I HAVE a mother and four sisters, wife, daughter and squadrons of grand-daughters and other female relatives all of which means at this time of the year I spend a lot of time in stores shopping for girlie things.

I have to sit or stand quietly, responding with a sickly grin to sympathetic (or is it gloating?) smiles from female shoppers and rapidly breaking eye contact in case anyone thinks I'm a perv.

I now know more about Sloggis than any male on earth.

All of which would be fair enough if women in pubs returned the courtesy and ordered their drinks like a man.

The drill is simple enough.

You wave your glass and the bank note with which you intend to pay for a refill and shout out the name of the beer or spirit you wish.

You get your pint in double-quick time, your change is slammed down on the counter in a pool of beer and the next gagging bloke moves into your place.

Simple.

So why don't women get it?

They buy drinks which take an age to serve and which frankly, have no place in a pub. On Monday I got to the bar to my intense misfortune two seconds behind a young woman ordering drinks for herself and her mates.

One wanted a snowball whatever that is and the other two coffee.

In the five minutes of gurgling and frothing which what with the whipped cream to go on top of the coffee and a dainty little sprinkling of cinnamon took a barmaid at least five minutes half-a-dozen blokes could have been wiping foam from their whiskers.

To add insult to injury and as always seems to be the case with women, she spent at least two minutes fishing in her purse for exactly the right change rather than thrusting a note in the general direction of the bar staff.

The day of the men-only bar has unfortunately long gone. I pine for spit-and-sawdust and walls and ceilings nicotined to a mahogany hue but have been forced by law to give up my cherished right to a male-only space.

Might I respectfully ask ladies that this Christmas, if you wish to drink anything involving cream, cinnamon, cherries, cocktail sticks, coffee beans or little bits of fruit you go to a cafe where such things are properly served?

In exchange I promise not to coo over babies, spend twenty minutes parking in a space large enough to accommodate an aircraft-carrier or take up line-dancing.