Definitely wine tonight.
Legata, a frosty-haired, sharp-nailed colleague of mine smiled as she said this. Her smile was bright with menace as if when she talked about wine she meant some kind of soft warm-blooded creature that screamed loudly when it was killed.
Oh yeah man, A coople ah beahs fuh me.
Hand-Relief rubbed his large tummy which all but deserved a chair of its own and closed his eyes as if he could taste the beer already.
He was from Newcastle down south in England. We didn't encounter a lot of Newcastleans in work, or in general because Newcastleans tend to die young in fights with one another or change gender and emigrate to New Zealand to teach basket weaving.
Might be more than a couple of beers for me!
I clapped my hands and rubbed them enthusiastically as though trying to start a fire with a couple of damp twigs in a dark wood.
I think you have a point Boomy, I might be persuaded to have a third glass tonight!
Fire-Canoe giggled.
She was a pale willowy lady who worked for the finance team, she was a quiet sort who had gained her nickname, perhaps unkindly, from rumours that her bahjina was a raging hot furnace which changed people.
I tried not to glance downward in her general Fire-Canoe area to see if I could see a heat shimmer.
Just three, milady. Surely you jest!
I chuckled. The very idea of just having three drinks was a weird one. Maybe she had Canadian ancestry?
Oh no, I couldn't have more than that. I mean, I am not an alcoholic!
Fire-Canoe tittered as if I had suggested we all go to Lapland together and watch reindeer eat yellow snow.
Well, it's hardly alcoholism to have three or four drinks on a Friday night in the house is it?
I tried to titter back but the act of tittering was not one that came easily to me. Instead, my titter turned into a donkey-like braying.
Really man? In yer owse? Drinking all the jars in yer owse? Gaan doon tha poob, that's different. But ye don't drink hundreds of jars in the owse?
We all looked at Hand-Relief in the hope that he would shoosh as it was too mentally taxing to translate his Newcastle noises.
I think he was warning me of drinking too much in the house as that surely led to destitution and misery.
Of course you can, on a Friday? It's practically the law! I mean, me and the Good Lady sometimes drink a bottle or even two on occasion!
A horrified gasp came from Legata and Fire-Canoe at this.
What, you drink a bottle of wine? And sometimes more? In one night?
Legata looked at me incredulously as if I were sliding down a pole but facing outward and only holding on by the power of my buttock cheeks.
Yeah man, all the time. Wine Fridays, we love it!
Considering that I had personally been in the pub with these people and had witnessed them pie-eyed and either fighting or kissing random strangers I was a bit puzzled by their disapproving antics.
In fact, I almost felt a stirring of... was that shame? Was I being shamed!?
You might want to take a look at your drinking in the house.
Said Fire-Canoe with a dismissive shake of her head.
Yes, Got to look out for your health.
Legata mewed primly.
I looked at Hand-Relief sternly to see if he would defend me or side with the ladies of no tomorrows in the Boom shaming.
Aye, the witshie gaan coom o'er ye if yer not cayfool.
We all drew a blank at that one.
I huffed and looked out of the window.
Looks like that famous eighties song by the Dark Shins was right.
When you're twenty you can drink
Not give a damn what others think
When you're thirty and you're drunk they sing along
When you're forty it's just right that you can still drink through the night
But when you're fifty they look at you as if it's wrong...