New Year in Edinburgh.

Edinburgh hosts the largest New Year party in the world. Over a million people flock to Edinburgh during the four day event and having been one of the million in my younger years I have to tell you that if you've never been a visitor to this fair city you should make the effort to be one before you die. After you've died is a waste of time. You won't enjoy it half as much.

In the centre of town the streets are closed off, stages are erected, fireworks are placed and ready to go and the whole of town becomes party central. Outside the centre of town it's a different matter... Gangs of pissed up youths wander the streets like feral dogs, strange bearded weirdys who speak in guttural grunts stagger and sway along the footpaths and kids on minimotos terrorise anyone stupid enough to venture out the house.

Strangely enough though this makes for a fine and high setting for house parties. It's pretty much a guarantee that you'll meet colourful people who will give you their opinion on any subject. Never mind the fact that they have the intelligence of a retarded monkey and will be unable to string together a sentence without swearing every second word and calling you a cunt. In a nice way.

I may sound a bit harsh on the people around me but it's only due to the fact that when you love something you see it warts and all. And that's as true an axiom as has ever been stated.

These days my new year is no longer a drunken daunder down drink droukit dales. Oh no, nowadays my new year is a drink with friends and family. And that to me is a far better thing than the four day hangover of the old days.

Maybe I'm getting old. But I doubt it...

Drink is the enemy...

Love thine enemy.

Right now it's hard to love my enemy as it has laid me low for the entire day. It's all Jenny's fault, honestly. I had nothing to do with it. I had intended on staying home last night where I had a very nice evening in front of the fire planned doing the things I love... Playing the Xbox, reading, writing, having a nice long soak in the bath, torturing kittens and wanking off.[1]

But it would seem that the Grand Whazoo disagreed with my grand scheme and decided that Jenny was to throw a party and that I was to attend. So at about five o'clock I had a bath, a shave and made myself look handsome. I chose a very nice, but understated, ensemble of jeans, comedy T-Shirt, my new No Fear jacket my sister got me for Christmas and my trainers.

About an hour and a half later I was headed for Kirknewton (twin town Brigadoon) in my mates car as he agreed to drop me off for a few quid in petrol money and enough for a deck of cigarettes.

Arriving at the party I realised that I was the last person to arrive and everyone was in quite the party mood (drunk) and subsequently had some catching up to do. Cue me getting a hold of a pint glass, half filling it with rum, topping it off with coke and necking half of it in one gulp.

I then spent about a half an hour chatting to all the old faces that I hadn't seen since my departure from behind the bar where they play marbles.[2] More drink was had and I steadily worked my way through the bottle of rum I had brought with me.

At about four or five in the morning (my memory is hazy) a taxi was called and I headed home to the warmth and comfort of my bed.

Strangely enough, despite the fact I had a bottle of rum in my system, I managed to have the presence of mind to fill a bottle of water, drop in four soluble solpadine and place it next to my bed for whenever I surfaced from the depths of my dreams. And thank god I did. I woke up at four pm with a head like the Rolling Stones had had an aftershow party in it and my mouth was drier than a welsh comedians favorite joke.

[1] One of these statements is not true, can you guess which one? Answer in comments if you can be bothered.
[2] They call it bowls but I stand by my judgement.

There's nothing quite like...

Drinking too much to knock hell out of your body.

I found this out (Again...) on Saturday morning after spending almost £80 on alcohol at Gorgie Mills Bowling Club on Friday night. (Four 35ml spirits and accompanying mixers was less than £5 so I know I must have tanked a fair old amount of booze during the evening.)

The reason for my darkening the doorstep of a bowling club was that it was Jenny's sister Gill's 30th birthday and I'd been invited along.

I did give give serious consideration to not going as I was afraid that I'd be spotted by members of my former workplace and they'd hound me out the building and chase me down the street for having the gall to say that the place was run in a less than efficient manner.

I was under strict instructions from Jenny that if I didn't show my life wouldn't be worth living if I let her down so I popped on my finest Hawaiian shirt and off I went.

Gill looked stunning (As she always does... I've fancied her ever since I first clapped eyes on her when she attended a cabaret in a red dress that would make Chris De Burg tear up his lyric book, recall every copy of "Lady in Red" and move to a small island somewhere.) dressed up as a can-can dancer complete with garter belt and a smile that could easily convince me to do anything she asked of me.

I, of course, began the night by throwing as much drink down my throat as was humanly possible in a space of time that would cause the average alcoholic to pass me an invite to their next AA meeting. (The first round was a double rum and coke immediately followed by a second double rum and coke chased with a shot of Aftershock.)

Within an hour I had abandoned the short glasses for a pint glass of rum and coke and was drinking like alcohol was being banned by the government at midnight. After that things got a bit hazy to say the least.

Amongst the things I do remember...

• Asking Jenny what the fuck Gill saw in the human hamburger.
• Arguing with a senior citizen about Muslims and followers of Islam (His view on the subject was that they should all be shot, my reply was to tell him he was a "Stupid old cunt" and if I had my way he'd be the first against the wall closely followed by his family and friends.)
  
• Screaming at Jenny "Women are as deep as puddles, Men are idiots and we're all doomed!" after a philosophical discussion on what women see in people who's IQ is significantly lower than that of a steak sandwich.
  
• Attempting to hump the leg of an old friend. (Just to see his reaction.)
• Drinking a pint of Malibu and coke and two pints of Smirnoff Ice mixed with Orange Bacardi breezer and blue WKD in the space of three minutes as no-one else wanted them.
  
• Yelling at the top of my lungs in the street as the club emptied "I do not have a wee fat cock!" at Jenny.
• Falling flat on my arse after taking a short cut along a muddy, dark path and laughing hysterically at the situation I was in.
• Having a heated argument with someone on the other side of the riverbank who was attempting to get me to keep the noise down.
  
• Collapsing in a heap in the public park around the corner from my house.
• Being awoken in the park by someone walking their dog at 3am.
• Telling a lamppost that I despaired for humanity in a conversation that lasted for about fifteen minutes.
  
• Waking up on the hall floor of my house at 6am in a shape that shouldn't really be possible for a human being to get into. (I'd somehow managed to contort myself into something resembling the shape of a pretzel.)
• Almost destroying the bathroom after attempting to use the shower curtain as an aid to keep me upright.
• Arguing with the aforementioned shower curtain for not being more supportive in my hour of need.
  

The following day I lay in my bed until at least 5pm with the curtains drawn and a pillow over my head in a vain attempt to make the pounding headache go away.