Imbibe! Imbibe 2010! A celestial instruction, an exhibition hall filled with booze. Free booze of the highest order. Chilean wine, Argentine wine, French wine! A Chateau Neuf du Pape open to the air conditioned hall, standing in an elegant row of Bordeaux. Slutty in its availability, a whorish and aromatic aristocrat. One of forty bottles on one of a dozen tables, tacky collapsible tables covered with a folded white cloth and completely unattended.

Image by Simon AKA Vietnam the movie

Bar Manager for the Dog and Duck, Assistant Manager of the Slag and Pickle, the Slap and Tickle, premiere sommelier to the Rothschild family. Lie with abandon. Deceive them all, rub shoulder’s with the legitimate and scorn them like a superior. Keep aloof. A collision with the man from St. Johns dressed as an early Michael Jackson. A Thriller lover with an accent accompanied by an eager if unattractive assistant, who declines my offer of a Rioja. A man dressed like a Mexican Bandito, refusing Spanish red. ‘Who’s this mother fu...’ A sharp tug of the sleeve and a preemptive departure.

A gin tout raises a suspicious eyebrow at my laminate, ‘Bar Manager for the Wag and Flannel?’ ‘That’s right, Gin me you loser.’ He diligently pours me a tot of Gin, not the Gin and Tonic I had been hoping for. I duly nail it with little pretension as to its flavour. With a pronounced cough at the methylated fumes, many eyes are drawn to the gin stand. Buyers wondering what filth they must be peddling. I denounce the liquor as hastily concocted piss and move off to another section.

The Japanese Whiskey peeps are more accommodating and Yamazaki Whiskey is goooooooood. The ten, the twelve and the eighteen year. Auchentoshan was politely inquisitive, the bastard. ‘Where are you based?’ ‘Parsons Green.’ ‘I live in Parsons Green, for four years now. How long have you been working there?’ ‘Two weeks.’ ‘Yes I haven’t been there in the last couple of months, I’ve been doing festivals.’ The powerful sweat taking over the body of the Maitre d’ of the Swill and Spittle begins to subside. A good strong body, smooth, rich and firm. A whiskey fit for marriage.

A stand promoting red wine with curry. An odd combo, a fairly pointless initiative, but curry and wine? A dream. Rogan Josh good, Butter Chicken a pinkish paste. An unwelcome slurry muddying a delicate pallet. The promo woman is duly informed that her curry is terrible, her wine passable, her dress... We have a wine tasting. The tirade is postponed.

‘The Fiano di Avelino 2009, a wine sure to be popular because it is easy to pronounce.’ A glance over the assembled booze samplers, four rows of four on two sides, surrounded by prefab walls open to the cavernous steel roof a hundred feet above. No one is laughing, that was not a joke. A glance at the six glasses of wine, three white and three red, a glance to the fool at the podium molesting a microphone. The wine is necked, the spittoon neglected. Who’s ahead in the Bartender v Sommelier competition?

‘The mixologists are coming up with some great combinations for this...’ What the fuck is a mixologist? The Organic Vodka is good, lightly chilled. It descends into the gullet thick and cool, leaving behind a gentle Eucalyptus flavour.  A second tot is offered to the nodding sage who is beginning to sway after two hours of abuse. The Swede is insisting on the importance of quality juice in mixers, why is he telling me this? Look to the laminate, shit I’m a bar manager. Keep nodding.

The blur grows deeper by the minute, pierced occasionally by the lighting hung high above the heads of the congregation. Retail and distributers, manufacturers and promo girls. Thousands of them, boot-legging with impunity. The pushers of Britain’s inebriation. I emerge altered, a far drunker man than the one that arrived a mere three hours previous.