'Tis the season to be bingeing

It’s two weeks until Christmas. Which is something that not only fills me with dread because of course I have all my bloody shopping to do, but I am also worried about how I am going to get through the festive period without putting on all the weight I have lost over the past two months.

Since the start of October I have lost just over 20 lbs, thanks to a mixture of eating less fatty food and doing more exercise - stop the press, who’d have thought that would work!

A dose of the old gastroenteritis has helped quite a lot as well, but wasn’t as much fun as going down the gym and whacking hell out of punch bags for an hour.

But now I have the fear that it all may be undone and, rather like a girl, I am in the position of having to think about how I am going to keep off the pounds so I can fit into my little black suit at the Christmas party.

It is frightening the amount of conversations I have where I am banging on like some tragic fat girl out of Now Magazine. I’ll be worrying about what shoes go with my bag next and making an overblown gesture of refusing the round of mince pies because I have to watch my figure, before guiltily cramming a burger into my face when I go out for lunch.

Gone are the days, it seems, when I could look forward to the Christmas party season with feverish delight as the prospect of several weeks of pouring gallons of booze down my neck to wash down the party food I would survive on, going from lunchtime bash to dinner do.

There is one particular annual party where the Bristol media massive congregates en masse to take advantage of an all night free bar, where you get so drunk that dancing to American Pie seems like the best idea in the world.

Getting into work the next day was always a mission that defeated all but the most ambitious, and driving a car was off limits for about a week.

Add to that the odd drink here and there that turns into an impromptu curry night, simply because ‘it’s Christmas’, which was an excuse I use to use from mid October onwards to justify binge drinking Monday to Friday.

And of course the mountains of turkey and stuffing to wade through, and the giant tins of Quality Street which are as much a part of Christmas as the tinsel and the Coca-Cola mascot in the red suit and white beard.

In fact, if I didn’t start January a good stone heavier, I would have considered it a disappointing Crimbo.

So I am trying to be good. It’s already nearly mid-December and I haven’t yet found myself comatose in the back of a taxi after a 'quick drink'.

I have also been trying to go to the gym, or even on a run, but it’s just too cold out there. Come on, seriously, who is going to want to be outside in weather like this, unless you really have no choice.

All our natural instincts at this time of year are to curl into a ball and burrow deep into the ground away from the permafrost, where we should probably stay until Spring.

But sod it, let’s face it the way things are going this could be the last Christmas to enjoy for some time, so hand me the mulled wine and let’s stick on some Slade!