It's the most pointless and overrated celebration going. The fact that pubs charge is outrageous - and I'm not convinced legal (if you are charging people to get in, you quite literally are not operating a public house). It also marks the end of the Christmas holidays, so it has that Sunday evening feel only more so. It's all a bit shit really. The only thing that kept me sane was listening to Nick Abbott's A-Z of 2022.
As with all 'Special days', it has become a money making venture for the fat merchants.
So stayed home, had a few extra and a Chicken madras. Looked for something to watch on the stream and stumbled on the 2019 Royal Edinburgh Tattoo. I love the pipes and drums, as well as the massed bands of the Guards, so I watched it.
It was marvellous and the joy from the different bands and dancers and singers from all over the world, joining in the spectacle was such a real pleasure to see.
The 2022 was brilliant, too. US army were great.
Then it occured to me that what made it really special, was there were no fucking politicians involved.
Never been a big fan of NYE. Last time I can remember celebrating it significantly was in 2001 in Sydney when we were holidaying in New Zealand and then spending a few days in Sydney on the way back. Thought we should make an effort and somehow managed to book a table situated in the first floor bay window of a decent Chinese restaurant in the Rocks area directly across the harbour from the opera house. A bit pricey but they had a fixed price nine course banquet menu incl. champagne.
Watched the usual procession of boats across the harbour and 2 fireworks displays (a short one at 9PM for youngsters and the big one at midnight). When the restaurant closed at 1AM they sent us off with a full bottle of champagne that was opened. Remember my wife calling her parents when we got back to our hotel to wish them a happy new year. When we returned home from the holiday they said my wife was slurring her words so badly they could hardly understand a word she had said.
When I worked in the hotel business I had to work every NYE, which really turned me off celebrating it when I left the industry. Now we have a couple of dogs we always stay at home to make sure they’re not traumatized by idiots letting off fire works all night long.
NYE was quite a big thing when j was a young lad growing up in Scotland. First footing and all that malarkey. I’ve gradually grown to dislike it all over the years. I find it very forced and always feel a little down after Christmas. I only stay up now to comfort my dog who goes mental at fireworks. Thankfully last night it was ten minutes’ worth.
Last time I went out on NYE was in the late 90's. My mate owned a village pub up in Nottinghamshire where I lived then. It was ticket only, but tickets were free and given to regulars only + 1. Everyone in the pub by 8.30 then doors were closed, my Mrs was one of the barmaids, so I took my usual stool at the bar and had a throughly good time, and much alcohol was consumed! Since then, it has been stay at home, have a few glasses of Red, watch TV, watch the fireworks on TV and bed! Last 2 years it's been stay-at-home, watch TV (last night it was Saving Private Ryan) and then bed by 11pm! Most enjoyable...and cheep! Trying to stay awake till midnight....nah thanks, getting ripped off in pubs...nah thanks, waking up feeling refreshed...yes please......until the game today will no doubt destroy my happy mood!
I used to dislike the pressure to have a really good time, it all seemed a bit forced.
My favourite NYE was when, after having a cold during the Christmas period at my parents house, I went back to London, and the next day went out for a coffee and a read of the newspaper. I looked at the date and it was the 1st of January. Had no idea it was New Year’s Eve the night before. Made my day!
Ironically, in recent years our New Year’s Eves have got better and better because we have friends who host host really good New Year’s Eve parties - so it’s all pretty straightforward. But I don’t blame anyone for ignoring the whole caboodle.
I've found that at NYE parties it's an exercise in forced jollity while you wait until 12:30 so you can go home to bed. Nowadays I much prefer, like others on here, a takeaway, a decent bottle of red and a film. Fireworks piss me off as they started around 7:30 last night, had a resurgence at 9:30 then from 11:30 to 12:30. Even the trembling hound ignored the last lot so perhaps he's getting over it. He's getting a long walk today before we have a massive Sunday lunch - perfect start to the year
I used to love a party as a chance to pull which was always good fun. Now, happily married for nearly 25 years, I am not a fan of parties as when music is blaring I can't hear any conversations. And my knees hurt when I dance. My message to those young enough to do those things is don't get too close to loud speakers and if you are injured, dont carry on playing football.
Never been one for being in tbe pub for midnight on nye meself. Was in the pub from about 1pm yesterday, but all the regulars drifted off about 7 o'clock as soon as all the one-night-a-year drinkers started piling in and rearranging the tables.
Always been one for New Years Day piss up at the football and then a disco / lock-in down the Horse in the evening. Great memories
Can't be arsed with it, cooked a nice meal at home and watched No Time To Die, mumbled Happy New Year to the missus and we went to bed. Only stayed up beyond midnight to soothe the dogs who don't like fireworks, so we have to play background music to try and drown them out
They got this up on the wall in my local. Sure it's been around for a while, but thought it was worth airing on this thread and pretty much sums up where I am as far as going to my local over Christmas and New Year. Had better sessions on the days between -
IMPORTANT NOTICE:
Christmas pub wankers, please think hard.
It’s that festive time of year when decent, honest boozers are plagued by non-drinkers. And not real non-drinkers, not people who don’t ever drink, they’re fine. We’re talking about people who don’t go near a pub for 11 months out of the year, the kind of awful human beings who buy their beer from supermarkets with the weekly shop, people who consume such a laughable quantity of alcohol that they can only be designated as “non-drinkers”.
Whether it’s the Christmas Work’s Do or a Festive Drink With Friends, you are ruining pubs for the rest of us. Everyone hates you. Every actual drinker in the pub hates you and all the serving staff hate you. You’re awful. Here’s a guide on how to not be quite so awful
DO NOT APPROACH THE BAR UNTIL YOU KNOW WHAT YOU WANT
• The bar is an intricate machine full of separate-yet-interconnecting cogs. It is NOT the place to think or choose or decide. The engine only works if everyone knows their place and performs their function. Do you hear that collective groan as you ask the Bartender if they’ve got Cranberry Juice? Or as you turn around to ask Barbara what she wants to drink? That groan is you single-handedly sucking life away from your fellow drinkers. Make a decision first, then go to the bar and order what you’ve selected. Just like ANY OTHER FORM OF COMMERCE!
DON'T START DRINKING AT 4pm
• You’re NOT a drinker. We haven’t seen you all year. You’re an amateur, so don’t start out with a Marathon. You can’t just rock up to the Premier League one day saying “I’m Match Fit, lads!” This is why you’re puking and crying before nine o’clock at night.
YOU ARE IN A ROUND
• I don’t care who you’re with, how many of you there are or how well you know them. You are in a Round with all the people you came in with. That’s how it works. You see those twenty-five loud, burly, drunken football supporters on the other side of the pub? They are a pleasure to serve compared to you. They order eight pints of lager, eight pints of Guiness, six pints of bitter and three Jack Daniels, then they pay the bill in one fell swoop. Your group orders ten drinks one-at-a-time and then pays for them all one-at-a-time as the rest of pub creeps closer to Death’s eternal grasp waiting for you to finish, despite the fact nine of you are drinking the same fucking drink and the last person, THE LAST PERSON, wants a Guiness putting on. Every single person waiting to get served wants your group to die in a complicated house fire.
KNOW WHERE YOU ARE
• Look around you. What kind of drinking establishment are you in? Is it a pub or a bar? If there’s 85 lads watching football on the telly, stop trying to be a drunk, flirty attention-whore because it won’t work. If the walls are cluttered with offers of 6 Shots Of Neon Sourz For A Fiver, don’t try asking for that Single Malt whiskey you memorized from Mad Men. Equally, if it’s a pub adorned with wood furnishings and hand-pulls, stop trying to get the Landlord to make that shitty cocktail you saw on Sex And The City
ATTRACTING ATTENTION
• Newsflash: You are NOT next. You might have been in the bar queue longer than anybody else, but that doesn’t mean you’re next. Do you know why? Because there are no "Official Rules Of Queueing At The Bar." The Bartender is 100% in charge of who is next. So do not piss them off. Yes, they can see you. You do not need to bang your change on the top of the bar. You do not need to wave your money around in the air, as if you’re the only person in the room with a tenner (unless it’s a Strip Club). You especially do not need to click your fingers like a Parisian Cafe prick or whistle like a Shepherd herding his flock. These tactics will only achieve one outcome: no matter how long you’ve been waiting up until this point, you’ve just moved yourself to the back of the queue.
PREFERENTIAL TREATMENT
• If an old bloke sat at the bar gets served before you do, and the Bartender knows him by name and even seems to know what he’s drinking before he orders it, just shut the fuck up. That’s Bob. Bob drinks here all the time. Bob drinks here five times a week, every week. Bob’s custom pays the bills. Bob and the other Regulars keep the pub open eleven months of the year whilst you’re having dinner parties and bulk-buying booze from the supermarket. Yes, they get preferential treatment. Accept it and shut the fuck up.
When I worked in the hotel business I had to work every NYE, which really turned me off celebrating it when I left the industry. Now we have a couple of dogs we always stay at home to make sure they’re not traumatized by idiots letting off fire works all night long.
As a dog owner it annoys me when other dog owners think they have the right to criticise people letting off fireworks on NYE or Bonfire night.
How people get excited enough to cheer like they’ve just won the lottery at possible the most predictable thing that occurs across the world, the clock ticking to midnight, I will never know.
One of the problems with NYE is that it feels forced as others have mentioned. This comes straight off the back of another forced event, Christmas. I love Christmas but can see why two forced events in a week gets people's back up.
I was in central London during most of the day yesterday and you just don't get that air of excitement that you get for other mass events.
You look at the crowd opposite the wheel and it just looks soulless. I think London could make the event much more enticing If it made the effort. I look at Times square and it looks like a cracking atmosphere
I don’t know why people would go to embankment to watch the fireworks. You have to get there hours early, can’t drink etc. just stand on the cold waiting for the 15 mins of fireworks
I don’t know why people would go to embankment to watch the fireworks. You have to get there hours early, can’t drink etc. just stand on the cold waiting for the 15 mins of fireworks
We went the year before Covid and everyone was drinking. All the pubs were serving in plastic cups so one of us would hold our spot on the embankment while the other got the drinks.
I don’t know why people would go to embankment to watch the fireworks. You have to get there hours early, can’t drink etc. just stand on the cold waiting for the 15 mins of fireworks
We went the year before Covid and everyone was drinking. All the pubs were serving in plastic cups so one of us would hold our spot on the embankment while the other got the drinks.
Have they changed the rules?
Was that the south side ?
Know someone who went in 2018 by Houses of Parliament and they said it was no alcohol allowed. Maybe it changed the next year?
Comments
So stayed home, had a few extra and a Chicken madras. Looked for something to watch on the stream and stumbled on the 2019 Royal Edinburgh Tattoo. I love the pipes and drums, as well as the massed bands of the Guards, so I watched it.
It was marvellous and the joy from the different bands and dancers and singers from all over the world, joining in the spectacle was such a real pleasure to see.
The 2022 was brilliant, too. US army were great.
Then it occured to me that what made it really special, was there were no fucking politicians involved.
Happy New Year all.
Thankfully I was ill again this year so hot ribena and bed all on my own with WW2 road to victory on. The best new years I've ever had by far.
HNY everyone.
Watched the usual procession of boats across the harbour and 2 fireworks displays (a short one at 9PM for youngsters and the big one at midnight). When the restaurant closed at 1AM they sent us off with a full bottle of champagne that was opened. Remember my wife calling her parents when we got back to our hotel to wish them a happy new year. When we returned home from the holiday they said my wife was slurring her words so badly they could hardly understand a word she had said.
Was a slow start the next day.
Now we have a couple of dogs we always stay at home to make sure they’re not traumatized by idiots letting off fire works all night long.
HBD fella
HNY to all.
Since then, it has been stay at home, have a few glasses of Red, watch TV, watch the fireworks on TV and bed! Last 2 years it's been stay-at-home, watch TV (last night it was Saving Private Ryan) and then bed by 11pm! Most enjoyable...and cheep! Trying to stay awake till midnight....nah thanks, getting ripped off in pubs...nah thanks, waking up feeling refreshed...yes please......until the game today will no doubt destroy my happy mood!
But I don’t blame anyone for ignoring the whole caboodle.
He's getting a long walk today before we have a massive Sunday lunch - perfect start to the year
Getting rave reviews on social media
Always been one for New Years Day piss up at the football and then a disco / lock-in down the Horse in the evening. Great memories
I love Christmas but can see why two forced events in a week gets people's back up.
I was in central London during most of the day yesterday and you just don't get that air of excitement that you get for other mass events.
You look at the crowd opposite the wheel and it just looks soulless. I think London could make the event much more enticing If it made the effort.
I look at Times square and it looks like a cracking atmosphere
Have they changed the rules?