Drinking

I’ve just noticed a few new principles to add to the Hector Benjamin Roddan lexicon of random rules about the Universe (one day, I’ll write a rule book…) More accurately, about the relationship between drinking and any sort of problem, question or niggling itch which we encounter in this sea of emotion, experience and exchange which we casually describe as “existence”…

The first stage is to ask a question, pose a problem, consider something when entirely sober.

By the second stage you have imbibed at least one unit of alchohol and therefore the problem is much more clearly expressed / slightly fudged / staring you in the face in a grim manner.

The third stage arrives at the second or third pint (I use the “pint” scale, for those of you that prefer shots, feel free to use an appropriate conversion scale). At this point, not only have you solved the initial problem which set you on the course towards drink, but you have solved a range of alternative problems – some of my personal favourites are — what to have for breakfast, how to make a paper aeroplane and world poverty…

By the fourth stage, you have realised that the perfectly adequate solutions to the initial problem are entirely useless, but there must be something. At this point, you come up with ideas like “if only I could solve world poverty by making a paper aeroplane carry my breakfast…”

The fifth stage, all this is slipping away a bit. The initial problem, the new problems, that sort of thing…This is generally known as the final safe stage at which one can eat a takeaway.

By the sixth stage, reality is doing similar. DO NOT RISK A TAKEAWAY AFTER THIS POINT.

At the seventh stage, you’re entering hell itself…

By the eleventh stage, you could well bring hell back up again. 

 

By the way, if anyone finds out what the intervening stages are, let me know…

Byeee!!!

Hec xxx

Strange Dreams

OK, those of you who know me well are probably aware that my subconscious is a dark and seedy place, filled with all sorts of nightmarish iconoclasms (that’s not a word, but its not stopping me). However, I think I may have reached a new level of “odd” last night. First of all, I was playing football – ordinary enough, you might think, dear reader. Except for the fact that this is me; probably the most footballophobic individual on the planet.

Second of all, the “pitch” (I always presumed this was a musical term, but I am assured by the dedicated team of experts in this blog’s research team) varied in size from – about the size of a living room, to a yawning plain stretching to the horizon and populated by large, vegetarian dinosaurs. The third thing – and feel free to write back if you spot any sign of megalomaniacal symptoms here – was that, whenever I was scoring or in goal (don’t ask) the pitch was really tiny so I was really good, but when I wasn’t doing either, it was huge (I don’t know what you call non-goalees or non-scorers in football and, to be frank, wikipedia is a long long number of clicks away!)

This all seems straightforward. Except that this football match, all 27.45 minutes of it (they’d changed the rules because otherwise the grass would get hurt), was to decide the 2010 General Election, and therefore I was playing on Team Labour, alongside various luminaries of the Party – including (for the record) Robin Cook, Tony Blair and various members of Cardiff Labour Students. Random.com

All very well. This dream is perfectly logical – playing a competitive team sport to resolve the next General Election on a football field of varying scope and size is quite a surprisingly profound metaphor, especially given it was entirely configured whilst asleep. 

But alas, the whole theory goes tits up (as it were) when you notice that the entire opposition are composed of garden gnomes in yellow and blue checked shirts and braces.