Last calls at the Strap and Waddle
Have a drink problem and don’t mind furtively guzzling warm beer through a hidden straw while in large crowds? Well, have I got a product for you!
The United States has brought the planet lots of world-changing inventions and innovations; from the mass-made automobile, the electric light bulb and the American Pie trilogy. Now, dropping into our lives like heat-seeking democracy from the US air force is the Beerbelly (around €35 at Beerbelly.com).
For readers planning to attend the Ireland footballers’ match with Australia (a nation rumoured to like a bevvie too, I understand) at Thomond Park in a few days time or Waterford’s All-Ireland SHC semi-final with the Cats at Croker this weekend, this could be the purchase for you.
It’s a beer-storage device worn under your shirt that holds 80 ounces – or about three and a bit pints in old money; just hang The Beerbelly around your neck, fill her up and off you go.
The device is supposed to allow you to smuggle cool beer into a stadium, leaving you to sit comfortably in the stands supping down your favourite imported product like a contented sucky calf on a Connemara spring day.
The makers recommend “sneaking the dispensing spout out your fly.” Perfect; who in the Hogan Stand is going to ask you to share? I road tested one, in the name of investigative journalism at Ireland’s last game at Croke Park, the 1-1 draw against Bulgaria.
This is what I learned:
1. When filling the Beerbelly, screw on the straw first. And do this over the sink, idiot. Wearing your now snugly-fitting Italia ‘90 give-it-a-lash-Jack t-shirt from Pennys may result in you dropping like a beefeater outside Buckingham Palace on a hot summer’s day. Instead, strap the harness on comfortably, slip the full bladder of beer in the pocket, feed the straw up through a loose fitting top, and you’re sorted.
2. Go to the toilet before you strap yourself up.
3. You’ll look like you’re trying to smuggle hot water bottles into East Berlin through Checkpoint Charlie; try to look natural. In the glow of Croker, I purchased a scarf – floodlight robbery at €12 – to wrap around my neck and camouflage the straw protruding from my coat. I waddled on, with fears bubbling that a steward was about to rumble me like the most dipsomaniacal suicide bomber ever while drenched in ignominy and stale beer.
4. Never overestimate uninterested stewards. Waltzed in. Need a drink though.
5. Don’t give the game away. They say the acre of real estate beneath the large Grand Central Station sign which warns Manhattan’s guests to ‘Beware of pick-pockets’ has the highest concentration of thieves on the planet. As the commuters – and tourists especially – alight from trains and read the advice, they instinctively pat the pockets their valuables are in. This, indicates to the waiting and watching shysters where to target.
I climb the stairs of the Hogan Stand, see the bars all locked up – unlike GAA Sundays – and tap my belly smugly, before catching myself. I need another drink.
6. The weight and mass of 80oz of body-temperature beer sees me toddle to my seat near the corner flag, burning with self-consciousness. I’m convinced my stunt has been scuppered while seen slurping from my pregnant coat by some officials during the teams’ warm-ups. But it’s not last call yet in the Strap and Waddle Inn.
7. Ignore the instructions on the box. The Beerbelly comes with a beanbag-type cool pack that you’re advised to put in the fridge for a bit, slip in next to the bladder of beer, and thus ensure frosty, frothy lager while you watch from the terrace in Thomond Park or wherever. Wrong! The extra cold device will make sure you’re bordering on hypothermia by the time the Fields of Athenry are heard in Limerick for the first time, you’ll have a kidney infection as well as a match programme as a souvenir and it won’t keep the drink cold for long anyway. In the last scene of Zulu, when the British are surrounded and are counting the minutes to a certain and violent death far from home, their general insists one soldier polish a button which is scuffed. Futile. Using that extra cool pack is like polishing buttons, in the face of certain oblivion.
8. Don’t think you’re going to pull a nurse in Coppers after the match. Or one of the Xposé girls in Lillies for that matter. Whatever you’re into. The point is you’ll look like John Hurt in Alien, just before the nasty little critter bursts through his shirt. I felt like Dan Ackroyd in Changing Places, face pressed against the gentlemen’s club window, watching my old life. Lads tear up and down the steps while I wheeze after them. Trying to squeeze into my seat, I knocked the baseball cap off a shocked-looking child seated a row in front, while I had to fold and rest my hands on top of my gut.
9. Share with your fellow fans; they may tell on you otherwise. Fed up of dragging froth through the straw for 45 minutes, I decided to let the law of physics help and feed the pipe out the end of my jacket into a cup, procured at half time. The Kilkenny native in the next seat joined me in a drink once I explained I wasn’t actually draining bodily fluids after a particularly nasty roofing accident. Someone asked me if I could ‘pull a hot whisky out of there’. The patent is now pending for the ToddyTummy.
10. After the game, have someone help you out of the harness or put some newspapers down first.
So for event junkies out here with more money than sense, you too can be a human keg. And for the more discerning ladies out there, the makers of the Beerbelly have now created the product for you.
Yes girls, at long last you can own a bra that fills up with alcohol.
It’s name?
The Wine Rack, of course. Probably the best Valentine’s gift in the world.
* Contact: adrian.russell@examiner.ie
Twitter: @adrianrussell
