Partick...The Twilight Zone

I was in my new favourite pub in Partick recently. As the night wore on I felt like I was in the Twilight Zone.

Quite early on one guy about 50 years old was dancing on his own in the middle of the floor to an Elvis tune, sort of shuffling and turning around with an occasional swing of hips. Yep, just like the big man himself. He was almost bald but had swept his hair over the top in the traditional combover style of the older gent. He had a very, very thick neck and a huge pot belly, wearing a black shirt, open at the neck to show off his gold chain and as he danced and sort of walked around the pub he was clapping above his head. No one else was dancing. I stared at him for some time.

My brother and I sat in the corner and then this couple sat down beside us. I could see my brother staring and when I looked round myself I could see why. The biggest ring was about 1.5 inches square and covered in "diamonds". The other fingers were adorned with several other rings, many with black onyx, all gold. On one wrist he had three huge chunky gold bracelets, each one bigger than the one below it. Maybe he had an account at H. Samuel.

He had huge sideburns, not bushy, but covering a very large area. Cropped greying hair, slightly balding on top. He was wearing one of those "soft touch" button down collar shirts, almost the same as one I bought in Burton 15 years ago when they were cool, and dark blue baggy tracky bottoms. Quite an ensemble. When he stood up to go to the bar I noticed he had one of his front shirt tails hanging out. And he never tucked it in and it annoyed me all friggin night. He had stuffed a pack of cigarettes in his shirt pocket which dragged the front of his shirt down quite a bit making him look even more shambolic. He was a right fucking state.

His tattoos were nice though. 'Mum' and 'Dad' on one forearm and on the other arm a skull wearing a top hat. In one ear he had a small Samsung earpiece to make it easier to handle his many incoming calls. Obviously no-one actually called him. Why would they? All his pals were probably in the pub, sitting beside him.

Both he and his wife sat drinking Smirnoff Ice, through straws. Cool for her, gay for him.

After a while they were joined by a regular in the pub. The blind woman. Quite short and round with a blue and pink Calvin Klein handbag. Genuine I'll wager!.

It's like one of these pubs you only hear about. I remember once me and a few pals of mine went for a drive to go for a pint, to Falkirk. Now Falkirk was about 30 miles from where we lived. Christ knows why we went there or went that far, but when we got there, we found this pub near the town centre, in the pedestrianised area. There was no-one on the streets and we walked in. It was quite a small pub and I was first through the door. I swear on my life, when we walked in, every single person in that pub, about twenty in all, stopped their conversations and looked round at us. It took us about three seconds and a few furtive nods to each other to mutually and silently agree that we weren't going to have pint in that pub.

We walked back out, got into the cars and drove all the way home.

Back to Glasgow.

In Partick on this night, there were a bunch of girls at the end of the bar who took turns going behind the bar to get themselves drinks. I watched them. I assumed one was the manager and was giving her pals free reign. There was an older woman there who looked like the Glaswegian Dot Cotton. She was nipping in behind the bar too and at one point went round collecting glasses.

One woman in a white skirt was behind the bar a couple of times up on the barman.....on the barman, not the bar. She had her legs round his waist, holding onto his neck, humping at him. These women became more lubricated with the vodka and ended up dancing on the pool table at the end of the night. Always a winner. Short skirts, pissed girls, dancing on pool tables. My brother and I watched intently hoping one would fall over and well....you know.

One of the barmaids explained they were all staff who'd just been to a wedding.

After we left the pub, the show didn't stop there.

We went across to the chippy and in there was a guy leaning back on the ledge at the window just singing his heart out. He hadn't bought any chips and didn't look as though he had any intention of doing so. He was just pissed and singing. On the way out I threw 10p to him for his troubles. I was ready to run if he took offence but he never bloody noticed. Waste of 10p.

And at the end of the night I made it home without being violated. Which was good.