Bad Hangover Bad Poetry

what were you doing getting drunk on a sunday night?? you have my every sympathy as i felt exactly the same on friday. and i like your poem.

Days of weeks are meaninglesss to hopeless alcoholics but I was round my friends' house then out with my Boyfriend and his sister, and it all went a bit pear-shaped after I moved from the beer onto the wine.

After getting in the same state on Friday night I felt as bad on Saturday and was taken round the Tate Modern for my sins. By the time I crawled back to Brighton fagless and hopeless I even watched 'A Beautiful Mind' with Russell Crowe and enjoyed it. How low can a man sink?

Jude you need to get a grip and stop bleeding publicly. Anyone who feels it helps to share their own recent hangover experiences is an idiot. Jude needs help and she needs to take her own crucifying needs to dry out and be responsible for herself, seriously. I don't know why everyone thinks it's ok and somehow groovy to have macerated their liver on friday or saturday or sunday or any day. It's as bad as thinking smoking is cool. Grow up. And you Jude as well as growing up, love yourself.

P.S. and next time you write execrable verse don't put it on here.

tx handbag it was deliberately execrable then you didn't have to read it. Bleeding publicity is all i can get seeing as noone here is giving me anything but taunts. you're right its not cool but neither is Russell Crowe

Quite right. Russell Crowe is a tedious piece of muscle who acts like the leg of a wooden table.

There's nothing wrong with a bit of public self-humiliation. It either makes everyone else realise that they aren't the only ones or makes you feel better for having got it off your chest. You are so right, smoking and drinking to excess are not clever, but then again - we've all got a right to have fun, sometimes.

No Tony, public humiliation of this sort is part of the problem. I have a close family member who is an alcoholic and believe me it is part of the cycle of behaviours designed to crush self esteem. Having "fun" drinking to excess is to alcoholism what having a mole is to having full blown cancer. You wouldn't be sitting round on here with someone who posted such as Jude did but about some other symptom. Nobody would be joining in saying "oh yes my hair was coming out in clumps the other day too" or "i was SO sick on my chemo" or "coughing up blood? you should have seen it". I think the truth is everyone is scared to actually care at all. All those people reacting to Kath's thread about her brother. "oh poor you so sorry" Has anyone actually contacted her and bloody arranged to pick her up and take her to see him? Well, I don't know and I don't want to know. The point is there is some sickly sincerity involved with that "genuine" illness and none apparent for Jude's. And that is partly due to the way she chooses to make it public. Jude hates bleeding heart liberals and I don't blame her.

handbag, how do you know I'm an alcoholic and not a social drinker who jokingly refers to themselves as an alcoholic as many do? j

I don't know. The issue is still the same though isn't it?

(But a social drinker surely couldn't write such bad poetry.)

blimey that's all got a bit serious since i was here before. the thing is drinking is a way of life now. jude's comments were just about a way of life. like talking about reading a book or going to see a film. who are you, handbag, to decide what can and can't be put on here? anyway have a feeling you're being deliberately cruel to wind us all up. which is even more tedious.

Marchioness you don't know what you are talking about. Things on this site have got to the ridiculous point of nobody being able to tell the difference between a genuine concern or caring attitude and a multitude of other imagined nonsenses. Deliberately cruel? Wake up, feel something.

its Marvin-esque, its actually a skill to write that badly, I challenge you to come up with something worse. About the issue being the same, I think Prince William groaned out his hangover on New Year's day 2000 in public to a huger audience than I'd ever receive and I don't remember even the cutting of Newspapers telling him to grow up and dry out.

My Dad was an alcoholic. I don't think I need a reminder of the evils of such a condition. However I do not think that Jude is an alcoholic. She likes a drink but then so do many of us. She drinks too much from time to time - but then so do many of us. That doesn't make her or me 'alcoholics' and the hysteria surrounding alcohol can create an alcoholic just as much as ignorance of the condition. You only know if you are one yourself and once you have recognised the problem then you need to get help.

No I suppose everyone just tittered along. Oh dear poor little princey is human after all. I am sorry Jude if you feel I have been hard on you for no reason. I have a reason, personal issues on this topic. I can't abide the people who have a few drinks like you say and call themselves alcoholics. I don't suppose you can stretch the imagination enough to see it as a caring gesture. Which it was. After all on here nobody really says anything they mean or that means anything.

err, okay lets put all this aggro on a backburner and put our points forward nicely. I appreciate handbag's view and he/she is entitled to it, so lets disagree civilly.

...and I don't think you are being hard on me either (and if i did think that I can stand up for myself). I just that if someone does have a problem this isn't the best way to approach it. I understand your concern but if I AM (or anyone is an alcoholic) If you want to help, this is off the AA website and they are the experts! What Not To Do Never treat the sufferer from alcoholism as though he or she was a naughty child. You may think that they act that way, but skip it; overlook it, and never mention it. Don't check up to see how much they drink. If you discover a carefully hidden supply of liquor, leave it alone. It will not help to take away the supply, or pour it down the sink. Such common mistakes in judgment provide the alcoholic with the best possible excuse to go on a real binge. Never attempt to discuss the drinking problem with an alcoholic unless he wants to talk about it, and never while he is drinking in any case. It stirs up antagonism, which calls for further drinking. Your Attitude Is Important Usually the best time to approach the subject is during a remorseful hangover period. Be casually sympathetic. No recrimination - no criticism - no condemnation. Never argue. Let her talk, and if he says he must do something about her drinking, tell him you know what can be done. Don't, however, mention any specific thing unless he asks. Have some literature handy, but don't press it on him. Better to just leave it around where he is likely to pick it up.

Here's one written from the Monday after the Friday night before Who took me home and put me to bed I don't remember a single thing I said I slept all day Saturday and Sunday too Why do I do this I haven't got a clue. I had pleasure in reminding everyone what they did on Friday night. My mates were steamed but as I drive I was the only one who was sober. I agree with what everyone has said. You don't have to get drunk to be an alcoholic.

There's a great healing power in humour, a handbag. You shouldn't really attempt to judge Jude until you've sat across the table from her for an afternoon and matched her pint for pint. But I'll tell you something for nothing, Jude possesses an admirable gallows humour that will get her through any challenges life chucks at her. Jude may well be an alcoholic (although I don't think she is). She may well be a bit of a pisshead. Or she could just be a top bird who enjoys a drink and a laugh. Whatever it is, Jude is dealing with it, and rather well actually. If she's dealing with it through humour then more power to her. Don't knock her for her chosen method of handling her challenges. And before you start, I too lost a close family member through drink. My cousin, Paul, who was one of the best trumpet players this country has ever seen, climbed into a bottle of Diamond White and never climbed out again. What a waste! They kept calling it a "disease" at the funeral. I don't know whether it was a disease or not, but it certainly killed him. And even after that, you'll still find me writing humourous prose concerning drink and hangovers. Life goes on, a handbag, and we have to learn to deal with it. Oh, and by the way, lighten up a bit, eh?

Bravo for missing the point entirely Wiggins. A lighten up from you is like Princess Margaret suggesting a soft drink. You assume I haven't sat across a table from Jude. You assume all sorts. And next time you get on your high horse about something that matters to you and you try however fumble handedly to show you care about something maybe someone will adopt a very patronising tone with you. Life goes on. Yes. Did I suggest it didn't?

it's not Ralph is it?

erm okay, I really don't want to be the subject igniting a flame war. I'm drinking mineral water right now anyway so lets forget about it and all go home

Good idea. BTW, jude, where were you in the US anyway? Or did you already answer that one and my memory is going?

Hi JT Philadelphia I liked it quite a lot, really nice buildings I thought. jude

just looked back on that and realised "Nice Buildings" is the most mundane, lacklustre and boring thing you can say about a place after "The food was good" and "Weather was nice". Still, we all have our off days

No one ever speaks their mind on here???!!! Erm. Ahem. I can think of someone. Just like to say, my mum, dad, partner, best friend, kid brother, baby sister, budgerigar, next-door neighbour, next-door-but-one neighbour, corner-shop owner, the canteen woman from work with the wonky smile, the god I worship and my feminine side are all alcoholics, so I'm even more immuned to a challenge on my views, and everyone should listen to ME more. March, why do you use the phrase "even more tedious" when handbag didn't complain of teduim in the first place. Ask yourself why you're so obsessed with tedium supposedly caused by others...people like you often are. And the poem WAS shite. But I know that was the point. Jude, it's not difficult to write shite poetry (have you ever been to an open mic night - some people pull it off all the time) I love you you I really do I turn to goo that smells like poo See, much shiter than your effort...but hold out, if other philistines finally catch on to what a difficult skill it is, fame may beckon for you yet.

well on the subject of poetry I am no expert but the hitch-hiker's guide to the galaxy says; Poetry, well written, can be a spiritually uplifting experience. Badly written, it can be an experience of buttock-clenching horror. The third worst poetry in the universe is written by Vogons, and frequently used as a form of torture. The absolute worst poetry was written by Paula Nancy Millstone Jennings. It involved decaying swans. Luckily, it was destroyed during the demolition of the Earth. Examples of good, if long, poetry can be heard on the planet of Golgafrincham, home to the great circling poets of Arium. You cdan submit bad poetry on the H2G website http://www.bbc.co.uk/cult/hitchhikers/vogonpoetry/submitpoem.shtml and I haven't suceeded in having one accepted yet. See cat sat on the mat is bad in its triviality but yiou've really got to get the content to physically cringe before the art is mastered.

I'm sitting in a morris minor With my face against the door Licking off the window sticker Cause i'm so god-dam poor [%sig%]

that's very good/bad

"fumble handedly" Gladrag? Fumble handedly? Are you dyslexic or something?

Oh great green house With vines on it A tree reaching skywards like brocolli and gravelled path a bit like Lentils. And as you my love Cannot be here I say a prayer instead For my Dear Aunt Nellie Whose arthritis has Been bad of late.

That's quite good, Jude. You're getting better, I fear now you'll never make it as a shite poet. What's "dyslexic" about "fumble handedly", Karl? Has anybody explained to you what dyslexia is yet? Or did you just want to taunt someone who you know has dyslexia (but quite possibly has nothing to do with this)? You shouldn't take the piss out of someone's born affliction. I don't, for example, give YOU grief about being an ignorant nutsack who everyone laughs at. Oh yes I do. Sorry, carry on.

Dart & Grec, what a double act. Dyslexia, I believe Paul, is an impaired ability to understand the written word, in which case I must suffer from it myself, because for the life of me I can't work out what "fumble handedly" means. I didn't even know the word "handedly" existed. Just out of interest, Paul, I understand you feel your main contribution to every debate should be to insult schoolboy fashion, but it's really not necessary, you know.

It's actually very rare for me to insult "schoolboy fashion", though I couldn't resist it this time. "Handedly" quite patently exists as a word, as in, "He heavy-handedly reprimanded the troll for his (or her) apparent ignorance of English adverbs." Lots of adverbs are formed from adjectives in this way: guarded > guardedly. Ya see? It's fun to learn Not The Real Ralph, don't put it off, get rid of your Gremlins. Dyslexia is usually noticeable through a pattern of spelling mistakes. There are no spelling mistakes in "fumble handedly"; it's original, and clear in meaning.

Jude, I am a huge fan of You and your work, and I love your bad poem! There is a place I love, where trees reach to high heaven, and the scent of roses assault the nose, prose is appropriate, but verse is better. The letter kills but the spirit never! The lawn beckoned and the lowly worm reared it's wormy head, dead lay the leaves and a shadowow cast it's net, let love form words that are never meant, and I will play the pipes at tea-time, or not as the light fades to sometimes grey.

Shadowow?

Its a shadow that makes you gow WOW! Good to see you on the site Mark. Hope you're well. j