The Sons Of John Barr
at end of 1991 I came out of a long term relationship at the same time as a mate got divorced and turfed out of his house. Getting a flat together and living it up seemed like a great idea and another mate moved in to take the third bedroom. There were only actually two bedrooms though, the other room should have been the living room, which there wasn't one of, and you had to walk through it to get to the kitchen

it was ok at first, lots of booze and recreational drug abuse but within a few months had spiralled to a really bad atmosphere between me and the original flatmate. He was a nice guy when sober but an aggressive bully when drunk, especially on whisky. He dealt hash and had lost what you'd class as his real friends but had picked up an entourage of chancing hangers on. I saw him grab people by the neck and slam their heads through glass doors and cabinets but they were back the next day if they thought they could borrow money from him for booze and tic hash off of him

it ended up him and a hard core of about 3-5 other guys basically living in that one room completely out of their tits 24/7. People were being thrown through the windows into the street, ground floor flat, during the height of their drunken revelry and concrete slabs were being thrown through the windows from the outside by outraged neighbours

apart from the core group there was a large revolving group of other people who came and went, hells angels, professional moneylenders and assorted flotsam and jetsam. The flat got abandoned by our other friends who were into a drink and drugs but not to the extent our place had become. Hardly any females visited, I once had to step over him banging one on the hall floor to get into the toilet, both of them pissed as newts, her a drug connections wife

I had to go to my folks for a bath as the bath at ours was filled to overflowing with empty Buckfast and whisky bottles and the bathroom floor a minefield of cat shit

the other flatmate is a notorious cheapskate whose contribution to the economics of the flat was to eat our food, try to pay nothing to the utility bills and purchase nothing more than ten Club and two cans of Gilde Pils a week and say he was skint. One day he came in and said he was off to India for a year and would see us later, a clue to where his money had been going

another hardcore boozer mate moved in in his place and things just carried on. My room was at the front so I'd be awoken constantly with people rapping my window to get in to get drunk and buy hash at silly hours, my flatmates couldn't hear the buzzer over the noise of The Mac Lads blasting out of his room

things came to a head one day when they went to the local pub and one of the guys saw someone at the pool table who had ripped him off for a bit of hash a decade earlier. They decided they were going to stab him and came back to the flat for a knife and decided they were going to use a ghurka knife someone had given me. I refused to give them it, my flatmate was brandishing a scythe, threatened my then girlfriend (a complete nugget) with it, ransacked my room and eventually found the knife. We had a struggle for it and he held it to my throat and I told him to go and do his thang. I knew they probably wouldn't actually go back to the pub, they'd just talk about it and buy a bottle of whisky about halfway there and turn back. I was right, they came back, my flatmate was being feted by his minions as being a great guy and they'd showed the other guy what for despite not actually going back. I walked into the midst of this and punched my flatmate as hard as I could right on the button and he went down flat on his arse. I then took the dropped ghurka knife and held it under his cheekbone and asked him if he liked having a knife held to him by a friend. He replied "honour, you've drawn the knife and you have to draw blood with it" (we'll get back to this later) so I said ok and gave him a small nick on the cheekbone, they weren't expecting me to do it and I was relieved of the knife by the other people in the room incase I did worse damage with it

I decided if I didn't move out one of was going to come to a sticky end so I moved out the next day. I used to periodically visit though and the place went from bad to worse. The last time I went back the kitchen sink was on the floor in about fifteen pieces. He'd moved into my old room and the floor was littered with empty bottles, swords, knives, crossbows, air guns etc. They were drinking John Barr whisky by the gallon and had taken to calling themselves The Sons Of John Barr. They had this whole honour thing going, if a knife was taken from its sheath blood had to be drawn and on closer inspection they were all covered in cuts across their forearms and the back of their hands. My flatmate was using one of the knives to open tins of catfood, cut himself with it, probably got a bit of Whiskas into his bloodstream and developed septicemia

it eventually came to a close when he attacked his best friend with a whisky bottle and smashed all his front teeth out with it, although there are rumours that to put in a more convincing claim for criminal damages the victim pulled out a few more teeth with a pair of pliers to make it look even more of a catastrophe. When he went to the police they were full of sympathy until they asked for the address, upon his reply they put down the pen and told him it was his own fault for going there and told him to clear off. Not to be detered from his rightful claim for compensation for no longer having any front teeth he took out a private prosecution and my flatmate got eighteen months and the flat was promptly closed down by the environmental health and our landlord went to prison for using one of his flats to grow grass, which was discovered when the flat next door caught fire

my flatmate got out out of prison still a complete nugget except now with a penchant for smoking smack and touching other mens bottoms

I walk past the flat on a regular basis and think "it was a melting pot of beliefs and cultures"

ps, my flatmate lives round the corner from the original flat, I've been in once and it looked the same story being repeated and I'm hearing of regular visitors to it drinking themselves to death at 33
(albinomeatpod, Fri 27 Feb 2009, 15:48, 3 replies)

Gilde Pils
...ah, that brings back memories. Lovely stuff, until they dropped the strength of it and packaged it in crappy black tins.

A local boozer was selling, just out of date cans of it, for the bargain price of "3 ferra pound".

I got 2 slabs worth.
(Cancer Joy was short lived, Fri 27 Feb 2009, 16:10, closed)

Whats a ...
...'Complete nugget'?
(powervator and NONE SHALL PASS, Fri 27 Feb 2009, 16:50, closed)

Wow
That place sounds incredible. I have been to a few places like that when completely fucked up and I am always so glad I am not one the people who has to live there. Lucky you got out when you did!
( MagicallyInept Bored Sig., Fri 27 Feb 2009, 16:51, closed)