Thanks to the good offices of an old mate of mine, I've managed to bag a ticket for Ireland's first Rugby World Cup game this weekend, in Cardiff. The old country are taking on Canada, who while adept at chopping down trees, shouldn't present much of an obstacle to the Irish when it come to 80 minutes of grievous bodily egg-chucking.
So, it promises to be a jolly boys' weekend then. A gang of first-generation English-born bog-trotters, an almost guaranteed Irish victory and a well-stocked bar. The only problem is that I mustn't get too catastrophically pissed-up. I don't manage hangovers well - and never have done. I get extremely maudlin when I'm feeling crapulent. I can't tolerate it. Added to this is fact that I'm attending a Richard Thompson gig in London on Sunday evening, so I can't be too under the legless weather. If I keep telling myself this, I'm sure it'll be fine.
Left to myself of course, there would be no problem. I like being moderately drunk - tipsy, jolly - call it what you will. But I hate being full-on drunk. It's scary. And I have a very well attenuated monitor in these matters. The bit of my brain that organising waking me up before I soil the bed at night knows when we've had enough, and brings the shutters down before irreparable damage is sustained to the chassis. Unfortunately, the chaps I'm going with appear to observe no such distinction. To them, tipsy is a picturesque and fleeting stop en route to paralytic, much like the Cardiff train thundering through Didcot Parkway.
"Please step back from the platform edge. This lot aren't stopping."
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