Falling off the wagon

Good morning all, for that is what it is here.  5.30 on a Sunday morning and I’m as wide a wake as a very wide awake thing that’s wide awake !  I don’t know why I’m wide awake (it can’t have been anything to do with the bottle of Shiraz that I shared out on the terrace last night – more likely the excitement only having 2 more sleeps till my family get here or the fact that the bed is so hard I might as well be sleeping on the floor !)

Or it could be because I left my computer running a virus scan all night, in an effort to see whether I’d contracted any disgusting diseases whilst I’ve been in Dubai this weekend.  I couldn’t get onto the internet here at my home hotel when I got back from Dubai last night and I thought that possibly, just possibly, it might not be the hotels fault for a change – I’m on it fine at 05.30, reading about the Saints superb win over Sale, so I suspect it is entirely down to the hotel !

Anyway, because I was up I thought I’d tell you all about my weekend in Dubai.  I won’t go into all of the sordid detail or you may erroneously get the impression that I’m a reasonable golfer, with a drink problem and lust for meat pies and other junk food……

I was invited by my good friend Julian….

to go and play in a competition at his very nice Dubai golf club (The Montgomerie – in case you have a burning urge to go and look it up).  The competition was 2 rounds with 4 different formats all jumbled together in 4 different 9s (I’ll explain it separately for anyone that’s interested on another day) and it’s fair to say that I was playing a blinder for most of it (although there were several holes on the second day that I couldn’t remember from the first day but I think I know why that happened………….) right up to loosing 3 balls in the water on the final hole – I was tired and emotional……

I was tired because although Julian had said “you can stop at my place” when he’d issued the invitation, he’d failed to mention that I would have to sleep on the sofa because he had someone else in his spare room, and I was emotional because we had spent most of the previous day (because his girlfriend had sensibly decided to have a sleepover with a friend whilst this debacle was unfolding) drinking heavily – apparently it’s compulsory for this particular competition (I’m not entirely sure that cider and meat pies constitute a healthy breakfast, although you could argue that it does cover one of my five-a-day…..pretty much the only one as it happens……)

Anyway, I got a free hat, which was nice, and 2 rounds of golf, and a weekend off the wagon before my family arrive in 2 sleeps……did I mention that ?