Hangoverwatch.

5.23am.

I wake up for the first time today. My bladder is full and noisy but my body is numb and I'm surrounded by too much gravity. My mouth feels like it's been open since June. My hair is in agony. I've started to realise that I'm not dreaming about needing to have a piss and, in fact, I really am needing to have a piss. Why do we put on so much weight when we sleep? I'm not this heavy out of bed. The mind rules the body and I am a strong man with convictions and piss will not tell me what to do. Piss is a bully. Ignore bullies and they go away. Mind you, bullies also piss in your bed. You know what? I actually think that I could sleep in a piss soaked bed. Right at this moment, lying in piss doesn't sound so bad. It's certainly a lot better than reanimating my corpse and puppeteering it downstairs to the bathroom. I don't know how bakers and postmen and newsagents do it. They're all out there now starting their working day. I'm a lucky man. I bet they'd love to lie in my piss instead of having to work. Ha ha! Yes, Michael, you're brilliant. Not being a baker or a postman or a newsagent was the best idea you've ever had. So what if just this once you end up lying in your own piss? They metaphorically have to wade through piss every day. The piss in my bladder has solidified and expanded. Like my bladder just downed 5 pints. Nice try, bladder, but it's my move now and I refuse to move.

5.55am.

The bathroom is freezing and annoying. The light switch string thing keeps hitting me while it's swinging plus my piss is refusing to go quietly. It sounds like white noise played through Metallica's PA system. Piss isn't supposed to have feedback. Someone has built another 50 stairs onto my staircase.

6.30am

I wake up for the second time because my heart is having a party. I don't mind it enjoying itself as long as it does it quietly. I remembered something I said last night. I say "twat".

7.50am

I wake up for what will hopefully be the last time today. I feel like I'm coming out of an anaesthetic. I put the radio on and realise that all music is basically nagging. Songs are just so fucking demanding and bastardy. I want you to love me and I want you to take me to heaven and I want you to always be there and I want you to imagine a perfect world and I want you to hold me and I want you to hit me baby one more time. OH, FUCK OFF AND DO IT YOURSELF. Can't I have 5 fucking minutes peace without a song barking orders at me? There are no "Would You Like Me To Make You Tea and Toast and Then Leave You Alone?" songs. Why has that genre been skipped? You know what? I rarely need to hear that last night you had a dream that somebody was fucking thick and desperate enough to love you but right now I really need YOU to make me toast and to go away for years. The radio is either further away or my arm has got shorter or I can't move anymore. I used to be able to move a bit, I'm sure of it, although I have no memory of moving in excess. It's the duvet. It's cocooned me. It's trapped me, the scheming blanket bastard. My mouth is dry and I'm sweaty and I'm too hot and I might be sick but there is nothing I can do about it because my duvet has imprisoned me. Like so many people held captive against their will, I have developed Stockholm syndrome. I have fallen in love with the very thing that has confined me with his two henchmen, Green Blanket and Red Blanket. They have left me with no food or water and the heat, the sweltering heat, is starting to suffocate me and yet I still do not want to escape. I probably should though as I am about to make a lot of sick.

8.30am

I've spent 10 minutes painfully miming being sick into the toilet. Nothing came out except repressed memories. I wipe the tears from my eyes and lift myself to my feet like a newborn baby deer. A fat, shaking, smelly, ghost white, sweaty newborn baby deer.

9.30am

I've been lying in bed for almost an hour just thinking about places I've been sick in. It used to be so easy to be sick when I was young. I think it was even fun back then. Part of the evening. Meet your friends, have a few drinks, throw up, kiss a girl. That was all I wanted then. Everything really was so much better back then including being sick. Being sick was celebratory. How did we let being sick become awful? I've been sick in nightclubs, pubs, cafes, museums, concert halls, cinemas, bins, my friend's hand, schools and swimming pools and every single time it was an event that marked a beautiful time of my life. A time when I was young, I had fun, I was sick and I got on with it. Now look at me. I can't even bring myself to be sick in the comfort of my own home. If you're young and reading this please remember this advice from a much, much, much older person: enjoy every chunk. Soon it goes. I've been about to be sick thousands of times in my 40's but I don't think I've actually throw up since 1998. It's shameful. I pick up my book of sudokus and spend over an hour lying in bed doing and thinking nothing whatsoever but with a book of sudokus quite near my face. I decide to get up out of bed and start my day.

11.45am

I've been lying on the floor for ages now. Negotiations with clothes went badly. I wanted to treat my trousers to a brisk walk around the park but as soon as I tried to get in them they tackled me to the ground. I realise now that I will starve to death on this floor. Then I remember that cafes do food. I don't need to break my back labouring over toast. Someone can do it for me. My trousers and I argue further but eventually come to an understanding after an hour or so. Finally, they're on. My underpants arrive and apologise for being late.

1.00pm

I'm out of the house. It's awful. The cold is picking on me. Because I'm hungover and old, one of my feet is colder than the other. I have no idea why this happens when I'm hungover but it always happens. I get to a nearby cafe and decide to get myself some fuel. I need something greasy. The guy that works there looks like an expert on grease. I order loads of food. I may not be able to eat for a while so I need to stock up. Toast, mushrooms, hash browns, beans, tomatoes, veggie burger, chips, tea, diet coke and a Lucozadey drink. That should help. I'll be fine after that. I sit down and await my feast. The very thought of it is making me feel better already. Sadly, sitting down is making me dizzy. That's how my body works. Even doing fuck all makes me nauseous. A man near me is singing. It's good that he's making the song up and has decided to show his work in progress to us. "Da da da da dada da, for the way da dada da, near da da dada dada and you da da da da dada da dada da da Chiswick". I'm near the door and near the radiator. I'm sweating to death and freezing to death. My food arrives and immediately turns itself into poison. I can't eat it. My breakast is diet coke and looking at food.

2.00pm

I'm home and lying down. If I just put a film on then I can just lie here and die and be happy. I put on Schindler's List. It's on for 7 minutes when I realise that no one in their right mind finds comfort in Schindler's List. Who the fuck watches Schindler's List while hungover? Michael Legge does. I mean, I do. I'm at that stage of the hangover where I'm convinced something this awful can't be happening to me. I must be someone else. I sigh loudly but it squeaks. I feel tired and emasculated all at once. Schindler's List isn't right. I should be watching Cool Runnings or Liar Liar. Something fun that doesn't matter. Schindler's List is too depressing. I take it off and put on Tyrannosaur. In the first 30 seconds a dog is kicked to death. It's rare that so soon into a film that I see a character I can identify with so fully.

2.50pm

I have fallen in love with Olivia Coleman or whatever she's called. She's so sweet and lovely. I think I'd like to go out with a religious person. They mean well, don't they? I look up the name of the actor who plays her husband on IMDb because I want to kick his fucking head in. I know he's just an actor but I make note of his name just in case he's method. If I ever meet Olivia Coleman or whatever her name is, I shall tell her I've done this. Defending a woman's honour always impresses them. I burp and smell very old dinners. I go out for tea.

4.20pm

A tool is sat near me in the coffee shop. I'm wrecked and the last thing I need right now is a tool. He's the most awful looking cunt that you've ever clapped eyes on. He's in a coffee shop, his beard is crap, he's wearing an Inca hat indoors. Everything about him is contemptible. To make things worse, he has TWO laptops. What a fucking boring cliche he is. I don't want a single, solitary nice thing to ever happen to him and my head hurts. I overhear him say "Of course you travel, you must. How else do you know who you are?" I find that statement worse than genocide. Fuck off, twat hat. You were born, you're a dick. You went nowhere, you're a dick. You went to India once, you're a dick. No matter what that guy would ever do ever, he'd be a dick. Hating him is helping. I'm actually feeling better. When he speaks, the blood in my veins circulates at speed and I can feel myself coming to life. Is that how I work? Dicks open their mouths and I feel energised by loathing them? Wow. I'm really unpleasant. But I am feeling better.

6.20pm

My journey home feels bracing. The cold air feels pleasant now. It's making me walk briskly with my back straight and my head up. I see a teenager get thrown out of a chip shop and think "My GOD!! I'd love some chips". After food I feel better. Properly better. Why do I do it to myself? Drinking too much when I know the next day will be wasted? So stupid. But I got angry and felt better. Had some tea, felt even better. A teenager being shouted at and some chips made me feel great. I threw my day away but at least I know that. At least I realised it was a waste and to do something like that again would be stupid. I like having a full day. Getting up, walking the dog, doing work. I like that. Tonight I'm staying in. I'm drinking water and looking after myself. A night in and a full day tomorrow.

8.00pm

Just realised the Comedy Awards are on tonight. I can't watch that sober.

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