The Cranbook, St Johns/Lewisham/Deptford, 6:30pm

Features: Wedge shaped pub with central bar and Irish sports posters. Most people standing at the bar with empty tables around.

Action: Everyone Irish. Heated debate about who was more poor sprinkled with slushy reminisces of a tripe butchers in Kilkenny. Occasional boistrous songs break out mid-sentance, with the conversation seamlessly continuing at the end. Little Yorkshire terrier waddling and sneezing throughout the bar kept on jumping up and trying to sit on my bag.

Sign Posts

The Queen Anne, Vauxhall

Features: Covered in graffiti standing alone with a park and railway arches in front and an estate block behind. All windows boarded up, door on the corner with no windows but covered in warning signs and with a close-circuit camera above pointing out. Absolutely no signs of life.

Action: Inside has the feel of a roadhouse bar. No daylight, very little light at all. American pool table immediately ahead through the door (in use), small triangular pit-like stage with three chrome poles surrounded by mushroom stools to the left. Headed for a corner to the side of the bar. Copy of Sunday Sport open on the bar. 3 half-hearted strippers in quick rotation on the stage, money collected in a Hamlet tin. Neon Budweiser signs and big angled mirrors on every wall. Big screen pulled down showing football on the far wall. Elaborate graffiti on toilet ceiling looked to have been done with burnt wine cork. Surprisingly jovial little barman. Few people in there (all male) near the toilets, one fat bloke sitting pride of place on the far side of the pit chatting to the strippers between sets. All strippers took the opportunity to stick their arses in his face whilst on stage. He returned the favour with a closed eyes sniffing motion.

The Standard, Deptford, 7:30pm

Features: One room pub, half timbered wall, heavy nets on all windows, big Millwall scarf pinned up along the top of the bar, another Millwall scarf on the far wall, lots of open space, very brightly lit across whole pub, hand written sign in window: Happy hour 11-1 and 5-8. Poster on far wall: ‘15 reasons why beer is better than women’.

Action: Landlord constantly on fruit machine, occasionally taking money from the till to sustain him. Landlady smoking constantly, sitting bar side. Ours were the only drinks bought the whole time we were in there. Two punters in there, each alone. One left to the call of ‘See you tomorrow’ from the landlady, the other intimated over the urinals that he should be going home soon as he’d been in there since 11. Large screen pulled down showing the first air strikes against Afghanistan on Skynews.