Off my Feis

Right - first things first - the Supajam offer was entirely genuine and we got in to the Feis on Saturday with absolutely no trouble. Fair play to them - considering there were allegedly 500 tickets, the queue we were in had what appeared to be a couple of thousand in it by the time we arrived. But they didn't seem to be arguing - my friend's bar code had apparently 'already been used', but his name matched the barcode so in he came.

The event itself was enjoyable enough, from what I remember. The rain was sporadic, the food was tasty, the bands were enthusiastic and the people were friendly. I suppose it's somewhat inevitable that at a festival which is essentially 40,000 Irish people in a confined space, some drink would also be taken.

It's pretty clear I overdid it, even if I don't know exactly how it happened. Suffice to say I returned to my concerned girlfriend several hours behind schedule, having done a few laps of central London, and spent yesterday suffering through the hangover from hell. Chuck in a horrendous night's sleep last night, and at work today I was rough, sweaty and miserable, staring at my computer screen and barely uttering a word.

Tonight when I got home, I still had a sense of being drained, but alongside it was a weird recollection that this is what my Mondays always used to feel like. Waking up with "The Fear" on a Sunday morning; tossing and turning on a Sunday night; tolerating work on a Monday and resolving not to drink until at least the weekend again.

I don't know when it happened, but this isn't me any more. And this evening, I am incredibly grateful for that. The weekend served as a timely reminder of how life used to be, before I calmed down and grew up (a bit). I still get drunk regularly - I'm no poster boy for a healthy lifestyle - and I thought I still feel rough most weekends. I now realise I don't - I've just adjusted my tolerance levels in light of my reduced wastery.

So, in hindsight, thanks Supajam, for reminding me that I no longer want to be a pisshead stumbling round London after an all day drinking session. Or, for that matter, forking out £35 in a taxi ride home after a couple of fruitless attempts to negotiate public transport ended in fiasco. Every cloud, and all that...