Artesian Well, Wandsworth

The Artesian Well. Your perfect evening out if it involves queueing, buying overpriced drinks and experiencing the dubious pleasure of the neanderthal bar manager scraping his knuckles on the ground, pausing only to pluck some fleas from his rear and gobble them down, whilst attempting to lord it over the "lesser people" - i.e. anyone other than him. Unfortunate, considering he's about as articulate as a pregnant slug with an over-abundance of slime (but with far less charm). He'd be better suited to a career as a Nazi camp guard in another age; or is that a camp Nazi guard, judging by his self-important mincing?

We'd reserved the upper area for a private party with a band, and when looking to rearrange some of the furniture, he immediately adopted an aggressive tone, thrust his crotch forward and stomped his feet down, maintaining that "MY furniture is not going to be moved," before explaining confrontationally that his DJ equipment was worth more than the NASA space programme and therefore he didn't anyone plugging into it. A simple, polite "no," with a brief explanation would have done. But, as he launched into his elaborate explanation, I began to realise that his IQ was actually closer to his shoe size than his age, and his management style can be captured in two words: AGGRESSIVE SHOUTING.

He "summoned" us to have a word with him by clapping his hands, as if we were naughty 8 year olds and talked at me for a while; when I explained that I didn't like being spoken to in this manner, he shuddered orgasmically, shouted for his bouncer minions in a high pitch and released a tirade of eloquent abuse, involving - in no particular order - the words, "tw*t," "c*nt," "w**nker" and so on and so forth. An interesting and somewhat unorthodox strategy to adopt with your customers, I must admit. Indeed, it was quite impressive; his mother must have sat him down on her lap in the zoo and carefully taught him how to correctly pronounce those words from an early age, as he was very good at repeating those words ad hominem, but didn't seem to able to intersperse his speech with anything else.

So, in summary, I would rather run myself a hot bath, turn on a live iron and dump said appliance into it before setting foot in the Arse-tesian Well again. I have e-mailed everyone that came to the private party that evening (well over a hundred people), explaining my delightful interactions with the primate managing the place and will be writing to the owners to ask whether it is normal for London Zoo to rent out one of its specimens to run a bar. Surely just supplying all of those bananas must make a chimpanzee-shaped dent in the profits?

Dissapointing. No, actually - downright awful. This is even worse than having your fingernails removed individually whilst being made to watch Glee on repeat. Enter at your peril. Just don't say you weren't warned.

18 Nov 2010 11:30