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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
Lifestyle

Pub nomenclature doesn’t stand up

People stand and sit drinking outside The Coach & Horses pub
The Coach & Horses pub in Soho, central London, 7 August 2026. Photograph: Yui Mok/PA

I was interested to read your article regarding “vertical drinking” (Curbs on vertical drinking in Soho pubs to go ahead as Khan criticises council’s ‘breathtaking arrogance’, 8 September). When I was a lad we used to call this “drinking”. It’s a bit like “wild swimming”. Again, in my day, we used to call this “swimming”. Whatever next? Eyeball reading? Horizontal sleeping? Mobile walking? Audible talking?
Joe Hyde
Bilsborrow, Lancashire

• Re your report (UN votes to adopt new world map that shows Africa’s true scale, 4 September), it’s good to see the UN catching up with the Guardian, which uses an equal-area world map in the “The week that was” feature in Saturday’s paper. Many of us in geography classrooms have been using Equal Earth maps, such as the Peters projection, for years.
Dave Weight
Former secondary school geography teacher, Leeds

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