A rabbit walks into a bar...

A rabbit walks into a bar.

Blah, blah and more blah (with a slight poke at the Great Leader, and beer)

Tonight I hosted at the comedy club, which was for the best as I'd not written anything new or rehearsed this week. In fact, I really haven't rehearsed for ages.

I got away with it though, bouncing along on a tide of old jokes and inane crudeness, trying out a different order for my Shenzhen girlfriend joke (which didn't work) and getting some laughs for my porn marathon. A good crowd, even if it was just four paying customers and some comedians.

Year of Eating Differently (101): Crown and Two Chairmen, Dean Street

So after a weekend in Sweden drinking incredibly strong coffee and eating cream buns, back to London. Went to the pub for something to eat.
The place has tried to rebrand itself as a gastropub when it's in the middle of Soho and therefore beset by hordes of weekend drinkers who probably don't appreciate that kind of thing. However, on a Monday lunchtime it's pretty much empty (there's me, the guitarist from a Hawkwind tribute band, and a woman who appears to be sucking her thumb). I get risotto with asparagus, which arrives after twenty minutes, and is pretty good, although far too small. Luckily I've also got chips, but unfortunately chips + risotto is too rich a blend and now I feel bloated and want to go back to sleep.

Year of Eating Differently (84): Slug & Lettuce, Wardour Street

Burger too big? Mouth too small? Manners too corroded? Really hard to say what was up with the Slug & Lettuce, but I ended up with burger sauce down the front of my top. By all accounts, I'm a revolting sight to see, scarfing down food as fast as I can in order to get back to the office to maximise shareholder value.
Anyway, the Slug & Lettuce is a nice counterpoint to All Bar One. All Bar One is where "people meet people meet people" - people with a bit of a stutter, perhaps? The Slug and Lettuce just sounds like an unfortunate combination. Both of them are strange places to be for lunch midweek - they're much more natural being full of braying idiots in cheap suits, enjoying a moment of 'freedom' at the end of a hard week. Losers. They'll be enjoying their 'freedom' wandering around Ikea in 16 hours time, or watching Sky Sports on their credit-card-funded plasma screen.
Burger is pretty good, although the bun is very big and square, and thus not suitable for jamming into your mouth in one go. Leads to mess down your front.
Chips look anaemic but taste really good. So it goes to show you shouldn't judge everything on appearances. Like the waitress with blonde hair and skin so pale that from a distance they combine and you think she's bald. Or the wallpaper, that looks like flock but inflated to the nth degree. Hmm. Not bad at all, really.

Year of Eating Differently (48): All Bar One, Dean Street

The Marie Celeste of food-pubs
A spookily empty bar. I suppose even the reprobates of Soho look askance at going to All Bar One on a Monday lunchtime. Is that because they're in more squalid environs? Is it because the usual clientele are some stuffed-shirt gumpfs from Essex, up for the evening and up for a good time? Such bitchiness and prejudice aside, a pretty good meal today. Annoyingly, the vegetarian burger doesn't come with fries as standard whereas all other burgers do.

Where are my chips?
Then again, it's cheaper, so I guess you don't miss out on too much. Although this does raise the question of why the chips are missing - is this the token healthy option? And why are the menus sheets that you tear off a great big pad attached to one of the pillars? And why if the menu is like that is there a huge blackboard with the daily specials chalked on it? And why are the daily specials exactly the same as what's on the printed menu? Can't they just find a laminating machine and recycle?

One menu is small, the other is far away...
So many questions. But as it is, I've filled up on mushroom and halloumi, and with my newfound addiction to mustard, I'm a little fuzzed out and trying to bluff it out for the rest of the afternoon.