu. This is a gastro pub. Gastro, that is, ending in onomy, not entitis. Incredibly, most people here, even those who look dead-eyed lumpfish standing on their flippers, can tell a raspberry coulis from a Bearnaise sauce, and a thyme infused lamb shank from a coq au vin. Put that all down to the relentless march of time and Jamie Oliver.

You've already had something here? The nuts on the bar ! No, you did n't...tell me you did n't...That's stomach pump stuff. People go to the gents, the ladies, they don't wash their hands...back to the bar...order a drink... grab a handful of nuts out the basket on the bar and ingest the urine and fecal samples of their great unwashed compatriots. Don't. Do not. You've been warned. If you want to eat, order from the menu, or get something that comes in a sealed bag.

I'm not exaggerating; I know it might sound like it, but I'm not. Just being candid on the subject of good and bad pub food. Nuts are bad. And if you're thinking of taking some nuts home from here that have feet on them, then make sure they're condom-wrapped for freshness.

Too direct. I'm sorry.

They'll be putting the football on in a minute. Be an absolute bear pit then. Pubs are tribal homes for football fans. It's like dogs and scent markings; this pub for one team, that pub for another. You'll see more pacing around when that match starts then you will in a year in the corridors of a maternity hospital. Every shade of emotion, every delicate nuance, from uber-euphoria to the darkest, meanest.

Forget the David Niven stiff upper lip, Ice cold in Alex thing, this will be pure madness. Several hundred overweight, gap-toothed men with enough hair between them to thatch the roof of a dog kennel, baying at the moon. Don't even ask what the women are going to be like either. There'll be so much shrieking it'll break every glass in the pub and the windows will probably shatter.

No, it's not every night. They do discos and bloody karaoke other nights. The speciality here is an '80s disco; crappy synth bands and power shouldered shouters with asymmetric haircuts. I loathed it then, I loath it now. Plus there's always some prat who comes along in his Flock of Seagulls gear with his over-ripe, flesh bulging in all the wrong places, Like A Virgin era Madonna wannabe partner. I never come on those days. My heart can't take it. It just can't. I'd blow a ventricle, I'm sure of it.

Karaoke...yes I have. I have tortured songs thinking I'm Mick Jagger or John Lennon. Lessons learned. That's all I'm going to say. Other nights, they might do a pub quiz. I used to be in a team that my cousin captained, but that all fall apart; I was so desperate to impress a woman on the same team how quick off the buzzer I was that I answered every question wrong. The moral from this part of my sermon is: don't take part in teams with family members who play to win and for whom defeat is unthinkable, and certainly don't think that sexy looking women are going to get turned on by a man whose only claim to fame is his advanced general knowledge skill. I have laid to rest that little notion single-handedly

The Ladies room? Where those people are going out to smoke, just before there...see the signs? You want the one that says Bitches, Bastards is the men's room. I'm joking, I'm joking...

I'll look after your stuff. Do you want another beer when you come back?