...AND AN ACCOMPANYING TWO CENTS

I find the end-of-night conversation can often go one of two ways, either it peels into repeated stories and tales between friends or friends of friends, each with their own tinge of exaggeration and added nuance just in case you haven’t heard this one before…or the conversation can twist and turn, descending into the downright bizarre and obscure, that will leave you thinking, how did we get here? In this case, please bear with me, as I think this foray into my mind may well be the latter but stay with it.

There is a definite beauty to a sweeping statement, love it or loathe it, everyone has a use for them. They are a tried and tested weapon of choice for late-night exchanges. Armed with uneducated and fallible knowledge, an inebriated raconteur can hold court unequivocally beguiling others of a similar state. Be it for comic effects or sensationalist headlines, it can be hard to not laugh at the generalisation or grin at a particular view of the world - strangely these do tend to occur more when drinking, at least with my friends. Be it a self-flattering story or declaration of wit, most are the same thing, lies. However, these are nice lies; lies no one wants to disprove or challenge past a certain time in the evening. It is an agreement which nobody has signed nor spoken of, but everyone knows. It’s not worth it.

Although, maybe it is worth it. I don’t mean to disagree with the man at the bar claiming he’s played bass for Led

Zeppelin, but with the other lies that we seem to live with day to day. Small (and big) lies we seldom feel like objecting to. I am talking about the corner shop having a £5 minimum spend – when I can see the numbers being input into the card machine, all I wanted was chewing gum. When a particular product is “out of stock” without someone bothering to check the latest delivery, please check. If I can’t split my payment between cash and card, I know you can do it. These are lies we live with every day, but we don’t question them.

This feels like an almost innate and ingrained British idiom, to not want to question or complain, for fear of causing offence. Not to say I won’t say if my coffee is cold, I will, but we all know the people who will complain, or cause issue, and we all know the people who won’t. The British sensibility, I feel, falls into the latter of the two.

Regardless, I think we live with a constant stream of lies, and what really irks me are the utterly baseless and completely illogical lies. I don’t mean you have to have read Kant’s reasoning on logic to make a judgement, I mean plain as you like, in your face illogical decisions which seem to be made around us day after day, endlessly. I’m talking about Mr Sunak claiming not to know Mr Zahawi was being investigated by HMRC before appointing him Chairman of the Conservative Party, even though it had been reported three months previous; Or the Saudi Arabian tourism board being allowed by FIFA to sponsor the Women's World Cup, without informing hosts Australia and New Zealand, because they were the best candidate? Or even hand luggage on a plane somehow being too heavy for the cabin but somehow fine for the hold when maintaining the same weight. These are big, irreverent, imposing, fuck you, look the other way, jobs for the boys lies. These are lies made by people who prey on the nature of others not knowing any better or having the power to make changes, I’m looking at you, Ryanair.

Somehow, someway, we have managed to worm our way to a point where the indefensible is defensible. Responses such as Mr Sunak’s, in claiming to not know anything, open us up to blurring the lines between opinion and fact. It is impossible to prove if he did know or didn’t, whether it is fact or fiction, but sitting on the fence or removing yourself from the situation either means lying about knowing or being incompetent. Make your own choice.

I want to go back to nice lies. Lies we tell ourselves and others to make ourselves feel better. Such classics as, “I will go to the gym this morning”, “I will take the bins out before going to bed”, and “Of course I could break Roger Bannister’s four-minute mile, he did that years ago”. All valid, makeus-feel-better lies. It turns out, lying to me about a £5 minimum card spend pales in comparison to what I feel I’m being lied to about. So here's to that. Anyway, lovely weather…

What You Should Be Drinking

Negroni…an aperitivo no more. Don’t be deceived into going to your local, £25 a pop, braces-wearing, tattoo-ladened mixologist for it, who does that anymore? This should be procured from the indomitable Black Lines, and enjoyed wherever you see fit. The East London-based bottle cocktail specialists have been pairing quality knowledge, spirits, and illustration since 2019 and that isn’t going away

Contributors

TREVOR SHIN // LEVI STRAUSS // RUN ON RECORDS

COUNTER-PRINT // GLASGOW FILM FESTIVAL

WASTED WINE CLUB // BLOOM & BREW

NEIGHBOURHOOD COFFEE // GRADUATE HOTELS

YVES SAINT LAURENT // DAVID M ROBINSON

TUDOR WATCHES // FRED PERRY // TAHIRAH SHARIF

SKY TV // STATUS PR // RONKE ABONDE-ADIGUN

BRITISH FILM INSTITUTE (BFI) // ORION STUDIOS RELEASING

NIMAX THEATRES // MATT CORBY // ALL STRIPES PR

PAYNTER JACKET CO. // RAFAEL CAGALI // IKOYI

KEBAB QUEEN // ALCHEMIST // /UNDER // LA MARZOCCO

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