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When I left St Helens in 1989, it was clear that change was in the air in more enlightened locales. All up and down Beverley Road, many, many hostelries had posters in their windows declaring that all-day drinking was coming – all, that is, apart from The Rose, a spectacularly pre-lapsarian, madness-infused pugilism shack, which had a poster announcing: "Coming soon: 'MILD'!!!"Although all-day drinking didn’t arrive at Hull University’s Student Union bar straight away, vodka and fresh orange did. And by fresh orange, I mean fresh orange, motherfucker. I was only just getting used to the concept of vodka and Britvic juice on the morning that I noticed that the bar’s fridges were packed up with what looked like cartons of milk except adorned with pictures of citrus fruit.The bar manager was an awesome, implacable and inscrutable guy called Tom who looked like Patrick Stewart. He possessed deep wells of self-control and patience which had come from serving 15 years in the French Foreign Legion. He hand poured me a large vodka into a chilled glass and then topped it up with the fresh orange juice which was so cold it cracked the ice cubes. Hundreds of pin pricks of condensation sprang up on the glass immediately, like the skin of a fat man stepping into a roasting hot sauna. I gulped it down so quickly it felt like Jack Frost was throttling me. Then I could taste the fruit in my mouth.
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But it wasn’t until 1995 that I experienced an honest to goodness cocktail, made and served with ingenuity and craftsmanship. During the summer I had read an article on how to mix the perfect dry martini in the Guardian. I’d never really known what the difference between the actual cocktail and the hyper-powered cheap Italian vermouth was. The former was favoured by international spies and high-powered American business people while the latter was preferred by those who had relinquished their quest for leading a happy life and those who lasted until 5AM at house parties. I chewed this feature over in my mind while working ten-hour shifts in a plastics factory in Hertfordshire. I determined to go to Claridge's in Mayfair on the weekend and drink some proper martinis. Otherwise, what was the fucking point?
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