Wednesday Janaury 30 - Free Booze Everywhere And Not A Drop To Drink

My name's Will and I'm a social alcoholic. It's been 30 days, 18 hours and two minutes since my last drink.

So, the good news is, I'm still on the wagon. The bad news is, I must have refused several hundred quids worth of free booze during that four-day jaunt to Italy. This feels like madness, as every journalist knows we must drink as much free booze as is humanly possible - thousands of pounds worth if we can - in order to boost our salaries to a decent level. Enough to match our more sensible peers, for example, who plumped for careers in well-paid professions in law or the City. Or, for that matter, teaching, nursing, busking, etc..

I can almost see my parents' faces flush with pride, as they explain: "Well, our Will works long hours for crap money, he doesn't really help anyone and society has zero respect for his profession. However, he did drink three thousand pounds worth of free wine last year, which is almost as good as a pension. He's building up a good layer of fat, which should see him through the first couple of years of retirement."

As a rule, press trips are boozy affairs. Firstly, for the reasons set out above. Secondly, because you go away with several strangers, and alcohol is a useful tool for either bonding with kindred spirits, or numbing the pain of having to talk to dullards.

My friend has a saying. It goes something like this: "On every press trip there is a wanker. If you can't spot him, it's probably you."On this occasion, however, I'm pleased to report a wanker-free party. Unless it was me, which is surely impossible.

Press trips are also likely to be boozy affairs because their reason d'etre is to bribe journalists into writing nice things about a hotel, which will then prompt honest members of society (remember those teachers and buskers I mentioned earlier) to stay in said hotel as a paying guest. And what better way to convince someone to like you than plying them with booze?

We were staying at a five-star hotel in the Italian Alps, which was so sumptuous that it really didn't need to resort to such booze bribery. But it did, anyway, much to the relief of the rest of the group.

I nailed my tee-total colours to the mast during the two-hour transfer from Turin Airport. I thought that was about right - any earlier and I'd have looked like an evangelist, any later and it may have looked like I was trying to hide a dirty secret.

The group were cautious, initially. One or two pulled faces as if I had stood up at a PTA meeting and breezily informed the committee that I'd gone ahead and booked Gary Glitter for the end-of-term disco. In others I noticed a mixture of recognition and relief. As in: "Oh, he's the wanker. Thank God for that - I thought it might be me."

To their credit, they gave me the benefit of the doubt, and even pretended to believe my story that I was writing a blog. (Yes, we know it's true, but if some random stranger tells you they've given up booze in order to write a blog, what would you think? Bloke pretending he's not a raging alkie? Me too.)

The first night was fairly light. Just a couple of litres of red wine and half a bottle of grappa. Each. I had already heroically shunned the bottle of champagne, which was waiting on ice when I arrived in my suite and continued to taunt me for the rest of my stay. Then it was dinner time, and as usual, refusing the first drink was the hardest. The sound of the cork popping like an angel's fart, the glug-glug of the first pour sounding sweeter than any tune played on heaven's harp, an aroma so sweet that you would KILL for just an acorn's cup of it...

But, y'know, water is quite nice, too. Quite refreshing.

It does get easier as the night wears on, however, and I felt that I kept up with the banter and gave a good account of myself. I even tried to join the post-dinner fun by ordering non-alcoholic cocktails. A Shirley Temple and a Flamingo, seeing as you ask - both of which looked gayer than they sound. Which, I'm prepared to concede, is pretty darned gay.

I even kept good humour on the second night, when one of Italy's top sommeliers gave us a personalised wine tasting session with four of the Piedmont region's finest red wines. I would write more about this but fear I may weep over such a senseless waste of top notch booze. Suffice to say I had the glasses before me but was only allowed to mournfully sniff at the contents. What a tease.

For the record, during the four-day trip, I also refused:
- Wine on the flight over
- Beer and wine with lunch
- Hot chocolate with rum during skiing
- A vin chaude for apres-ski
- Champagne with pre-dinner nibbles
- Several buckets of posh wine with dinner
- Fancy dessert wine with, er, dessert
- Grappa, whiskey and other snifters post-dinner
- Beers at Turin airport en route home

And that was just the stuff I was actively offered, never mind what I could have sought out myself. I can't think how I came to be a social alkie.

Oh well, it was tough but at least things should be easier for a while. Now, what am I doing this weekend? Oh, great, a stag weekend in Barcelona. Perfect.