I am Christ. This has nothing to do with the rest of the post, but I've decided to seize on Bentley's habit of beginning each entry with captivating irrelevance. And, in the continuing spirit of onedownsmanship, I'll add a few choice beverages of my own, UK edition:

Alcoh-Pops: This is the euphemism Brits use in an ill-fated attempt to make the likes of Schmirnoff Ice and Bacardi Silver suitable for human consumption. If you're drinking it, you're at a club called "Filth" somewhere in the Midlands that lives quite well up to its name. You're stunningly attractive, yet have no ass to speak of, and as per common law statute, are "sort of" dating a musician from London. Or you're an American.

Carlsberg: You're a scared shitless Fresher from Devonshire, in over your head at Oxbridge and you're nursing it, at £1.80 a pint, as if it were your blessed mother's breast milk. Or you're a lagerphilic American.

Carling: You meant to order a Carlsberg, but you're too far into it to care. Or you meant to order a Carlsberg and you're an American.

Tetley's Bitter: You're a bic-headed rugby hooligan called Jimb-O, and currently letting the dartboard know what a "fuck-king cunt" it is for refusing to hold onto that last triple twenty you need to beat Dom and the boys. Or you can't afford Carlsberg because you got screwed at the currency exchange and you're an American.

Guinness: You are a former member of the Irish Republican Army, perversely embittered by the vagaries of war of peace. Once, you were a hero of the Counties, now nought but a by-gone relic of "Troubles" your people would just as soon forget, as every day they inch closer to an unholy union with the Orange Men; or, if the pint is sitting unattended and two-thirds full on a crowded bartop, you're an American.

John Smith's Smooth: You are presently dressed in full sub-fusc, black suit, white bowtie, gown and mortarboard, with a pint of dark brown smooth in one hand and a rusty, chipped iron and wood bucket chained to your other, and you've just been instructed by the right honourable master of your drinking society to fill the bucket, "one way or another." Or you tried this instead of Guinness because you're an American.

Budweiser: You're a self-hating Brit or a Brit-hating American.

Pimm's: It's summer term and after six days of play, you've just handed Albert Lord Rothermere's eldest son a sound trouncing at the cricket grounds of Christ Church Meadow. Or you're an American who's never quite forgotten the first time he saw King Ralph.

Champagne: You're a Brit and its either Monday or Tuesday, or late in the week, or Saturday, or the day you go to Church. Or you're celebrating having just become an American, having just met an American, or having just heard about the existence of Americans.


Eat, drink, and be merry. For tomorrow we drink.