the Monday Musings column from that consultant bloke

I am talking here about alcohol, but not just that. It came to mind because the Berkshire Belle was doing a survey on-line and was asked about our family consumption of booze and soft drinks amongst other products and the survey didn’t seem to want to accept an accurate answer.

There was a time, thirty years or more ago when we first were together we used to keep a wine box in the ‘fridge and would have a glass when we got home from the office and top that up when we sat down to eat half an hour or so later. At weekends we would have a bottle of wine on the table on each of Friday, Saturday and Sunday evenings and would often have a gin and tonic on Sunday afternoon. Not a vast intake, but that was how we were.

Now we share a bottle of wine that lasts us for both Friday and Saturday dinners, or possibly Saturday and Sunday if Friday’s meal does not suit wine (a curry for example). On a bank holiday weekend we might splash out and have two bottles, or perhaps a gin and tonic on the day that we don’t have wine. Otherwise through the week we are largely alcohol free.

I do sometimes treat myself to a bottle of beer whilst cooking our meals; cooks privilege, and I do use alcohol in cooking quite often. Our consumption of alcohol has diminished considerably, not that we were boozers to start with.

Neither of us likes to lose control and many of the opportunities that we had for social drinking came through work where we had an almost paranoid desire not to do something that we would regret or, worse still, do something that we did not remember, but that others would. I became a master at making one bottle of beer last all evening to the point that I think more of it evaporated rather than went down my throat. The Berkshire Belle was a mistress of the art of circulating and leaving drinks behind her all around the room having just wet her lips on each.

I first got drunk at a works party when I was about 19. I was told the next day that people had been pouring unwanted spirits into my pint of beer. Hilarious, but on the way home I had lost my beautiful hand made leather wallet. The hangover was something too. The next time that I got drunk was at a do at the Cafe Royale. It was a similar cause, but this time it was the First Lady that I was married to who sabotaged me, swapping her continuously refilled wine glass for my rapidly emptying ones. I should have noticed, but I was in my brief spell as a pompous pratt and was too busy bending the ears of our fellow diners to notice until it was time to go and I had problems standing. A few brain cells had enough function to get my lady and I to a taxi and to our hotel, but I had a stinking headache the next morning.

By that time I was working in London in a very boozy environment. We took it in turns to take one lady director home every afternoon and it was not uncommon to have to put her over your shoulder to carry her in to her home. It was a lunchtime session at that job that put me, if not on the wagon, walking alongside. Our team was breaking up on conclusion of a project and we went off to a wine bar near St Pauls in London a few yards from our office. there were six of us to start with, but all of a sudden there was just Helen and I, both of whom were supposed to be testing software that afternoon. We finished the bottle we had before us and went back to our test room, put the coffee pot on and started work, b both now realising that we had really tied one on that lunchtime. As darkness fell, it was early December, we packed up and, between us, we found enough cash for Helen to get a taxi home to Hackney.

I headed off to Liverpool Street station and a train back to Marks They up in the top right corner of Essex and about an hour away on the train. Asleep before the train left the station the peculiar rhythm of the rails not long before my station awoke me and I got off in the right place for the short walk home. There I found my mother-in-law was visiting and I sat down alone to eat my tea, kept warm in the over. Then I went for a shower, came downstairs and cooked myself another meal. No-one was impressed, and nor was I when I got the credit card bill through as saw what I had spent in the wine bar.

This isn’t just about booze though, because I just like the physical sensation of drinking. I can down a pint of water in one go and frequently do. I like the mouth feel and the sensation of swallowing and a good pull on a glass of something cool is a great pleasure. Fortunately I like the taste of good wines and some spirits. I got into wines fifty years ago whilst working for a wine merchant and can sip a good wine to make it last. I have also developed a taste for single malts, except for the peaty ones and can make a gentleman’s measure last all evening.

On my travels I have always asked to try local brews, alcoholic or otherwise. In Bogota I drank Columbian coffee and Club Columbia beer. In Tripoli I drank coffee Arabic style. Asking for a local drink or dish helps break the ice when travelling and whilst I might not be a great fan of what I get, trying something different always opens the door to finding a new favourite. Working out in China and Thailand I tried various black and green teas all of which I liked to some degree, and it is a mug of tea that I will finish this musing off with.

Many years ago I was a member of the Civil Emergency Corps and on one overnight exercise in the pouring rain we had been searching for casualties. Soaked to the skin and with the night sky beginning to lighten we were told that all casualties had been found and we were standing down. Arriving back at the base we got the news that one casualty was missing after all and in our search area; we had to go back. By the time that we had found our man and returned to base there was no milk left and the tea in the urn was well stewed. Still, it was hot and we were cold. Then one of the team produced a flask of rum and poured a tot into each much. Never have I enjoyed a drink more. It may have been stewed and black and I do not like rum, but it still sticks in my mind some 52 years later.