Drink? Feck! Ar*e!

First work day of the New Year is done - got to be happy about that.

However, I didn't rush home tonight as quickly as I would normally do after the first day back.

Because, in the midst of all the rain and the snow, I have a forecast you will not have heard from one of those excitable TV weatherpersons during the current cold snap.

I predict - and confidently - that the rest of January will be totally dry (at least until the last weekend).

In our house.

Those friends who know about our plan say I'll never do it (they have a lot more faith in Vanessa) and I have viciously shot them down.

But I will. Or, to put it another way, I won't - have another drink this month (at least until the last weekend).

I haven't stayed off drink for an entire month (at least until the last weekend...and...er...not including the first weekend) since I went to university almost 20 years ago. And it isn't going to be easy.

After coming home from work on the first day after the Christmas break, it's pretty much mandatory in my book to run straight to the fridge and open something to deaden the pain. But not tonight.

Because there comes a time, dear readers, when reason and responsibility must kick in. Hell, yes (and it almost certainly will be).

The wave of Christmas drinks thingies, coupled with too much drink before the run-up to the festive season actually began, too much drink during Christmas, then too much drink over New Year, has made me conclude that my strangely-proportioned body needs a break. And Vanessa's decision to join in makes it even harder for me to relent.

January, traditionally, is a very long month.

But January 2010 looks set to be a very, very long month.

At least, being sober, it's one I'll definitely remember.