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Bit cold there innit?

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Not really,summer is generally better than the UK.
Just had more than a week at 30c or so,the same way up North.
I have seen plus 35c here before and the heat builds up very early due to long hours of light.
Only drawback here in the countryside in Summer is the insect life,some places ppl.cant leave there houses its so bad, even after aircraft spraying.
The coast and cities are mostly OK.

Cold in the Winter,but usually a dry cold with little or no wind, so can be more pleasant than the UK.
Its the long hours of darkness that many incl.myself dont like in Winter,.....very depressing, so Im usually out of here by Oct heading back to Spain by way of a short stay in the UK.

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It is possible to have a zero, because I was routinely stopped and breathalysed by the Guardia three years ago.
The meter showed up zero, he looked pretty shocked by it too....even called the others to see it. :lol:
And no....I don't drink at all.

Re: End of an Era ?
 

Interesting report.


http://uk.news.yahoo.com/21/20090715...s-6323e80.html

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I think you are completely wrong on this... It is a fact that that more pubs have closed since the smoking ban on a weekly basis than before. Although in another post you mention a boom in the food sales, this is not where the most profit is made... Before you say it, yes I did work in the trade too, for many years, and although when you say about the profit made on a barrel of carling for example where you dont take into account the overheads etc, the mark up on food is nowhere near as much. so although you may be selling a few more nuggets and chips, the bar sales are down! I myself am a smoker, and I may be one of the few that DO agree with the no smoking law to some extent, there is nothing worse than sitting down for a meal and some prat at the next table sparking up and blowing the smoke your way... but by the same token non smoking friends of mine who were all up for it when it first came into effect have since said on many occasions that they would prefer the smell of smoke to the smell that you get in a high percentage of pubs nowadays which seems to be a disgusting mix of sweat, stale beer, sewage too much air freshener to cover up the aforementioned...

anyway, gone off topic... with regards to the drink driving limit, if going out for a night, there are always alternative forms of transport, fair enough, in spain the buses are slow and always late, trains are the same and taxis expensive, but if you split a cab 4 ways thats that problem solved, and really, if it is too hard to go out with your pals and not drink then you have a drink problem...!

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I honesty think this is one of the worse arguments I have ever heard and I hear it all the time.
Someone once told me that because of the smoking ban he now refused to go into a pub because he could smell urine on the blokes at the bar! Wow, after 20 years of smoking I was surprised he could smell at all!


Let me ask you something.

Given that you can, at the moment, buy 8 pints of magners cider from ASDA for £8 and the average pint of Magners is about £3.50 a pint, do you not think that the supermarkets have more to blame for the death of the pub than a ban on smoking?
It amazes me that people don't see it, why buy two pints and get little change from a tenner yet you can sit at home and for a tenner you can have 8 pints and a bag of pork bits and, if you want to you can even kill yourself with tobacco!

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I think you've hit the nail on the head there. That is exactly why pubs are closing in the UK

Meanwhile in Spain I always order a canya in bars and cafeterias as its usually the cheapest thing in the place, plus it tastes goooood.

Saying that though, in some bars, clubs and cafeterias in tourist areas cerveza is more expensive than in the UK, especially if you compare the price to the volume you are getting. It was 3 euros for a canya in a lot of barcelona and up to 10 euros for a drink in a club!

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It is the limits in the UK that are likely to have to change to bring them in line with the rest of Europe, always thought the UK limits were way too high. Would love to see even lower limits, but doubt that will happen. It's probably the alcohol lobby in the UK that keeps the limits so high as the government gets loads of money from the alcohol taxes.

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worst argument... wasnt an argument it was an opinion and a general observation! think that is something everyone is entitled to is it not? and if you were speaking to someone who can smell piss on the guys at the bar, just goes to show the type of establishment he was used to frequenting!!

bearing in mind that we have always been able to buy booze cheaper from the supermarkets, are you that naive that you think it is a huge coincidence that when the smoking ban came in this is what smokers have started to do more and more of?!?!? and seeing as you obviously are so anti-smoking, one thing that really pees me off in pubs now is if it is a sunny day (few and far between granted) you will always get some non smoker sitting outside where we are banished to come rain or shine and then start whinging about the smoke etc... you want no smoking inside pubs, then stay inside!

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Loss leaders are a relatively new "invention"

The only statistics that show that the smoking ban has killed the license trade are the ones that have come from the Anti-ban lobby. As such they can't be trusted.

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Limits in Spain have always been that, so it's not gonna affect that many, and most holiday makers go to areas they can walk to the bars from. If it was a new law, then it might make an effect, but I very much doubt it will. In any case, round here, most of the ex pats and visitors are from Scandinavia, Holland and Germany.

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Im not anti ban, and although you may not believe statistics (13.6589% of statistics are rubbish anyway!) the results speak for themselves... loss leaders... no idea what youre on about, if you mean the price of supermarket booze going down then then although that is a definite factor, that mixed with smokers not being able to enjoy their cig (however unhealthy we may be) has led to this... and if you look nowadays, since the beginning of this economic downturn, alot of prices in supermarkets have gone up for beer... asda for example... November time last year... £3 for a four pack of pint cans of fosters... yesterday... £3.68 for 4x440 cans... that is just one example... wine is more expensive, spirits too...

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Yesterday I bought a litre bottle of vodka and a litre bottle of Morgans spice for £10 and £12 respectively, and you can buy 3 bottle of wine for a tenner, a 15 can box of Stella/Bud or carling for the same.

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They might run a loss on some, but across the board they just as expensive, I have yet to see a Supermarket significalntly more cheaper than that of a cash and carry.

Teabags and bread cost sweet FA in a supermarket, this does not stop people using Cafe's, so to keep going down this road I dont think is correct.

Prices in many bars are a rip off they dont need to be, £2 for 250ml water in some place the other day I was in, quite ridiculous, they cant back it up with good service. There are many more factors than the cost of cheap alcohol from supermarkets.

Am lot of the smaller newsagents come off licences are far more competitive in some cases than supermarkets.

If supermarkets are selling beer at a loss then why does the local landlord not go there to buy his booze to sell on ? Because its fantasy I guess !

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Thats exactly what many of them do, thats one of the reasons that many supermarkets have case limits.

I certainly know that we have stopped buying many products from Macro and Booker.

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I'm glad i live here, I can sit in the bar have a smoke, get pi**de for 10 euros and walk home :thumbsup::thumbsup:

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I wouldn't drink that pizz water, certainly not at your prices :eek:

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Guiness £3.80, Scrumpy £3.70 Grolch £3.70, real ale £2.80...


Large glass of house wine... £4.95 (we buy the bottle for £4.10), take your pick, prices are rising in pubs on a weekly basis, and the supermarkets are taking full advantage and all the while we are happy to blame smoking, the supermarkets are laughing all the way to the bank!

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I think its the costs that need to be reduced more than the competiveness of supernarkets, a bottle of wine in a supermarket is £3-£4 you can go to Yates who are far from the cheapest bars and drink a bottle of red/white/rose wine for £4.85 every day.

I honestly think other than the cheaper carlsberg and carling I dont see supermarkets selling much cheaper. When I do see the offers they are packaged at manufacture level so they are fully aware of the promotion.

Personally for me Supermarket prices have not stopped me from venturing out, there are a host of other factors, I used to frequent bars dailly, I dont smoke, however I have not been in many bars since the smoking ban came into force. I dont think im a one off here, just a whole host of other factors are the reason.

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I guess it depends on location? I guess holiday makers will be prepared to pay those prices :blink:

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Same as in Sussex and thats not a holiday destination...

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A bottle of wine in a supermarket here is all of 80 cents, but it certainly doesn't stop people using bars, neither does cans of beer at less than 40 cents.

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I could not afford to drink there either :rofl:

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Exactly you can buy cans of beer for 16-30 cents, a small lager in a bar in spain is Approx 1€ to 1.75€, yet plenty of people take one in a bar still on a daily basis.

In fact I would go as far as to say the cost of Alcohol from a supermarket in Spain to that of a bar is a greater difference %age wise than it is in the UK maybe.

The price of a pint is a major factor as the 3 last posters have shown

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You do realise that you live in Spain right?

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A couple of years ago some friends were out at a party with a designated driver who hadn´t even had a single drink. They were stopped by the Guardia in the early hours of the morning and the driver wasn´t able to show his licence (although he does have one) so the Guardia made his father who was also in the car get out and drive even though he was absolutely ten sheets to the wind!

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:frown:I very much doubt this

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Ohh, so that's why all the people I meet insist on speaking Spanish to me, I've always wondered why that was...

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Just shout back at them really slowly in English, they will get it eventually!

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I would agree with this... I visited the UK at Christmas, what I seen was that people went to the pub, had a few drinks and then a group would go to someones house. Heard many comments on how 'it's cheaper to go back to a house and have a drink than move on to a club or sit in the pub all night' and that's what they do, meet up and have a drink with all and everyone at the pub then a group of them go back to a house to carry on.

Something that I have noticed of late, family don't ask me to bring drink over for them anymore when I go to visit, they say they can get if for cheaper 'or fairly near the same price' in the super now so no point... so I can see the drinking at home or other peoples homes makes sense.

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What does it mean if you are opposed to the Law of the land?
Well basically you are selfish. Most laws are introduced for the welfare of us all and for the most part make good sense. Therefore if you flout the law it's because you don't care about any one else but yourself and sadly there are far to many selfish people in the world, selfish is as selfish does.
I can't see why zero tolerance would be a problem to any one.

The decline in the Pub trade is mainly down to cheaper supermarket booze and folk drinking at home. That and the other factors mentioned before.

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Another factor could be that pub clients have better things to do with their time and more demands on their disposable income? :confused:

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'What does it mean if you are opposed to the Law of the land?
Well basically you are selfish. Most laws are introduced for the welfare of us all and for the most part make good sense. Therefore if you flout the law it's because you don't care about any one else but yourself and sadly there are far to many selfish people in the world, selfish is as selfish does.
I can't see why zero tolerance would be a problem to any one'.

No on the contrary, 'selfish' means expecting someone else to adopt your own narrow minded, bigoted viewpoint irrespective of their own personal views on the matter.
Breaking the Laws which such people bring in, or adhere to unquestioningly, merely renders you a 'criminal' !
Which presuposes every single law ever brought in made common sense, which in itself is nonsensical.
Be VERY careful, when advocating zero tolerance on ANYTHING.
The last little chap to try that, ended up putting a bullet through his brain in a Berlin Bunker.
Keep your own zero tolerance, by all means.

Cheers
Fredthered

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I did say 'most laws' not 'every single law'.
Zero tolerance is only applied as a last resort to legitimate serious social issues, like drink driving which costs thousands of lives and serious injuries every day.
I will ignore the rest of your post as it speaks for itself and I don't much enjoy been classed a narrow minded bigot related to A.H.
I sincerely hope you are never a victim of a drink driver.

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' I don't much enjoy been classed a narrow minded bigot '
Funnily enough, not many do.
Although that is exactly what you are, when you try to impose your own particular ZERO tolerance opinion on everybody.
I didn't suggest you were in any way related to AH, only that, that particular mindset, led down the same road.
Zero tolerance = Totalitarism

As an ex-Motorcyclist of many years, I can assure you I have indeed been the victim of several 'accidents', the most horrific of which was caused by a pedestrian, who slammed into the side of me, trying to beat the traffic.
I was relatively 'lucky', only breaking my tibea, fibula and femur against a concrete lamp post.
Being a pedestrian, he was never breathalised, however it illustrates: Stupidity does not always lie at the bottom of a bottle, or with the motorist.
Conversely, not everyone who has had ONE drink is incapable of driving.

Cheers:beer:
Fredthered

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Fred, can you use the quote tool button rather than cut and paste, makes things a bit confuisng to read
Thanks

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If you read the forum rules you will see that it has Zero tolerance when it comes to comments like the above.
It would appear that you don't find this rule acceptable either.

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If you don`t like any post, click the report button then the mods or admin will see it and deal with it as they think is required.

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Don't tell them that! I get enough people reporting me!