Sluggish Letters

We spent a pleasant day in York yesterday. Eating lunch at exclamation mark enthusiasts, Yo! Sushi! was a wallet busting £50 for me and Mrs Rantyman, but that's not the focus for this rant.

No, we went afterwards with friends to the Slug and Lettuce – the one hidden in the labyrinth behind Stonegate rather than the one looking down on the river and mocking that pub that always floods.

If you've never experienced the Slug and Lettuce chain, they are a group of pubs that think they're upmarket but are in fact just like Wetherspoon's with the prices doubled.

We intended to have dessert and so chose items from the menu before heading to the bar to order.

Dawn French/Morticia Addams behind the bar informed us there was “at least an hour's wait on food”. Peculiar as they were busy, but not overly busy.

“Even on desserts?” we asked.

“They'll be about 40 minutes,” she replied.

As everyone knows, 40 minutes is exactly how long it takes to lift a piece of Sara Lee cheesecake out of a fridge and put it on a plate with a strange-looking cluster of berries and a dusting of icing sugar.

We decided to just have drinks.

An espresso was ordered.

“A shot?” French/Addams asked us.

Was this a trick question? The sarcastic side of me wanted to say “No, we'll have a pint,” but instead I just mumbled “err, yes”.

Two hot chocolates were ordered.

“Would you like to pay a ludicrous amount extra for cream and marshmellows?”

*needle scrapes across record*

Hold on a moment. Marshmellows? It's spelt with a fucking a, for Christ's sake.

It's a small miracle I didn't torch the place at this point.

I played it safe with a beer.

An overdraft-bothering amount of money was handed over and we retreated to the table. We waited. And we waited and we waited.

A tray was spotted on the bar with what appeared to be our drinks on it. It just stood there.

Mrs Rantyman went to get it. There was almost a tense standoff due to the health and safety risk of a non-trained person carrying a tray of hot beverages twenty feet, but it went without incident.

Our welcome was outstayed when a member of staff unlocked and opened the disabled toilet for a mother and child and I managed to push it shut so that the key had to be requested one more time. Said mother gave me a stare that almost melted into my skull.

If I was barred from such a shit pub it would probably be the best thing that's ever happened anyway, so fuck you, the Slug and the Lettuce.