I wonder what that pub's like?

for example, I have passed the Swallow at Hillingdon loads of times as it is right by the tube station where the bus stops en route from Oxford to London. It looks quite scary. Has anyone ever been there? Is it as forbidding as it looks? I have never seen anyone go in or out, tho the lights are always on, but then I rarely see it for more than the couple of minutes it takes ppl to get on and off the bus!

Until yesterday, I kind of wondered what the pub 45 seconds out of my back door, the New Arlington, was like. I'd been here 18 months and still not been in. It wasn't that it was scary, it's just that there are two or three good pubs not much further away, plus a bar that's even closer to my front door. I went in last night though, because we wanted to get a bottle of wine to take home and the off licences were closed. It smelt a bit like upstairs at the Woodside, v.stale beer and faggsy, but had a good atmosphere. There seemed to be lots of Irish in there.

When I lived in Stoke Newington, I wondered for ages what that T-Bird place on Blackstock Road was like. It just looked unusual - you don't get many places like that in London, esp. not in such a location. When I finally dragged people there as an experiment, it was pretty much as you'd expect inside, and I quite liked it, yet I never went back.

i have never been in The Swallow but I did sit outside for about 15 minutes prior to Enland vs Germany in Euro '96 (which we ended up watching in The Heath in Hayes instead). as far as I can tell The Swallow has nothing it would be worth non-locals and non-nearby grafters entering for other than of course the usual range of alcoholic beverages typical of unsavoury suburban pubs.

I have never been in the Bird in Hand, Palmers Green, which is my parents' local. It looks pretty awful and I can't help thinking that if I did go in I'd meet someone I was at school with. My sister and her friends got chucked out of there when she was nineteen - the barman said they weren't buying enough drinks.

come to think of it I haven't been in any of the pubs across the A10 in Edmonton either...e.g. The Bull and the Two Brewers. The latter looks like it might be ok.