Sunday July 15 - Guess Who's Back?

My name's Will and I'm a social alcoholic. It's been six months, 14 days and 20 hours since my last drink.

I always used to think that drink made me lazy. That if I could just avoid those long nights in the boozer and extended hangovers, then that play/novel/bestselling film script that I must surely have inside me would simply burst out. It would be practically unavoidable.

So did it?

Nope.

Turns out I'm just naturally lazy. I can't even be bothered to write a blog entry in two weeks. Pathetic.

Seriously, two weeks without a blog post is prety darned poor, and I suspect the handful of regular readers may have given up the ghost. I know I would.

On the other hand, perhaps you had mistook my long period of absence for a spectacular fall off the wagon, and are now tuning in to read all about the gory details.

If so, I'm afraid I'll have to disappoint you again. I have not spent the last fortnight on an Elton (an extravagent bender). I am not writing this entry from the Priory, covered in tattoos, yellow bruises and sick. Boringly, my body has remained untainted and the only new addiction I have picked up is Facebook. Sorry.

For the record, I have had plenty of opportunities to fall off the wagon. Last weekend saw Brummies Matt P and Don come up to the Pool, for example, and both beat me on the Allerton 9-hole. Losing in your own back yard to a little ginger fella and a man who underwent major back surgery two months ago is surely reason enough to want to drink - not to mention the fact that it was the first peep of sunshine in about a month. Alas, it had to be an overpriced cranberry and soda at Alma de Santiago. Well, you can't go somewhere that "upmarket" and ask for blackcurrant squash, can you?

Naturally, I've also made several trips to the Penny Lane Wine Bar. I used to moan that it was too smoky in there. Post-smoking ban, it turns out that it smells of farts. And it still costs £1.60 for a soda and blackcurrant.

On Friday, Gregg and I stopped in Liverpool at around 7pm on the way back from Wales to "pop into" Mike Hornby's leaving do from the Echo. (Mike is one of the lucky pups replacing me and Emma at PA). I write "pop into" in speech marks because, inevitably, one thing led to another and I found myself still in town at 12.30am. To be precise, I was in Blundell Street, screaming to make myself heard over the din of a bad Dean Martin impersonator and a gaggle of ancient Hens. I'm not sure why I was screaming to be heard, because my audience (a stag party casualty from Dudley, my wedding photographer Ray Farley, and a glassy-eyed Gregg) were barely capable of speech, let alone listening or independent thought.

I wouldn't say I was tempted to drink at that stage, but there are definitely moments when I question the point of this whole project. Standing in the pissing rain (away from the din), drinking a flat Coke that I didn't want, waiting for Gregg to finish his 8th lager (a task made infinitely slower by his regular bouts of suggestive dancing and talking nonsense) was one of those moments. If I'd have been drinking, it would have been a cracking night. Instead, I had an OK time. It feels like I'm wasting a perfectly good year of my life in sobriety.

The rest of the weekend was fun, but no great strain on the no-boozing front. Gem's sisters were up with their fellas, and we only went out for a couple of cheeky ones at the Penny Lane WB. Gem and Nicola still managed to get pissed, though, as I think the barmaid had some kind of bi-polar disorder in which she could only pour wine by the thimble or bucket. Hence, when I asked her to top up the pathetically small measures of rose wine, she filled the glasses to their very brims. For those who remember your science lessons, I could clearly see meniscuses peeping over the top of the glasses.

Today, it was Sally's bloke Dave's turn to beat me at golf. He hadn't played for about ten years, and even that was just pitch'n'putt with his granddad in Telford. Still, such defeat is becoming so regular that it hardly drives me to drink any more. I just need to get used to the fact that I'm the Tiger Tim of Allerton 9-hole. Maybe Robinsons would sponsor me, too. I do drink a lot of squash, after all.