Urgh.

I was quite drunk last night. I got a decent night's sleep, but struggled to get out of bed this morning. After indulging in some 'me time', I eventually got out of bed just before 11 AM. But I've been feeling muggy all day. I always do after a night out drinking.

I'm already looking forward to my bed tonight and having a clearer head tomorrow. I have stuff I need to do that requires concentration. 

Work and Play

Quiet Girl pinged our group chat in work earlier. Were we still going to the work even at the end of next week? I replied saying that I was. No-one else has said anything as yet, but I'm looking forward to it. It's been good fin the past few years and I think our group will be a little bigger than last year.

It might be similar to the year before that, though, where we ended up in CB Pub and QG's friend might have made a suggestion about me calling her.

That was a great night, and if we get close to having a night that good, I'll be pleased.

I will say that my capacity for alcohol has greatly diminished over the past year or so. Even on Saturday out with G, I only had like 5 pints over 5 hours and I was definitely not sober. 

It's weird... I can drink a lot more in the house than I can in the pub. 

But something to look forward to nonetheless. 

Suits you.

Shortly after posting my last post, G was in touch. He was in the city. I replied and told him I'd meet him in an hour. That would give me time to finish a couple of chores, get showered and get the bus into the city.

And so it was, pretty much exactly an hour later, that I rocked up in a local tourist bar to meet G, his wife and youngest son. And it was good fun. We parted ways around 7:30 PM after roughly five hours of conversation and banter. Despite only having 5 drinks was very tipsy and horrendously dehydrated.

That's been a feature of me drinking alcohol over the past month or so - it doesn't take a lot to get me drunk, I don't like being drunk (even more so than in the past - this feels like a different type of drunk) and I get dehydrated really easily.

And as a side note, I had a bit of a strut on. I wore some of my new clothes - a shirt and a pair of jeans - and I caught myself in the mirror before I left and I looked good. I can't remember the last time I thought I looked good to the point where I actually had a confidence boost - probably wearing a suit and getting compliments from KfW2/eye fucked by CH. 

Bittersweet memories.

Facebook has shown me a picture of a pint of beer from three years ago today. I recall the day well: I met with FP and BR, we went to a restaurant, chatted then ended up in a pub that's close by.

It's memorable for all the wrong reasons. FP shared news about his illness with BR. BR shared news with FP about his addiction problems. And while the news sharing wasn't fun or great, it was great catching up with the guys, and the conversation quickly turned more positive and happy, even though strictly speaking, we shouldn't have been in the pub, but BR insisted it was OK and we did want to continue our conversation.

And a final, less positive note on this memory, it was the last day I saw FP in person. A very bittersweet memory. 

I'll have a beer later, I think. 

Sun's out.

Bit of a last-minute invite to my sister's for a BBQ yesterday. The weather here for the past few days has been great.

BBQs mean beer and I'm afraid to say that I might have over-indulged. And even though it's a Bank Holiday here in the UK, I'm working.

I'll log off early though and go and read a book in the back garden. It'd be a shame to waste this good weather, right? 

FFS

I bought some stuff during the week to make cocktails. Espresso Martinis to be more accurate. But can I find my cocktail making kit? I know I had one. I ordered one off Amazon years back when I had my cocktail night. It's unlikely I would have thrown it out. While I am not a hoarder, I also don't throw stuff out unless it's broken or it's been replaced with something else.

Man, this is frustrating. 

EDIT: I found it. I looked up the order on Amazon, recognised the box that triggered a memory and I had it in my hands within 30 secs.

Plans.

I've just been speaking to D about Friday night. He's going home after the gig rather than staying over, so my plans are to meet up with Quiet Girl for an hour or so, have a few drinks and then meet D at the gig venue.

Potentially, I could meet up with the work people after the gig, which isn't going to go on too late, but I suspect QG will have gone home by that stage. She's not a big drinker. Neither am I these days. Three Pina Coladas and half a dozen beers were my limit on Saturday night at KfW2's (though there may have been some additional factors, if you know what I mean).

Acid attack.

2026 is not off to a great start. I didn't sleep well last night, woken on several occasions by acid reflux. It's actually been a pattern this holiday, and it seems to be kicked off by alcohol. And it doesn't have to be a lot of booze, either. 

The booze hit me quite quickly last night. Well, not quickly, but all at once. 

I made a New Years post on Facebook around 11 PM and I was feeling OK, but I'd had a (small) bottle of Baileys and a couple of gins. By the time I came to write my blog post, with another gin in me, things were different. Typing was a problem. Heh.

Anyway... I went to bed shortly after posting and was more than a little tipsy at that stage, but I woke at least four times during the night with reflux. I had already taken an esomeprazole capsule, which is usually sufficient, but I needed additional help throughout the night.

I used to suffer quite badly from reflux, but it's been less of an issue over the past few years. But when it strikes, it goes in hard.

So, yeah, a lack of sleep. 

Cheers!

Friction Guy replied, so it looks like we've got a core group and a rough time for meeting and a place to meet.

I'm not interested in the drinking. I hate being drunk and my ability to drink alcohol is now non-existent probably due to the fact that I've lost a fair bit of weight this year and I've done little to no socialising, so I am out of practice.

And the nights out with D, FBS etc. always seem to involved a lot of alcohol. We tend to meet around 6 PM these days and call it a night around midnight. That's six hours of drinking. The night out a few weeks ago with The Crowd was just over three hours and I was extremely tipsy.

Let's see how this turns out. 

Cheers!

Double birthday party today and it's going to be a very drunken affair. I'm not looking forward to tomorrow, though I do have the day off work, just in case. I can't remember the last time I was drunk, properly drunk, not just tipsy drunk. The last time I was tipsy drunk was probably out with KfW2 for lunch and drinks a few months back.

But otherwise, I've not drank that much alcohol this year nor have I been out a lot. 

Lovely day.

I got another invite from my sister for another BBQ last night. I was quick to accept. The weather was glorious and I get on well with my sister. I've drank more in the past few days than I have in months. I'm feeling it a little today, but the weather's still nice so a couple of hours in the garden, chilling with a book will do the trick.

Bah.

During one of the last work nights out, I ended up in a local, and expensive, cocktail bar with an ex-team colleague. She introduced me to a Negroni, which was delicious.

I decided that I'd get the ingredients in around Christmas and make some for myself. I did a test run last night after getting in the required booze and... it was not how I remembered. By the third they were tasting quite nice, but still not as nice as the one in the cocktail bar.

It's not like I used cheap ingredients either. Maybe it needs further tweaking, though I don't know how you can go wrong with three different boozes in the ratio of 1:1:1.

I need to experiment.

Pleased to meet you

The night out with KfW2 was, as expected, a great success. It was later than expected. A 1 PM start was first mooted, but by the time we both arrived, it was nearly 4 PM.

I shared my news and she was both incredibly sympathetic and angry at the same time. Sympathetic due to the nature of the news but angry that I hadn't shared with her earlier. That goes back to earlier this year and the fact I only told her about FP's illness literally days before he passed away despite knowing for months. While this time it's different, the life stuff is still unfolding and I deliberately held off from sharing so that I could tell her in person, knowing we had our day out.

And I didn't want to say that I'd been trying to get a hold of her at the start of last week and got no reply.

But, I had a great time, as usual. KfW2 is great company, I value her opinions, advice and viewpoint, and I made sure to tell her that. Some day, I'll need to do it when we're not drinking, because I'm pretty sure she forgets when I tell her that, or that I love her. And I was incredibly drunk by the end of the evening. More drunk than I would have liked. However, that's the price I was willing to pay. I needed the distraction, and it was provided.

But that's only twice we've seen each other this year. I must do better. Maybe we can do something during the Christmas week. Something to ponder, I guess.

Planning ahead.

I sent KfW2 a quick message. Did she want to come to mine for drinks once she gets the next two weekends behind her (she's busy for both, and I'm seeing D, FBS etc. on the Halloween weekend)?

She did and was very enthusiastic about it. I can't remember the last time I hosted KfW2 at mine, on her own. It might easily have been a few weeks after I moved in, which is many, many years ago.

I might even get to use a Christmas present that my sister bought me a while back - gin glasses.

"For when KfW2 comes to your house," she explained.

She knew that KfW2 and I love gin.

Listen up.

Urgh. Work night out last night with Stalky Guy and a few others. Ideas Girl even came and sat with us for a bit while my ex-boss (he who favours Stalky Guy in performance reviews) was none-too-subtle about staring down IG's top.

I drank a lot, and somehow managed to lose my earbuds on the way home. That's the second time I've done that in six months. D'oh.

Where'd everybody go?

Sadly, the very social March has not carried over into April, so far. I was sat in, alone, last night. I fancied a drink, though it's probably not a great idea given that I'm not particularly happy at the moment. Mentally, I've been in better places, though as usual, it's difficult to actually pin down what's wrong and what the root cause is.

I ended up drinking some rum. Normally, in the house, beer is my go-to drink, but I had none. Or so I thought. Imagine my surprise when I opened the fridge five minutes ago for a can of Pepsi only to see six ice-cold cans of beer that were left over from a few weeks ago. D'oh.

Oh. Monday Blues.

I don't know if it was the huge amount of gin that I drank on Saturday evening or finally getting the night out with KfW2, some other factor or a combination of everything, but I felt really lonely all day yesterday. I think it's been building for a while, to be honest, but I think getting out with KfW2 was a trigger. A reminder of pre-Covid times, a friend who genuinely cares and a desire to meet someone new.

It was a busy week as well. I was on-call with work, so strictly speaking I had to be within 30 mins of my laptop at any time. That restricted me to an extent, and I had to get a timeout from work specifically for going out with KfW2. That stressed me out somewhat.  The last time something like that happened, it ended up going really badly. The leak in my roof, which I thought had been fixed, came back on Thursday evening. Despite calling the roofer who did the work (it has a 6-month guarantee), I've yet to hear back from him. That's going to fuck with my social anxiety for a while.

However, on the plus side, I'm meeting BR and his wife tomorrow (other people like M and MM could be there, too). I have Friday off work, and I might be out for a few beers on Thursday evening.

I'm still feeling it a bit now, but I don't know how much of that is just Monday Blues.

Bad decisions.

Just before Xmas, my neighbour arrived with a selection of Belgian beers, not common to shops local to me. I knew all of them, they're very nice, but I've not had any of them in years. Interestingly, one of them reminded me of a night I spent chatting to GM and GB about CB and MFF, shortly after I saw CB in CB Pub. At GM's request, I ended drinking a leftover beer that was 8.5% in strength. Not a great decision for a Monday night.

But good memories, tinged with a little regret at a missed opportunity.

About time!

We had our day out yesterday and despite KfW2 and Stalky Guy not turning up, it was still a great afternoon, catching up with old colleagues. We always got along great anyway, so our team was always social. Two guys left early-ish to catch the last bus. Two of us stayed on and it was quite late when I got back into the house. Well, 9 PM, which isn't late in itself, but when you consider that we'd met at 2 PM and had been boozing all afternoon, then I was very definitely not sober.

But it was a great afternoon and while I wouldn't say that it was worth the wait (this was our rescheduled event from this time last year), it was still a very enjoyable afternoon.

Surprise.

It was a weird day yesterday. Midway through the afternoon, I suddenly felt queasy and very light-headed. It lasted for a few hours. I was due to go and get my eyes tested and I seriously contemplated rescheduling up until it was time to leave the house whereupon I grabbed my keys and left.

After spending a LOT of money on a couple of new sets of glasses, I got a phone call from my brother-in-law. Did I want dinner? I did actually. Could I bring beers? I could. I definitely needed a drink after seeing the bill for the glasses.

Long story short, it was after midnight when I left my sister's house. We drank all the beers, enjoying the weather in the garden and a bottle of rum between us. Today was not a good day.