O'Neill's (Euston)

Ronnie Corbett (The Two Ronnies)

Ha ha ha ha! Now behave yourselves!

They’re making up their own jokes up, in the back over there! I’ll have some of what they are having!! Ha ha ha! Now where was I? Oh yes, the story; so there’s this bear ok,..and he goes into the pub to get himself a drink.

You know what it’s like. He’s had a hard day relieving himself in the woods. You know, a strenuous afternoon searching for honey, singing, ambling around and such, and he really fancies a drink.

As an aside. That must be hard, mustn’t it. Searching for honey. I mean, I find it hard enough myself, searching for condiments,..and that’s just in Tescos! I don’t know why they always store it all the way up there on the top shelves! Ha ha!

Anyway, I digress….

So this Bear, he goes into the pub. It’s an O’Neill’s pub in Euston. Don’t ask me why he is in Euston. Maybe he has just returned to London after visiting family up North. Maybe he has family in Nottingham, in Sherwood Forest. I don’t really know. Yeah, that’s it, he is in the pub upon returning from a weekend up Nottingham way. He is a sociable bear.

He is just back off the train, and has one of those mini-wheeley-suitcase things. And it’s getting on his nerves to be honest,…turning over when he goes up curbs and coating in dog muck. It’s been getting on his nerves all day, if he is honest. You don’t need something like that in a forest do you really. He doesn’t know why he brought it. Annoying.

Anyway, he’s in the pub in Euston. Yes,..he lives in London, in Regent’s Park in London Zoo. But he fancies a pint, of course he does, after the arduous train journey that he just had, and the aggro with the suitcase.

No,..the journey was not the best either. What with the new smoking ban, he’s not had a cigarette since Nottingham. Has not had the chance to nip off the train at Stoke on Trent for a quick one en-route. ‘Smoke’ on Trent he usually calls it. But of course he can’t do that now. Ha ha!!

So, you see. He wants this pint to relax after his train journey. He is a little agitated, after the all the signal failures and the lack of a smoke. ‘Smoke / Signal Failures!’ Ha! He is a bear with a sore head!! Ha Ha! His sore head is made worse by the huge sun hat he’s been wearing all day in anticipation of the forecasted scorcher.

The sunshine was not forthcoming at all. Of course it wasn’t. It was pissing down all day up in Nottingham and his hat is soaked through.

So, he’s in the pub and he goes to the bar. Yes, he is allowed to go into pubs,…yes, yes he can leave the zoo anytime he likes. He has a good relationship with the zookeeper. They are old friends. Ha ha ha! They were in the cubs together!! I’m joking of course,..

Ha, ha! So anyway, stop distracting me. Quiet you! This bear, he can leave the zoo at anytime he likes and he is in the pub in Euston on his way back from Nottingham. No, the O’Neill’s is not his local. His local is The Engineer in Primrose Hill. But for the purposes of this story he is in the O’Neill’s on Marylebone Road.

And he goes up to the bar for a pint. He likes a pint.

Speaking of, ‘going up to the bar’. I was out for drinks with my Producer the other week. I was quite looking forward to it, as it happens, as he had one of those ‘corporate cards’ you know,..where you can charge your lunches to the company. Except, here at the BBC, they are just cards with the word’s ‘your round!’ written on them. Ha ha ha!!!

So anyway, My Producer, he tells me, that he is going up to the bar, and asks what I would like. I say ‘the usual’.

Now,..between You and I,.. I won’t say he’s tight, but put it like this,..he is the type of man that will never play head’s or tail’s with his own penny, for fear of it rolling under a desk and getting lost!

Ha ha!!!

So anyway, I say to him ‘yes, the usual please’ and off he goes to the bar.

Ten minutes later, he comes back empty-handed, and so I ask him what happened.

He say’s that the barman gave him the correct directions to the toilet and that I should take it upon myself to go and get the drinks ‘as usual’!! Ha, ha!!!…Yes he’s a right card.

Oh,..he’s looking at me now making gestures as if he want’s me to ‘cut’ my story short. So I’ll get back to it……

So, yes, this bear goes to the bar for a drink, puts his soaking hat and busted suitcase down, and he orders a pint of Bulmer’s on draft. He likes the old cider, having a taste for apples from his days munching on them in the forest. Oh yes,..in the zoo; London Zoo. Well remembered.

And so then the barmaid asks him if he wants ice. He say’s ‘yes, yes please’. You know, that he would like some ice. Seeing as the train journey has left him a little hot and bothered, sore head etc, as I mentioned earlier.

So anyway the little barmaid pops off and fills a pint glass to the brim with ice and then tops it off with a tiny bit of Bulmer’s from the pump.

£4.25 is what she asks for when she comes back.

Now,…..the bear, of course, is not in the best of moods anyway, even before this slight. And, so, obviously, he feels the need to take issue with the amount of cider in this ‘so-called’ pint.
‘I seem to remember that there are special ‘larger’ glasses that you have on the premises in order to accommodate these ‘pint’s’ of Bulmer’s; that are served with a sizeable amount of ice’, he says to her.

‘Larger glasses!’ she says, ‘Larger glasses!!!....Seems like those are exactly what YOU need sunshine! This is Euston me old China. Paddington is about 2 miles a thata way!!!!! ' 

Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha!!

Ronnie Corbett's rating for O'Neill's - 4/10

Rolosocosy

• View by pub
• View by reviewer
• View by place

• Natural Selection,..

  “,….. Why didn’t they live to be 100?Huh? Well, they woz running round all day, hunting mammoths, eating berries,..rumping their little hearts out. No boozing or smoking. They must have been fit as fiddles. Yer Neanderthalls……….I’ll tell you why, it’s … Continue reading →