Post par-tay

I still don't know exactly how I felt watching everyone revelling in all the free booze. There moments when I felt quite envious, I don't ever remember dying for a drink though, I don't think that I missed it that much on a moment to moment basis, I was certainly getting pretty sick of drinking tonic water but that was all. I found that rather than battling not to have a drink the real challenge was the mental struggle of thinking that I was missing out on something, although I knew I wasn't really. I was at the same party as everyone else, having roughly the same experiences, I just wasn't drinking. I wasn't the only one either, there were a few people who weren't and they seemed to be doing fine. I also noticed that I came away having spoken to less of the people I didn't already know than I would if I'd have been drinking. Perhaps that's a good thing though, I can never remember what I've said. I can Imagine conversations the morning after several weddings I've been to.
"Who was that twat with the beard?"
"God knows, he kept going on about inventing a pie that just had cheese and a fried egg in it though".

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Debbie's Limoncello

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So I've completed my first week, not that long I know, but I have been to a wedding with free alcohol.
We drove over to Newbury on Thursday night so we could be there to help out on Friday morning. I spoke to Toby as we were setting off and felt a slight pang of jealousy when he told me that they were off out for a few drinks to celebrate his last night of "freedom". My ears pricked up for a moment until I remembered that I am 4 days in to my yearsans. Fortunately I was able to rationalise the feeling of jealousy and process it quickly.
" You can still have a good time without drinking Gaz. Your having a break, it's not forever!" and so on.
It was late by the time we arrived and almost last orders so we didn't make it to the pub anyway.
The temptation started early on Friday, we bobbed round to drop of some speakers at the marquee first thing and the tables were strewn with bottles of homemade limoncello. Then prior to the service we all met up in the pub, my first visit since I've stopped. Whilst everyone else had a nice pint I had a sparkling water and a tomato juice (which I quite enjoyed). I wasn't feeling to hard done to by this point but it was fosters on Tap so nothing to get to green about. It was when we arrived at the reception that I started to feel a bit sorry for myself. The champagne was out straight away, a nice glass of bubbles to get warmed up. After that it was pretty much a free for all, there were box's and box's of ale and lager and cider. There was red and white on the tables along with the lemoncello. Later on some bottles of sloe gin got passed around and a huge box of spirits that had been sitting on the floor all day suddenly made it's way onto the bar to become the star attraction. Thankfully The temptation wasn't so strong as to leave me champing at the bit or where there ever any thoughts of throwing in the towel, but it was a strange new experience for me. One which will take some getting used to....

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Nicely

It's Wednesday the 3rd of August and it's going well. Chris was round ours for tea on Monday night, testing my will with a bottle if red and my jilted bottle of Tyskie. I think the Tyskie knew what was going on, it just sat there on the table, condensing the warm air until it beaded down it's frigid Polish neck. Bitch.
Everything is going well on a personal level but everything is going absolutely fantastic on a raising money for way ahead level! It's only day 3 and we've already reached 10% of the overall goal! How fantastic is that! So I would like to say a

¡¡¡¡¡¡MASSIVE THANK YOU TO EVERYONE WHO HAS SPONSORED SO FAR!!!!!!!

You have all been very generous and it really means a lot. If you haven't sponsored then I do appreciate you taking the time to read the blog, it's getting more hits than I expected it would. Get us a pint in when you get paid though eh!
Thanks you'ns

Adios

Bye for now

We got a taxi back from the Grand about half ten, only an hour and a half to go until my self imposed year of prohibition begins and there's no beer in the house, I should have thought it through. The taxi driver was happy to stop at the offie but unfortunately the offie wasn't that well stocked. I came away with a bottle of Tyskie and a Westons organic cider, I cracked the cider about 11 o'clock and nursed it. I was so full it took me the next hour to drink the bloody thing and consequently I didn't make it to the Tyskie. So my last beer for a year was a cider! A decent cider but a cider all the same, I did enjoy it though. So that's it my yearsansbeer starts now.
So long, old friend

3,2,1..

After that George returned from work and we got dolled up for our meal at the Grand. We arrived and headed to the bar for an apéritif. After our drink we were shown to our table in the conservatory, it's a bonny restaurant that looks out across the road to the sea. The food was good, George had rabbit spring rolls, black pudding stuffed chicken in parma ham and sticky toffee pudding for dessert and I had wild boar ham with pickled veg, lobster in garlic butter and a cheese board to finish. This was accompanied by a nice bottle of Gavi and a port with my cheese. So all in all it was an excellent meal to end the year. Thanks to all of you who made it a proper Bo thirtieth, you know who you are x