Of Drink & Debauchery (Well, at least one of them, anyway)

So, I got back from town, and immediately had to start figuring out what to do about the evening, having spent the rest of the day being indecisive about the flat ;)

I'd worked out what I'd be wearing to drive and get there in - given I was already wearing it when I went to town ;) (I was looking at a 1hour+ drive, so I didn't fancy driving in my suit so I could change in my room when I got there and feel more relaxed).
I have two suits - a black one and a blue one - but I only tend to wear the black one these days, be it occasional for business-related purposes, or for the occasional "evenings" such as this one.

Normally (i.e. the last six years of Christmas dos ;) ), I would wear my black suit and a colourful shirt, and an appropriate tie to match shirt. A nice red or green shirt is good for the Christmassy colour :) I also have a Christmassy tie (with an annoying tune playing thingy in it) that my sister bought for me a few years ago. This year, I didn't really fancy wearing something Christmassy yet, as despite the fact it's technically our Christmas party, there is still a whole month to go :)

In fact, I actually decided that it was time for a change from the norm, and that I would in fact wear... a black shirt!
I've had a black shirt lurking in my wardrobe for a couple of months now, but I hadn't found an appropriate juncture to actually wear it :) I decided that it'd work well this evening with a shiny silverish tie :)

I gathered together whatever else it was I thought I needed (shaver, toothbrush, etc.) and went to print out the information I had on where I was going and when I was getting there. Unfortunately, I had that information at work, and it turned out that I was completely unable to connect remotely to work all of a sudden. DOH!
Fortunately, I was fairly sure I could remember which hotel it was we were staying at, and a quick Google revealed a familiar website.
I couldn't be certain what time the meal actually started (as I couldn't get in to my work e-mails to check), but I decided to assume 7. Given around 1.5 hours to drive there, I needed to get my skates on as it was already coming up for 5pm :)
After having got outside, I then spent about 15mins swearing at the 100 assorted cables that my new GPS bits had, before eventually managing to leave at around 5:05pm.

Fortunately, the journey there was somewhat uneventful.

And I think that's about all that happened really, not much springs to mind after that ;)

What!? ;)

Well, I arrived at 6:45pm, and was pleased to find out that the meal wasn't until 8pm, so I did have some time to go up to my room, get changed, and relax from the drive.

Watched a bit of Planet Earth. It was a repeat, but I hadn't been paying much attention the last time it was on ;)

Anyway, I made it downstairs for about 8pm, and within moments had acquired pint of Grolsch. Menu selections were made in the bar area, before proceeding off to sit down for the meal. What did I select? Ermmm... Some sort of "oriental" starter (it was three things, quite tasty, not sea-y though - or I likely wouldn't have ordered it ;), a 10oz sirloin steak (rare), and... Oh wait, I didn't order dessert at this point, which is good, as I can't remember what it was anyway ;)

At this point, I switched from the beer to red wine. Now, at this point, I also feel compelled to disclose how much I drink of an average week ;)
An average week for me sees me have a pint of a Friday lunchtime, and that's me lot. Sometimes, only sometimes mind, I might stretch to a pint and a half ;)
Now, on top of that, I weigh just under 9 stone (that's... under 126 pounds for any Americans ;) ). So, what I'm saying is, I probably can't drink that much ;)

However, throughout the meal, I did get through three glasses of red. And it was a very nice meal :) Glad I said "rare" on the steak - I had pondered "medium rare", but it appeared to be an over-eager chef, and I've probably had more rare "mediums" than this ;) (Eugh, especially the first time I had steak in a restaurant - "well done" in France beats "rare" here on the "ridiculous amounts of blood" levels ;) Still, not complaining, I enjoyed it anyway :)

'Ey, and I tell 'ya what, I pulled a couple of crackers that night though...

(You know what's coming, don't you, and yes, I apologise in advance)

Yep, I pulled one with m' colleague Needles (sitting to my left), and one with Loud Jack's partner (sitting to my right). The company had also bought us each a li'l silly book. I have "the little eBay book" which tells you about "the website's most weird and wonderous". Others included "Management Bollocks" and "Insulting Gestures".

I think I had a fruity cheesecake for dessert. It was ok, but not special. Several other people were unimpressed with their desserts.

Shortly after that, BB's wife, who had been very restrained throughout the evening until then, asked, "So, come on then Monkfish, what's going on with your wife?", or something very much along those lines ;)
Some shifting of seats took place. More wine was suggested, but we discovered we'd already got through most of the 2nd set of bottles, so I ended up getting a glass of white as there wasn't any red left.

We adjourned to the lounge for a bit, where the subjects continued to be varied, and occasionally coming back to me. Some expressed "Awh, leave him alone!" opinions, but to be honest, I wasn't all that bothered answering questions. I'm comfortable enough at the moment with talking about it to be able to do that, and I didn't expect any to really be poignant enough to get much out of me ;)
At some point, someone did ask something like, "So how often do you have sex?" to which I'd drunk enough to reply with, "March."
(Yeah, like I'd have drunk enough to say "Just coming up for six years actually, but we last had a bit of a fun fondle back in March" - I don't think so)
Someone did thoughtfully point out that March was when we got married. "Yes," I said. "It was."

Drinks check: 1 pint Grolsch, 3x Glasses red wine, 1x Glass white wine.

Now, I must confess, I did something many of you will perceive as downright unacceptably dispickable behaviour at this point, for someone in this situation with an unlimited supply of free drink.

That's right... My next three drinks were tap water ;)

I could feel at that point I was already really quite drunk and I needed a breather from drinking. At some point, I decided some fresh air would be a good idea.

I nipped outside and after a short while decided a short run around the car park would be a good idea. Running around a wet and slippery car park in the dark when you feel you've had too much to drink isn't THE most sensible idea that one can come up with ;)
I slipped over turning a corner, and landed on my left side, bruising my leg and grazing my arm. I dusted my suit down, before returning inside, feeling glad that nobody else had been around to see me ;)
After a couple of minutes, I decided to inspect my war wounds, so hopped up to my room. Tidied my suit up some more (no permanent damage, it was just a little grubby in places) and ran my arm under the tap. Apparently I did take about 20minutes and they wondered where I'd gone ;)

After returning, I was eventually happy to resume drinking again, and had a couple of Southern Comforts. It was at some point now that we noticed two or three hotel staff 'enthusiastically' escorting someone from the premises.

It was probably around 2-3am that I decided to nip outside again. This time, I was more careful to trot carefully around the car park ;)

Upon returning to the hotel entrance, I was surprised to find the automatic doors did not open as I approached them. I took a few steps back, and tried again. Nothing. I lightly tried sliding it, but could tell it didn't want to. "Oh," I thought, "I guess they turn them off automatically opening from this side once it gets late."
As I began to look for some sort of doorbell, I was aware of someone else arriving.

"They appear not to be opening automatically," I said, as I located and pushed the doorbell thingy.

The other bloke appeared to be a little less patient than myself, as he rattled the doors in frustration. Lightly, at first, but then with excessive force.

"Calm down, mate," I offered by the way of advice. Clearly a sign I had been drinking, as I didn't think anything of saying it ;)

He ignored my presence however, and decided to start banging on the glass. It sounded a surprisingly loud bang. At this stage, hotel employees had arrived on the other side. I noticed that the glass appeared to have been shattered outwards from where he had hit it - not smashed, and still in place, but cracks emitted to every corner from the centre of the pane.
"I told you to go away!" exclaimed the hotel staff, or something along those lines.
The bloke suddenly ran off to my right, straight past me. The hotel staff turned and walked back into the hotel.

I looked around for a few seconds (at the empty lobby on the other side of the door, at the broken pane of glass, at the direction the bloke had run off), and rang the doorbell again. Someone let me in without any difficulty or even questions.

Curiously, luckily perhaps, I appeared to have remained remarkably unnoticed throughout the whole affair.

I hadn't realised until someone else told me, but the bloke was the same one as had been "ejected" from the hotel earlier. Nobody actually has any idea who he was, who he was with, or what he was doing there.
Bad news though, as the bar had decided to stop serving drinks at this point. My boss complained at the reasons given for this. ("I don't mind," he said, "If it's because of that bloke, but if it is, just say it is. Don't come up with some bollocks about [whatever the silly reason was but I wasn't really paying enough attention]")
This news was immediately enough for Loud Jack to decide he was straight off to bed then, thank you very much. After 5 minutes, he returned to pull his partner up too, complaining that he hadn't seen her for 10 days as she'd been to Antigua.
BB insists he actually said, "as I haven't had sex in 10 days", although I don't think he actually SAID that, but clearly MEANT it ;)
Shortly after this, BB and his wife also departed for bed - apparently they had decided earlier to make sure to outlast Loud Jack and his partner, after she had been boasting about "always being the last one up".

By now, this left only myself and my boss (the other one having gone a couple of hours earlier). We chatted for a bit, and watched the police arrive and talk to a couple of hotel staff about the incident.
After a while, the night manager came over to us and apologised for having closed the bar and offered us both drinks (I'm not sure who was actually paying for them, though). I declined at first, but then joined my boss with another half of Grolsch, my final drink of the night.
For those paying attention, that's:
1 pint Grolsch, 3 x Red wines, 1 x White wine, 2 x Southern Comforts, 0.5 pint Grolsch. Overall, I think I did fairly well ;)

I think my boss said afterwards that he thought we went to bed at around 3:45am. I know I didn't actually get to bed until 4:15am, although that could be related to the fact that after I got up to my room, I eventually realised (with, may I add, only a bare minimum of noise) that I had left my key in the room when I had retreated there earlier in the night.
Back downstairs I popped, where I was easily and swiftly furnished with new key (The advantage of keycards, I guess). The night manager apologised again for the 'incident'. I said something along the lines of "No problem, these things happen sometimes. And besides, I've been a bit of a plonker for leaving my key in my room."
It was something along those lines anyway. It was quite late, and I was quite drunk ;)

I made it back to my room ok after that (sure enough, the original keycard sat glaringly in the middle of the desk upon my return), and as I said, I think it was 4:15 before I had flopped properly into bed. I set an alarm for 10am, on the off chance I wanted breakfast which finished at 10:30.

The next time I looked at the clock it was 8am. I actually have no recollection of sleeping, so I think I must have been kidnapped by aliens ;) (hey, if you're going to lose track of a few hours, at least I was in my bed, rather than a bathroom or something ;)
I got back to sleep swiftly, and woke up at 10 when the alarm went off.

Oh boy, did I ever know I'd been drinking the night before ;) On the occasions I do drink a lot (for me), I don't often feel seriously hung over in my head, but I can tell you I did right then ;) Throbbing headache, all noises too loud, all light too bright, the full works ;)
I shuffled to the loo, then back to bed, and put the alarm back to 11. I didn't really get back to sleep though. The pain was one thing, but I gradually started feeling a bit 'ill'. Eventually, come 11, I decided enough was enough, and I had to move to the bathroom which would probably jog me into being properly ill ;) Which would be reeeeasonbly fortunate as these things go, as that's the room you want to be in at that point ;)

Over the years, the times I've drunk enough to throw up probably number less than five. Having said that, I don't recall having been sick for a reason other than excessive alcohol ingestion at all over the last seven years (An easy number to pick on, being the time I've lived here).
And I was very properly very 'ill' ;) Fortunately, not in any 'wrong' places ;)

Once I was done being ill, the headache and general nausea somewhat subsided, and I was left more feeling very drained and still somewhat drunk. I left the alarm (well, my phone; I'd been carrying it back and forward with me since 11) on snooze the whole time, to ensure I didn't fall asleep anywhere silly ;) (Or even in bed, once I made it back there). So I spent 20 or 30minutes in bed not quite getting asleep, before I decided eventually I really should move at 11:45, bearing in mind checkout time was 12 ;)

I didn't bother shaving, and within 30 seconds you couldn't tell I'd brushed my teeth ;)

Once I made it downstairs to checkout (12:15), several of my colleages had already left, but some were still around. I sat around for a bit and chatted with them. I drank a couple of cups of tea, had a biscuit, and leafed through some "Sport" magazine. The interview with Ronaldinho didn't do much for me, but there was an interesting article on some people who are going to the Southern Pole of Inaccessibility (POI). Basically, it's the point pretty much in the centre of Antarctica. The only people ever to have been there were some Russians in 1958. The Russians did it with huge military vehicles. The current team will be pretty much walking there.
The coldest natural temperature ever recorded on Earth is -90degrees celcius. This was recorded in Vostok, Antarctica, a Russian research station. The POI has a higher altitude and is further inland, so stands a chance of hitting even lower temperatures! Crazy stuff :)

It was about 2pm before I left the hotel. And then I spent about an hour playing with cables and GPS in the car, and trying to work out how to tune a radio-station in ;) I also just recently got one of those thingies that lets you transmit an MP3 player or whatever onto an FM station to be picked up on your car radio so you can play it over the car speakers, and I hadn't got around to playing with that at all until now :)
I was quite happy taking my time, as I didn't really think I was in a state I should be doing all that much driving.
Eventually, I headed towards Southampton and did some random driving around there.

Being so close to both Dianne and to 'Manda, I'd have loved to have met up with one or other of them (especially my good friend Dianne, whom I really should get around to at least phoning one of these days ;) whilst I was at that end of the country, but did not for a variety of reasons. Probably for the best, as I really doubt my conversation skills were doing that well, let alone my breath that could cut through bank vaults, and not having shaved ;) Still, on the other hand, at least I'd have some great excuses if they didn't enjoy my company ;)

Eventually arrived home at 7pm. Had a great time :)

RIGHT THEN! Is THAT enough detail for you!? :) Ok ok, I know, too much there really, but I don't really do much of that whole "drinking" thing, so it's all interesting to me ;)