A Grovey Roader Reunion

For the third time this year so far, I'm spending my Sunday nursing a hangover. Boozy sessions in Birmingham, Nottingham, and now Manchester have all been huge fun, but it's irritating how even the mild badheads can result in an entirely unproductive day after. Fortunately I planned ahead this time and booked the Monday off work, to give me some time to catch up on things - website, tidying up, buying birthday cards, etc. Today though, was just a day of recuperation.

Woke up on a sofa with a raging thirst, and smelling of beer, dry ice, wine and pizza. Yuk. Gathered together my belongings as I tried to persuade the other lads that no, honestly, I didn't chunder in Pizza Express - I mean, surely I'd remember such as event, right? Although admittedly all I recall of the meal was drinking overpriced wine, instigating a salt n pepper fight, and explaining for the fifth time that evening what I did for a living, and for whom. Other people always seem to find my career far more interesting than I do...

The beer wounds were mercifully light - just an aching back, grazed knee, and torn Levi 501s, courtesy of Rich leaping on my back and bowling me onto the pavement as we wandered through the city streets towards a small club playing repetitive beats and charging £1.20 for 33cl of non-brand mineral water. Fortunately I avoided paying this by falling asleep for much of the night..

Everything had begun in such a civilised, relaxed, and restrained manner - just a few quiet pints watching the rugby in a pub. Ah, but starting the session at 2:30pm compounded the lairiness come 10pm - a long day made for lots of drinking. The pub was pleasant, if inhabited by some strange patrons - one guy looked for all the world like Foggy from Last of the Summer Wine, flat cap and all. We felt sure he must've arrived by riding an old bicycle uncontrollably down a hill, only to fly arse over tits over a dry stone wall at the bottom. Another drunken guy introduced himself to me as Brian, 53, with two kids (I forget their ages), before bursting into some Cat Stevens tunes and asking me to buy him a pint ("I'm a millionaire you see, but it's all in my wife's name...") You've gotta give him points for trying, I guess.

All in all, it was a pretty fine day, and facilitated the first full Grovey Roader reunion since graduation.

Today, though - the wind, rain and hail batter the north of England, so I turn the heating up and relax into a foam bath with Vivaldi on the hi-fi. Not my most-played CD, admittedly, but I find it difficult to bathe to Labradford or Quickspace Supersport. Then sat and watched another classic episode of Mr. Benn on video (just £3.99 for four episodes! bargain!) - someone stands to make a fortune releasing classic 1970s cartoons onto VHS; I'll be making a return trip to HMV to pick up a selection of Bod episodes, and I know a number of people who want the Bagpuss vid. All for our nieces and nephews, of course...