Fabien fixes things for a living. Gutters, fences, flat-pack disasters, the odd leaking radiator, he runs a one-man handyman business out of Kiltiernan on the south side of Dublin, and most days he is up a ladder or on his knees under a sink from eight in the morning. I know him from golf, not from work. We played a round together a few weeks back, him in his Guinness beanie against the cold, and somewhere around the 9th he started talking about the one thing that actually gets him through a long day on the tools: the pint waiting at the end of it.
Ask most people what beer they like and you get a brand name. Ask a guy who spends his day cleaning gutters and hauling toolboxes up ladders, and you get an actual reason. Fabien’s answers came down to two beers, and both were about what the work does to your body, not what is trending behind the bar.
Pick One: A Frozen Cold Amber
First one out of him was an amber ale, and it had to be cold, properly cold, straight out of a fridge that has been running all day. We were in a pub that had Wicklow Wolf on tap, and that is what he ordered, no hesitation.
When you have been up a ladder in the sun all day, you don’t want something fancy. You want it frozen cold and you want it to actually taste of something. An amber does that better than most lagers, and it goes down easy after that kind of day.Fabien, Dublin handyman
He is not precious about the brand. Any well-kept amber ale, served cold enough to fog the glass, does the job after a day of manual work. It is the temperature and the malt that matter to him, not the label.
Pick Two: A Guinness, Obviously
The second answer was never really in doubt. Fabien is Dublin born and bred, and when the amber runs out, or when he just wants something to sit with rather than something to knock back, it is a Guinness. Not for any complicated reason, either.
A Guinness is the one you have when you actually want to sit down for a bit. After a day of lifting and climbing, your body wants something slower, and a pint of stout forces you to slow down with it. Plus it’s the one drink where nobody ever asks you why you’re having it.Fabien, Dublin handyman
It is a small thing, but it says something about the job: an amber when the work has been physical and you want to cool down fast, a stout when you want the evening to slow down properly. Neither one is about being a beer expert. Both are about what the body actually wants after doing real work with your hands all day.
If you are in south Dublin and need work doing around the house, gutters, small repairs, the jobs that keep getting pushed down the list, Fabien is the Dublin handyman to call. He runs his own handyman services business out of Kiltiernan, and he has earned that pint at the end of the day more than most.
