Rgh.

The hamster wheel of life completes another revolution - it's Sunday, it's raining, I have a hangover. Yesterday was the end of the football season, which means that for most of the guys it'll be many months before they can return to sticking their boots on, running around in a swamp and occasionally getting kicked. We drew 3:3 and when the chance fell to me to make a hero of myself and win the game, I took the ball down like a rock, snaked my way past 4 defenders in the box and then fantastically lost my footing in the mud, managing to swing a leg towards the ball. It bobbled up, I smacked it into the ground and it rolled lamely towards the keeper. Ah well. The final whistle, however, didn't signal the end of my day on the wing, as shall be revealed !

The whale of a crew was reduced down to two as Ross and I headed back to the flat, snapping up bottle of vodka from a night shop on the way, greatly amusing the guy behind the counter with our discussions on what mixer to buy. We ploughed into the vodka-7up, watched some videos, chatted some crap and got slowly warmed up while we carried out the main activity we came back to the flat for - prowling the internet for a new place to go, just to put some variety into our Saturdays. Teklands, a party on the VUB Flemish University of Brussels campus seemed interested if mysterious. We went down there, paid our 5€ entrance, stepped in, looked around, looked at each other and laughed. It was a small room, half empty, and those who were there all appeared to be entranced, hoodie-wearing wasters jigging around disjointedly to the most bizarre "experimental electro" music (and I use this word very loosely). We wandered up to the bar only to be informed that they didn't accept money, only coupons that we could buy from the entrance. This little chopped up pieces of card, which I imagine could easily be forged, was then traded for the most immensely strong whiskey and coke I've ever had, one of the 2 items on the drinks list. The other was a small plastic cup of beer. We tried to dance a little, but the music was too crap. We tried to talk to people, but they were too out of it. We went to sit in the chill out room, but it was just another room where the music from the main room blared in anyway. Emerging from this bizarre little joint into the concrete wasteland of the VUB campus, we got absolutely drenched and decided that maybe the Fuse wasn't such a bad option after all.

Inside the Fuse, I carried out the duty that all men must when their time comes. That is, to play the wingman. Scenario - Ross bumped into a girl on a long weekend from London, ironically, who was with a friend. Ross tries to pull this particular girl, but obviously said girl wouldn't leave her friend just to hang around alone. This is where the wingman comes into his own, and I spent a while attempting to entertain this character (who will remain anonymous in order to protect her honour). The conversation (and again, I use this term in the loosest sense) was short, uninteresting, uninspired. She appeared to have some sort of social defect which impaired her ability to talk to someone else, and instead spent most of the time just staring off into the void.

- So why did you choose to come to Brussels then ?
- No reason really...
- Aha ok... what do you think of it here ?
- It's alright I suppose

It continued along this vein for much of the evening, and in this context I spent a lot of time contemplating matters in the bottom of a glass and ended up getting rather wrecked. This probably didn't help my conversational skills either but, eventually, she cleared off and I breathed an enormous sigh of relief. I don't mind doing this duty at all, but you, all the ladies out there, please show some compassion when you're being entertained by a wingman. Sure, we'd rather be doing something else too, but we're in this boat together and let's make it as interesting as we can, shall we ? Thanks. Got home, tried to write an e-mail to M. Typing correctly was a big struggle. She's leaving for Paris today, another week in the hamster wheel at the office and I'll go to meet her there. And this time, I'm not going to choose where we go out to.

And, dear reader, I leave you now in order to carry out the most familiar of hangover activities - the long trek to the shop, in the rain, to buy hangover food. I love you all.