I am sat gently shaking in a dark corner of my lounge, I feel utterly dreadful.

I’ve just returned from Sainsbury, a particularly enormous Sainsbury that I usually navigate with ease, breezing from aisle to aisle, sweeping comestibles and consumables from shelves as if I were Shiva, pausing only at the vast booze section at the end of the store to carefully oversee the war of attrition that occurs between price, quality and desire. I always win.

Today the whole trip was fucked. Suffering as I was from a hangover the size of Europe, I flopped, fumbled and floundered, crashing into products, trollies and people, my huge red sweating face wobbling atop my creaking windpipe as I tried to keep a grip on sanity. A panic attack sat in my chest, inches from bursting forth in a spume of mortal fear, a little bit of last nights booze squirted into my mouth following a wet retch in full view of a horrified 4 year old, I attempted to smile, the child stared at me in disgust, then her mother joined in. She looked at me as if I’d just bunged a turd at a nun.

The weekend had begun civilly enough on Friday. I met with a close friend in a pub near Leicester Sqaure for some drinks, along with some of his friends, one of which was a charming well read chap, who, it transpired, researched questions for a popular highbrow entertainment show on the BBC. After a while and more pints than I care to recall we ended up at The Groucho Club and here it begun to get messy. Cocktails were ordered over beer, French Polish specifically, my stupid idea, arrived with White Russians. People began to drift off until only my friend and I remained. We decided to leave at around midnight, both of us thoroughly rotten and from here on in my memory is somewhat confused.

Essentially, my friend ran into some writers outside the French House, one of which had just had his debut novel published and was clearly the toast of the town. He and his entourage were all very engaging, drinks began to pop out of nowhere, glasses were shoved into my hand and I soaked up the atmosphere feeling quite at home. At some point we arrived at Black’s, I recall getting a rocket from a very pretty blonde barmaid for having smuggled in a bottle of beer, not that I remembered doing so. I apologised profusely and she accepted my reparation with a warm smile. My memory following this is shot but I must have got a cab in the wee small hours and returned home, obliterated.

The hangover on the Saturday was one of the worst I’ve experienced. I felt like porcelain in a vice, all of my plans were iced, I just stayed in bed feeling as if my internal organs had been replaced with manure. There was an additional concern, I’d arranged to meet another old mate, who, until we’d met last summer in a fucking garden party (both of us are about as much ‘garden party’ as Anne Frank is to drum kits) 15 years had passed without either of us having any contact with the other.

Not prepared to cancel the arrangement, though sorely tempted, I found myself in a local bar cradling a pint of lager feeling like Anne Widdecombe’s vibrator. This was wrong, so wrong, my liver must resemble a small walnut and here I was drinking. ‘I’ll take it slow’ I muttered to myself. My mate arrived a little after 7 and we swiftly engaged in conversation, playing catch up and generally re-discovering each other. Second pint down I was feeling largely back to normal, indeed, I was feeling quite good and had started to relax and enjoy myself. My mate from up the road arrived with his girlfriend and then there were 4 of us…and drinks promotions. Then music, then pool. Then dancing, all of us fucking dancing, I don’t do ‘dancing’ but there I was moving over the floor like a shitty puppet with some of the strings cut. To my horror Cunt from downstairs appeared, alone, dressed in a fucking pinstripe suit and tie for the love of Christ, he was moaning about how a barman in another pub had actually turned his back on him when he went to order a drink, choosing instead to quietly clean glasses. That speaks volumes to me. Needlessly to say, we left almost as soon as he arrived, no one wants to be close to poison. By now it was after 1. My friend and I got a pair of chicken kebabs and we arrived back at the flat full of beer and cheer. Foolishly (again) we continued drinking (my mate saw his kebab later following a disturbing sound from the toilet, he sounded like he was being bummed by Idi Armein). I let him hurl in peace and he returned to the lounge as white as a sheet grinning from ear to ear. He crashed on my sofa and at about 3.30 I went to off bed.

I awoke this morning in a similar condition to the previous morning, not quite as bad as yesterday. A 2 wanks hangover as opposed to yesterdays 3. My friend had already left as the poor sod had to face an afternoon at work. I stayed in bed for as long as possible, ate a boiled egg and waited until I was sure I was in a fit enough condition to drive. I hadn’t counted on not being in a fit enough condition to shop.

I’ve just unpacked my shopping. I’ve managed to buy just about everything I don’t need and none of the stuff I do, I bought 2 tins of mushy peas. I don’t know if I like mushy peas.

I feel dreadful; I’m off to the pub with my mate from up the road.