My heart goes out to the pub and restaurant trade

I just noticed my previous post was on this very subject but was a while back as we came out of Covid, or thought we did.

So now, you go into a pub, you must wear a mask whilst not at your table, you can't order or stand at the bar, everything is table service only. You can only take the mask off when you sit.

I went for something to eat with my pal The Bear tonight. Wore the mask, used the gel, scanned the check in with the NHS Track and Trace app which isn't associated with the NHS at all and is about as much use in the grand scheme of fighting Covid as a chocolate teapot.

We were told what we should do, what we shouldn't do. Everything has to be ordered via an app. I'd downloaded the app following a courtesy call today asking me to do so. Bear hadn't got it and he was paying. Growls from him as everything he ordered had to be keyed in and then put his card details in by hand. He may be 75, but this one pays for everything with a wave of his phone. That is of course except the time the lads sent him to buy beer and provisions for life on the boat down Cornwall and he waved his phone, only to find when he got back to the good ship Lollipop, he'd not actually paid. This is how I get him to do my bidding you see. I just threaten to ring the Tesco in Cornwall with his name and address, grassing him up like a kipper.

So with all the rules, having to order your drinks and food by phone, the relaxing dining experience sort of dies a death, when everyone is tapping away at their smartphone.

I will say, the service (extra bodies serving on tables etc), was first class, as was the food. We both had the Hunter's chicken tonight and I followed that with treacle sponge and custard which frankly should have a law against it. Two weaknesses on one plate, steamed pud and custard.

The Bell was pretty quiet, but I reckon with all this extra restriction on what you can and can't do whilst in a pub or restaurant, people are just going to order take aways. Christmas is coming and I for one tend not to eat out around that time, because everywhere is heaving with the ill -mannered and badly behaved.

I reckon the office Christmas party complete with a snog from Doreen in accounts just isn't going to happen this year. The Bell is part of a big chain, Ember Inns and I can't say a bad word about how they are organising people. But the dining experience is crushed. Add to this they are having to discount the food heavily, with no more government funding, whilst having to provide staff to serve on tables and your economic spreadsheet takes on a whole different complexion, a vile shade of puce.

I wonder about the small "spit and sawdust" pubs I used to favour when I could afford to go for a beer most nights a week. Mind you, there were pubs like the Britannia half way between Dudley and Sedgley where the landlady pulled the beer from taps on the wall. The place was so small it didn't have a bar in the bar and so, you were served at table. I also recall in the 70s, ATV's John Swallow reporting from a pub in the Black Country (Tipton I think), where a barmaid in her 70s served you at your table, wearing a T shirt, lurex hot pants and arriving on roller skates.

Those were indeed the days my friend and yes, we thought they'd never end...

Covid's not done and I do believe we can all forget the traditional Christmas and New Year shenanigans. We can all point the finger at the Covidiots, the teens, the government, but at the end of the day, the only way this thing is going to die a death, is to stop rubbing up against each other in pubs, at each other's houses, on public transport, massage parlours, American nail bars, anti mask tinfoil hat crayon munching events, sports meetings and of course stop eating the bats. Then, maybe things will get better. But it certainly isn't going to be over by Christmas.