So the weekend has come around again on its seemingly endless endeavour to get the nation pissed. Its saturday and not just any old saturday but one where a Welsh rugby international against the Irish has just taken place and we WON. (19 ~ 13 if you're interested.) So why am I here wittling away at another virtual wood carving on some dusty corner of the internet, instead of bathing (almost literally) in my favourite alcoholic beverage? Okay i'll admit I could be sitting here, merrily typing away with a snifter of scotch at my side but trust me, im not. Its been tea only.
So what has come over me? Why is this normally on~his~sixth~pint~by~now guy, sitting in virtual darkness after a Welsh win in the rugger and content with cups of tea? Have I had a 'moment of clarity' as the A.A. bores would say? Or have I suffered a 'gwedd newidiad' (divine change) as my grandmother would have put it? Well a firm NO is the answer, much to the frustration of my doctor should she ever read this. Now to make this pretty dull sounding announcement sound a leeetle bit more interesting, I am in fact in the middle of an experiment (cue a big 'Ooooh!' from my dear readers.)
Please God! Let it end...Oh im not mixing chemicals in the hope of discovering some nefarious, trippy substance and neither am I attempting some rustic form of alchemy in the faint hope of creating gold. Nothing so exciting im afraid. No, what I am trying to do is find out if a saturday, and rugby international saturday to boot (pun intended,) can be enjoyed if one remains completely SOBER.
I admit this may not sound like a big challenge to normal people (although tell me what is 'normal' these days) but to me, the type of guy who doesn't merely like a few drinks but loves guzzling GALLONS of the stuff almost nightly, it IS a big deal. Im not alcoholic (and no smart ass better say 'yet') because im happy, or happy~ish, sticking with herbal tea but I do so LOVE getting sozzled. Plowed. Shamboozled. Pickled. Seven sheets to the wind.
So how was it? Well lets be straight, up until 3pm I was fine but I figured I would be as I dont usually begin drinking 'til after 6pm anyway, so no trouble there. While the clock slowly (REALLY slowly) ticked off the minutes however, AFTER 3pm I found my mind wondering how good beginning the blotto journey would be. And seeing crowds clutching pint glasses in the coverage of the Italy v France game didn't do me any favours. Strange how a minute BEFORE 3pm my mind was thinking about new poetry ideas, then suddenly WHAM! Almost a second past 3pm and my thoughts had strayed into fields of bottles and pretty wine glasses where damsels skipped half naked and all of them after me.
I wasn't OBSSESSING over booze before any wannabe shrink starts getting ideas above their station, I was simply fancying one. Well ten. I was happy with the tea of course but it wasn't growing my c**k if you get my meaning. And after the Italians beat the French in a suprising but well deserved win, it was around 4:30pm and oh how I wished I was in Rome! The food! The celebrations! The history! The beer! Yes it was becoming a near constant thought by now and I was shocked at how much we Brits (because its NOT just ME) have associated the weekends with getting blitzed! To some of us, those who still have hungers, desires and fire in their guts, a sober saturday is like spending a week in the best orgy that ever was without genitals. We have conditioned ourselves to getting absolutely, sh!t searingly (sh!t searingly?) toasted on a saturday.
Needless to say I spent the entire Wales v Ireland match with half my mind wishing it was sunday when normal service would resume. Now here it must be said again (because armchair psycholgists are such stubborn creatures) that I wasn't curled up in the foetal position, sweating buckets and seeing pink elephants. I hadn't had a drink in days and was in fact enjoying alternating between the blackcurrant squash and teas but geez my heart was aching for a pint. (Its okay for hearts to yearn for a drink, its when the soul begins the same habits one has cause to start to worry.)
Wales won due to some luck but every team needs luck now and then, so that was great. I would have hated trying to drown my sorrows on chamomile tea. Come 7pm my tongue (and no doubt liver) was really starting to feel dry and I couldn't shake the feeling that I was wasting a day. Again I dont think im alone in feeling this way as most people (the fiery types I mentioned earlier) are like bowels without sh!t when they spend saturday dry. And Wales WON and someone is still abstaining! Perish the thought! At times we are so much similar to machines in our behaviour, needing most things to come in routine and order. We are frightened of abandoning all plans and leaving life to the perils of chance. Weekends are proof of this.
