It's not so long ago, really, that finding somewhere to go after last orders was problematic. Okay, it's 25 years ago, probably more, but it doesn't feel so long since The Man of Cheese and I, plus whatever assortment of others was out that week, would exit a pub a little after closing time and stumble around the provnicial streets of small-town east Kent, in search of a late drink... somewhere.
The thing about stumbling around provincial streets of small towms is that they tend to be pretty quiet, late at night, unlike gaggles of youth post-pub. Often, one of our number would entreat the others to keep it down a bit - we were good eggs, really. But this, in turn, could result in a woozy, beery, giggly rendition of a song from the others in attendance. Verses only, of course; no-one really had the vocal chops for the chorus. I can still hear it now...
I expect some would have seen the title of this blog post and expected some early REM. Well, I don't like to disappoint, so here it is.
God, I love REM, especially the IRS years. But anyway, the song of theirs I should really include if I want to maintain the theme of walking home tipsy after a night out, stumbling around being accidentally noisy, is this. Intentionally or otherwise, it always felt like the perfect song for arriving home, unable to be quiet despite best intentions, the slightly goofy guitar line through the verse a perfect fit for the attempt to get yourself "up the stairs to the landing, up the stairs into the hall..."
Ah happy and carefree days. On a drive home from a late shift I sometimes see groups of youngsters stumbling around or arm in arm holding each other up after a drink or ten, always takes me back and makes me smile. Can someone invent a time machine please?
ReplyDeleteThe happiest. Mind you, we can still stumble with the best of them, just not as often and we suffer more the next day...
DeleteAh yes, those long, late night drunken walks of 40 years ago, I remember them well....or bits of them at least. In my case it was two miles from pub to home, frequently incorporating our flailing interpretations of the Monkees '...here we come, walking down the street...', or the Madness nutty boys equivalent, either of which invariably resulted in one or more of us being scattered across the pavement in a giggling heap. Halcyon days.
ReplyDeleteHa, have done both of those too. The Monkee walk is almost guaranteed to cause a stumble.
DeleteI have memories of 8 of us doing the Madness walk in rural Italy at Italia90
DeleteThese days that would be captured on someone's smartphone...
DeleteAh, what lovely and resonant reminiscences. I too remember the tipsy post-pub stumble home (or to boyfriend's home) - and one in particular, where the route back from the pub was down a winding, unlit country lane, in many spots bereft of pavement, with only the moon to guide us. There were many near-miss ditch disaster incidents, I can tell you.
ReplyDeleteOh, ditches... Let's not go there ;)
DeleteThere was a marked difference between my time still living at home with my parents in a Bristol suburb that was both geographically and culturally remote and years living in a city centre, for sure!
ReplyDeleteThe latter could go one of two ways. Either the drunken stumble in search of further drinking haunts, which was really not a problem with the number of all-nighters and renowned pubs with lock-ins.
On other occasions, after a night clubbing on no substances other than cans of Red Stripe and friends too far gone to carry on, I seemed to turn into Steve Austin/The Six Million Dollar Man and gain otherwise unseen sprinting skills and get home in record time.
No idea what that was about, but it may explain why I never got mugged when going home alone...too much effort to catch me!
Oh, I would have liked your Steve Austin abilities!
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