Days Without Alcohol - 50! That just seems incredible. It's a proper milestone. But I wasn't tempted to crack open the champagne after another successful Banter recording. I'm going to push onwards. And the 50 day report is I am still feeling healthy and happy and I'm getting much more done than when I was drinking. I weigh in at about 85.5kg, down from 93 at the start of the year (that's 16.5 pounds), though weight loss has slowed down and there have been a couple of unexplained leaps upward this month - but now it's moving downwards again. And I think if anything that I am having a better time socially, though occasionally the antics of the more inebriated can be a bit tedious when you're sober. I have enjoyed the slight look of horror on some people's faces when they hear what I am doing. I think I am going to push on for 100 at least and then we'll see how I am feeling.
One of the strange side effects of the alcohol ban is that I am pretty sure I haven't had a diet coke all year either. This was not a conscious decision. I used to drink at least a litre of diet coke a day, but since stopping the boozing I haven't touched the stuff. I don't know why. Perhaps I saw it partly as a hangover cure, but more likely my body is getting used to healthy stuff and is rejecting all of the crap that I used to like. There were a couple of diet cokes in the fridge of the dressing room at my Totton gig. Usually I would have necked them both to wake me up pre gig, but the thought of consuming them made me feel a bit ill. I took them home and they're now sitting in my own fridge, but I still don't seem to want them. I can't quite understand it. I used to almost live off diet coke. What has become of me?
The train ride home from Manchester was much more civilised - no dogs or madmen, plenty of empty seats (luckily as the seat I had on my ticket was not down as reserved on the train). I managed to sit at a table and actually get some work done. Of course it was slightly easier to carry my luggage around as there were now just a handful of programmes in my suitcase rather than a whole boxful. But getting some writing done made me think that maybe it would be better to train it to any gig where I am staying overnight. More often than not though I need to travel home straight after the gig and only a car is practical for this, so I doubt there will be too many more train journeys. Shame for Warming Up as you meet so many more funny people on the train and there is more chance for incident, though today little of interest occurred. The man on the tannoy system kept coming on early in the journey to remind people to check on the indicators if the seat already had a reservation, but he pronounced reservation - "reserwation" which made the old lady opposite me laugh. Also the nearest toilet was marked out of order and the next nearest, whilst open to use, was actually also out of order and wouldn't flush. I used it early on when there was a small amount of other people's urine in it and I was still a little cautious as I filled it further, wondering what would happen if the train suddenly braked. I would be forced to spend the rest of the journey covered in strangers' urine. Some people might like that, but not me. The next time I went back, somehow hopeful that the problem would have been fixed I decided not to risk it. The stakes and the urine were too high. Good to know where my fare money is going though. Right into the pocket of evil Richard Branston, who doesn't care if the toilets don't work and is secretly slightly sexually exited by the fact that there is a chance that some of his passengers may have a cocktail of strangers' urine slopped all over their trousers. And if that isn't the case then I defy Richard Branston to sue me in order to get a retraction. I don't think he will. Because what I have said is true.
At Banter the pre-show talk was all about something I had said in the latest Collings-Herring podcast. Andrew Collings was asking the others if they had ever heard the rumour that I was spreading that when
Michael Fagan broke into the Queen's bedroom he actually wanked into the sleeping Queen's ear and that has been hushed up to save her from embarrassment. No-one else had heard this apocryphal tale and Collings accused me of making it up. I am sure though, that I had heard this (probable lie) from somewhere. Collings asked the audience about it too, challenging them as to what the story might be, but only people who had heard the podcast knew about it. So maybe I did make it up, or maybe I am the only one to know the truth. I just think it makes sense. If you had managed to get that far and not been caught by security, then why wouldn't you wank into her ear. You'd have to wouldn't you? I would argue that to ejaculate into any other orifice would not be respectful to the Queen's high office, but etiquette would allow the ear to be assaulted in this way. That is my belief. And if it isn't true then I think you should all start to spread the rumour, along with the one about Richard Branston and the urine. It's time the truth was known.
