Pub will be keeping it real with a pizza more action (From Oxford Mail)

So another boozing venue being gentryfied in Kidlington - where are all the yobbos and drunken louts supposed to go now?

Let's hope they get drunk and loutish on supermarket lager in front of their 80'' plasma screens at home, and leave the rest of us in peace!

Well another pub consigned to history, with The Squire Basset now a restaurant are our young kids ever going to know what a real pub was?

Buy 'em a one-way 'booze cruise' ticket to Benitses or Ibetha, or maybe the Isle of Man - do they still usr the 'birch' on Man?

Paul, what is the problem here? It will still operate as a pub, with drinks served. The market for wet-led pubs is shrinking, and the alternative to a joint wet- and food-based pub is for it to be turned into flats.

On my manor, the Berkshire House, Duke of Monmouth and the Punter on Osney are still great pubs despite doing food.

I do wish someone would explain the meaning of an apostrophe to the manager though.

King Joke wrote:
Paul, what is the problem here? It will still operate as a pub, with drinks served. The market for wet-led pubs is shrinking, and the alternative to a joint wet- and food-based pub is for it to be turned into flats.

On my manor, the Berkshire House, Duke of Monmouth and the Punter on Osney are still great pubs despite doing food.

I do wish someone would explain the meaning of an apostrophe to the manager though.

Not so much a problem, but due to the smoking ban, and the cost of beer in pubs, the traditional "wet customer" has nearly been eradicated, and as you say to survive they must change into restaurants with a bar. But I was commenting on the demise of the traditional pub, which in only my 40 years of drinking in them has changed beyond recognition.

THe demise of the 'wet customer' was always going to happen. Let's face it, you'd be frowned up on returning to an office after four pints at lunchtime, let alone a building site or production line, as was common thirty or more years ago. People just don't drink as much now for various reasons, another one being almost total dependence on the car by some people even the shortest journey, which means no or very little alcohol intake throughout the day until they've got home.

Yes something might have been lost in the demise of the traditional pub, but some are things we can afford to lose, like a choking cig smoke, an intimidating atmosphere for women customers, and the rush to get a load of beer down your neck before a strict closing time.

The move to decent food has got to be good as well. You can't survive on crisps! THe most revolting thing I have ever attempted to eat - I gave up after one bite - is a 'beef batch' in a very traditional pub in Coventry in 1995 . It was no more than a lump of fatty boiled beef in a roll. No sauce, no butter, no mayo, no spice no seasoning. If this is what traditional pub food was like, most of us will be glad it's gone!