Over the Boon

Lame Lambic: old ones aren't always
the best ones

As the great Elvis Costello once sang, I just don’t know where to begin. Despite four early nights characterised by uninterrupted sleep and modest-to-low alcohol consumption, I feel absolutely drained. Why?

Wherefore such debilitating tiredness? I’m at a complete loss to explain it. I’m not ill (for once), I’ve been eating well, I’ve been taking my vitamin supplements and I haven’t been overindulging (for once). By rights, I should be full of beans, shipshape, Bristol fashion and a whole host of other suitable metaphorical clichés that would fit this deserved state of being like a glove.

Instead, I can hardly function, struggling out of bed, zombie-ing my way to the office and chucking down outsize mugs of coffee like there’d been a run on it. Post-lunch is worse; my neck is sore following several bouts of ‘wagging’ (head lolling to the side due to seeming narcolepsy followed by a swift jolt upright on realisation) while my eyes would no sooner be open than Donald Trump would invite a family of Jihadists over to his place for afternoon tea. I swear I yawn more than I speak during the afternoon.

Naturally, I’ve discussed the condition with my colleagues, not all of whom have been overly sympathetic. The general consensus being I should just shut up and get on with it. So much for health and wellbeing at work, then.

Fortunately, one voice stood out from the murmurings of disgruntlement. That of my creative team co-head Colin, who suggests it could all be the result of not having been to the pub often enough over the past week. Now, I’m no doctor, but he might have a point there. Save a swift visit to The Rake last night, I haven’t been down the boozer at all this month. I didn’t go this evening either and shan’t be going tomorrow, Thursday or Friday.

I must be ill. And there can be only one cure.

Beer: Oude Geuze Boon à l'Ancienne
Strength: A truly unwelcome 7%
Smell: White wine vinegar aged in sherry barrels and finished off with a side helping of bear bile (I reckon).
Tasting notes: Perhaps it's because I'm tired or a mite glum or because Southern Rail saw fit to piss-ball me about on the way home this evening (and on the way to work, for that matter), but this is not hitting the spot I thought it would. I'm a huge fan of Lambic beers, but this one isn't cutting the mustard. In that it doesn't really taste very much of mustard. My tongue had prepared itself for an onslaught and all it got was the Gueuze equivalent of a lukewarm, damp flannel. While it does what a Lambic should, that is, make you feel you've just chomped down on a lemon burger, it doesn't quite deliver quite enough tang as I'd like. Which leaves me feeling somewhat deflated and wishing I'd bought a Drie Fonteinen Oude Geuze instead. Oh, it'll do; of course it will. But I'm padding disappointedly away with the smack of rejection burning my ears a striking shade of crimson.
Session factor: Average. Almost impossibly average. More average than average merits.
Arbitrary score: 101,526