I never anticipated university would teach me so much. Those pauper days where every penny counts – unless it’s a Wednesday night and everyone’s getting trashed. Personally, I was never one to waste my cashish, and never got into spending what little money I had on booze. Still, being a girl, I didn’t really have to. But on those nights out where a drunken fella didn’t fancy throwing his student loan down my oesophagus, I’d simply have a quiet one on tap water, and still murder the dance floor.

Yes, long gone are my student days, but oh, the habits I picked up. A continental veterinary student once taught me this one: stealing drinks. Now, don’t get me wrong, this has nothing to do with not having much money (although, you can easily see how it might link in). But no, time is more precious than money in this instance.

Who wants to queue at a four deep bar for twenty minutes, waving a score at the dopey bartender whilst getting jabbed in the ribs, and invariably getting red wine splashed on your new shoes? Fuck that. So, stealthily – and that gets more fun as the evening progresses – you stroll around the heaving bar, lean over a table, check behind you, maybe engage a puzzled look over your face just for effect. Then delicately yet purposefully pluck a drink of your choice from the full table, and strut away without looking back.

So simple. So easy. And thusly, it got employed on this recent evening. Here we are, in one of the sleekest bars in Edinburgh on a palpitating Saturday night. Wallets stuffed, cash a non-issue, we stealth-drunk the night away because the bar was too flippin’ packed to even consider bothering with. Watch your drinks, ladies and gents. If they ain’t bein’ spiked, they might just be plain ol’ stolen.

– Mae Ling l’Argent