I Get No Kick From Champagne
It's true. I never have liked the taste of Champagne. Yet as all Daily Mail readers will be aware, we've been forced to drink it for years here at the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ. Up until recently you were handed a glass each morning as a little 'thank you' for turning up for work. All those perks have been done away with now, of course. Pretty soon we'll be told to hand back our caviar spoons. Things are grim.
Ahem, but seriously folks, we're now in week three of ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ Radio Scotland's Under The Influence season - a month of programmes themed around our nation's relationship with alcohol. Each weekday morning Fred MacAulay has been keeping tabs on five listeners who have each decided to curb their intake of booze. This morning I was heartened to hear Roy Hudghton talk about how his decision to monitor his own drinking habits had encouraged his friends and colleagues to do the same. Many of them discovered, with a shock, that they were downing a lot more than Roy.
"I'd like to thank Radio Scotland," he told Fred, "and that's not something I would have said three weeks ago."
Meanwhile I have no regrets about my own decision to stop drinking. It's been remarkably easy so far and I've even discovered a good alternative for those social situations when other people get uneasy because you're the only one without a proper drink in your hand.
Diet ginger ale laced with lime cordial. It looks good served in a whisky glass and even has a bit of a kick to it which means you don't knock it back too quickly.
One potential snag is that ginger ale is becoming harder to find, especially in pubs where you often have to go through a whole rigmarole of explaining that you don't want ginger beer.
In fact, I was on a train two weeks ago and watched a female passenger arguing with the guy in charge of the drinks trolley because he had never heard of ginger ale. She finally conceded defeat and ordered a vodka and tonic instead, then she phoned her husband to tell him what had happened.
"You'd have thought I was trying to buy a gram of cocaine." she said, much to the amusement of everyone else in the carriage.
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