It’s a Kind of Magic...

On entering this small street corner premises, you could be forgiven for thinking you’d just stepped out of Diagon Alley and entered Olivander’s Wand Shop...

....makers of fine wands since 382 BC - with Mr Olivander scurrying up the shelf ladder for a vine wood and unicorn hair core wand....
It has an old curiosity shop atmosphere with ornate shelving up to the ceiling,  carved and fluted pillars, porticos and a travelling ladder mounted on a brass rail to access the upper shelves.  In this case however it is not wand boxes filling the shelves, it is another kind of magic...
....single malt whisky - the water of life.

Old curiosity shop shelving...laden with whisky...

Having ventured in here earlier in the evening, before my visit to the Society Rooms, in the hope of food, I found that the Unicorn pies were in fact just a fantasy at 7:45pm, as food service stopped at 5pm...

Unicorn pie board, columns, plaster friezes, bench seats, whisky paraphernalia  etc etc...

...inevitably, after my riveting Society Room visit, this was a place I had to come back to.
The Pot Still is a small pub/bar with columns and plaster friezes and whisky memorabilia everywhere.  There was a good crowd in, of all ages and as far as I could tell a few different nationalities.  The place buzzed with the sound of conversations and the bar staff were kept busy.  In short it was about as different to the Society Room on a Monday night, as a place could be.  When it comes to creating a great atmosphere - small is beautiful.
there was a good selection of Scottish cask ale on the four handpulls and I ordered a half of Inveralmond Ossian pale ale (good).  As there were no spare seats, I found a space to stand next to a column, which had a handy shelf to perch my beer on, and soaked up the atmosphere

Ossian - not the stuff in the glass (that’s lager)

As I returned to the bar to get a couple of photos, a Glaswegian man and woman started talking to me.  I mentioned that I was impressed with the selection of single malts and he replied that he was drinking Scottish Leader blended whisky at £1.25 a dram - because it was cheap,  (in fact probably the cheapest whisky in the place by a fair margin).
Don't ask me how but he then got to telling me a story about his 'cigarette fight’ with two 'jakies' who demanded that he hand over his ciggies when he was having a smoke outside the Pot Still on some previous evening.  Instead of parting with his cigarettes he apparently told them where to go, and was thumped by one of them - so he then thumped the other one...
...a post-smoking ban smokers life can obviously be tough in Glasgow...
The time for another beer came, and before the Scottish Leader man had the chance to fight me for a whisky,  I excused myself, moved further down the bar and ordered a half of Knops Musselborough Broke, a 4.5% scotch ale (good)...

Half of Knops Musselborough Broke...

From this new bar propping position I got talking to chap from Lytham St Annes, who was on his own, in Glasgow - for a holiday - in February - as you do.  I suppose the Blackpool season doesn't start till Easter.
He was trying a whisky or two guided by the expert barman, with me helpfully chipping in with “that’s a good one” and similar knowledgeable comments.  Apparently he’d never drunk whisky before - but at least he was in the right place to get his whisky drinking career off on the right foot...
We had a chat while he drank his whisky and then he left...just as the curly handlebar moustache man in Rupert Bear’s clothes came to the bar.

Rupert Bear man with curly handle-bar moustache (just under his nose but out of view) ordering whisky, adds to surreal feeling of evening...

I couldn’t leave without partaking of a single malt and I asked the barman for a guided tour of the Ardbeg whiskies.  I was forgetting what he’d said almost straightaway as he shuffled bottles on the shelf and reeled off all the names - luckily he seemed to get bored after the first half a dozen...or realised I wasn’t taking anything he said in....
...predictably I decided on the last bottle he’s showed me, which was the only one I could remember..
Ardbeg An Oa (£5.80 for Scottish dram - 35ml) - peaty smoke bomb - (very good)...

Ardbeg smoke bomb...

I loved this place and it seems so do many others....
..and so with a last longing look at the legions of whisky bottles on the shelves - I made myself go back to the Novotel and bed....
......past this painting in an nearby art shop window - which seemed to sum up my evenings enjoyment at the Pot Still, and in fact, all that is good about a social drink in any good pub...

Laughter and flat caps - obviously the dog’s heard the joke before...