The repercussions of getting very drunk on a Sunday night

1. You’ll abandon the people you were actually meant to be there with in favour of strangers (sorry Peas for not aiding you in ending the date a lot earlier than it did, sorry Nan and Eily, who after not seeing you for a few months, I should’ve spoken to a hell of a lot more). Yes, when drunk, you love strangers, and you’re amazed you never realised how much they love you back. So, you’ll exploit the fact you’re wearing a t-shirt that says “I was discovered in the dusty streets of Soweto” to start a conversation. Everyone wants to talk to someone who proclaims that, don’t they?

2. You’ll convince yourself that every table of strangers at the Jolly contains a potentially great new friend. So you’ll engage as many tables as possible in conversation. You’ll ask questions about people’s deepest darkest secrets, and in return learn that someone cheats on his girlfriend twice a week because she only sleeps with him once every two weeks.

3. You’ll be told by the barman to stop doing a one-legged dance on a stool holding a Guiness in your hand… who will then return and tell all the other people trying to better your effort to get off the damn barstools please, and throw you another really hairy eyeball.

4. You’ll bump into long-lost mates from varsity, then try and show off one of them’s strength (he does “no-holds barred” fighting, I think it’s called – no rules, attack your opponent on any body part you like) by insisting he pick you up on the palm of one hand like he used to at varsity (when you were probably 5kg lighter), much to the not-so-amazement of your onlookers. (still fucking cool, if you ask me).

4. On account of the fact that everyone’s so generous, you’ll take them up on every drink offer. Which means you get so rat-arsed, you embarrassingly have to accept your really strong friends’ offer to follow you home. You spend a while trying to find your car, don’t recognise them waiting for you in their really swanky car (in their case, an instance of brains meeting brawn. Not fair!), but eventually make it to your place in one piece.

5. You’ll double-check your appointments for the next morning, and thank God you had the good sense to make your first meeting for 9:30, not 9am. Because that extra half-hour of sleep will go down really well.

6. You’ll get up at 7:30 as planned, feeling dreadful, but determined to get through all the client’s client interviews you have lined up for the day (yes, the same task that saw me wearing a Sasko skirt to a competitor’s company) and learn valuable insights for your client. You’ll double-check the details of the first meeting to remind yourself what’s in store (that means a quick re-look at the appointment time. Still says 9:30. Relief – you didn’t fuck up).

7. En route to your first meeting, which should be made in comfortable time because you’re so well organised, you get a call. “Is there a lot of traffic on the road?” the secretary enquires. “Um, no – thanks for asking. I’ll be there in perfect time” you reply. “The meeting was meant to start 20 minutes ago.” D’oh! “In my diary it says 9:30” you insist. But you curse silently to yourself that you’re now making the Financial Director of one of SA’s four big banks wait for you. Gulp.

8. You arrive at the place, check your bloody diary, which now says the meeting started at 9am. Shit. The dude’s going to be furious, he probably has back-to-back meetings lined up for the whole day, and you’ve kept him waiting for 25 precious minutes that could be spent negotiating a company takeover or something equally important.

9. You apologise profusely – the secretary looks at you suspiciously – you sit down at the table, and the man starts firing questions at you. “How long have you worked at this company?” “What job did you have before that?” “Where did you study?” “What did you study?” And you’re thinking, shit, this man doesn’t think I’m capable of doing my job (in the condition I was in, probably true) – he was expecting someone a lot older, someone whose background was in Actuarial Science, someone without a major hangover. You get quite nervous, to the extent that when you pick up your glass to pour water in it, in order that you may soak your parched, parched tongue, your hand shakes ridiculously (although you’re not sure whether it’s from the booze or the nerves). So you ask him “Why the interrogation? I’m here to ask you the questions.” Turns out he loves the fact you studied Chemistry, he thinks those are the perfect skills for the job – after all, his ex-wife is a Chemistry lecturer who gets head-hunted all over the world – even the fact that you’ve got Italian heritage is great. So after the interview, which rapidly becomes much more pleasant, he drags you to the Head of Strategy, where he waxes lyrical about you and your employer, and gets the Head of Strategy excited about your company. So now you’re a saleswoman, too!

Moral of the story: get as much Sunday-night Rogering in as you can, it’s good for business!