Ok so it’s not the most creative of titles, but what do you want from me, I’m tired. I’ve done 24 of these already (as the now seemingly aptly named title proves).

Tonight was supposed to be our somewhat quiet Halloween night of sobriety. (When I say sobriety, I mean not partaking in the festivities to the same extent as others may do – and by this I mean we weren’t in costume, we of course managed to sink a couple of fizzy pints of sexy brown liquid.

After the enjoyment of the ‘Eerie’ pub’s London Stone (from last week’s My 2 Pints) I had been seduced by the spooky pub chain’s influence on the city during this time of year. The Friday before Halloween would only offer an even friendlier, spookier night surely? 

Not quite. Things taking a downward spiral from the start, I had convinced Nick to join me out in a celebration of my new job by assuring him I would ‘spot’ him. He needed to be ‘spotted’ for the night thanks to unwelcome cashflow problems. Alas, after having met up, walked to a cash machine, and retrieving £100 (£50 for the Nickloan) he chose then to inform me that his cashflow worries were sorted, and the ‘spot’ would not be required. Walking off, bewildered, fearful, and a little bit thrilled, I stuff the entire £100 into my pocket, knowing that by hell or high thunder, booze, kebab, or hooker, I’d be spending the full ton that night. You see, it’s just natural drunk’s law that when you get past a certain point of drunkenness (it’s usually the same point which for some reason encourages you to believe a dirty street corner kebab, which might as well be filled with condoms and swine flu, is the height of sophisticated alfresco dining.

Weighed down by my sudden duke like wallet, we finally reach where I think the bar is. Except it isn’t where it is, it just… isn’t. There’s some other shitty all bar one style wank sitting on its still-warm grave. I’d never been there when it stood, but I still somehow feel offended so much pretention is happening in its name. Kind of like people suddenly getting offended at anyone referring to Jade as a racist after her death.

Still disappointed at the downfall of the entire night’s plan, Nick and I step into the familiarity of the John Snow after he suggests a trial run for his patent-pending ‘Sam Smiths Pub Crawl’. He’s found 4 of the pop up brown pubs in the Oxford Circus/ Tottenham Court Road/ Leicester Square/ Piccadilly square of Soho. I’m sure there are more, and probably enough to make a proper crawl out of within walkable distance of each other, but this will do us plenty as research.

With Gazz set to be joining us in a few hours, we’ve got plenty of time to make sure we stay behind a white chalk line someone in a high-vis jacket has drawn, and be told to stay behind it lest we be thrown from the establishment. Cue lots of childish sneaking toes creeping over the line when he’s not looking, then retracting them back like a 12 year old’s pocket knife when he looks over.

Gazz catches up to us once we hit pub No. 2. The Duke of Argyll. Nice enough place, warm, spacious but cosy, but this isn’t a My 2 Pints so let’s move on. 3 pints down, and I don’t recall the name or location of Pub 3. The one thing holding the rest of my memory to ransom is the same as the thing holding the other pictures to ransom, the weird ass pub game [since researched and named ‘Bar Billiards’ which is slightly ludicrous as it’s nothing like what is now known as Billiards] found in a forgotten corner. £5 down, and £2 a game, it didn’t come cheap. Especially considering there were no obvious rules, and no clues anywhere in sight.

Ingredients. 7 white billiard balls. 1 Red ball. 2 white, and 1 red moveable wooden pegs which can be balanced on the table. The game involves (after it being explained [it turns out wrongly, but much closer than we could guess] to us by a helpful man whom I could not see) hitting the red ball into a white, basically getting the whites into the holes on the cloth, without hitting a peg. After an embarrassing 310-0 defeat I storm out of the pub, red faced, and full of declarations of preposterousness, “Why not play a real sport?” I scream. “Let me loose on a table tennis table, then we’ll have a game!” I howl into the night.

With everyone (me) calmed down sufficiently, we set off for the fourth venue of the night, The White Horse. Sadly the place was just shutting up shop for the night, but we managed to sneak in before the bell and the late October night remained cosy enough to make London’s forced outdoor drinking laws seem reasonable.

15 minute’s later and we’re being kicked out of the place. I’m happy to admit, 5 drinks down, I was well within the mood (because of the Sam Smith’s venues I still had £85 perched in the wallet saying farewell to its friends and family). But Alas Gazz and Nick are cut from the same stone (is that a thing?) and both hate staying out after the closure of the tube, even on a weekend. What could I do?

Sorry queens, get the sleeping bags out, you’ll have to get down for the night.