Drinking diary.

Anyone who has attended alcohol treatment services will be familiar with the concept of the drink diary.

You write where and when you were when you drank and what you thought, in the hope that you can get to the bottom of some of your emotional reasons for drinking and trying to change them.

Thus, yesterday.

4pm, at the The O, a pint of Stella. Physically relieving, but also distressingly predictable. I've been trying to start my drinking later and later in the day in a bid to cut down. To an extent, I've succeeded in this - I used to hit the pub at about lunch time. Now it's usually 4.30pm. Yesterday, I started earlier. My girlfriend had rung to say she was coming home from work early and would I like to meet her for dinner out - this threatened the treasured routine that guarantees me my current seven a day, so I went to the pub half an hour early.

Yesterday I drank, three pints Stella, one pint Asahi, one watermelon collins, two cans Stella.

We went to a Japanese restaurant. We both like the food and it feels healthy too - mmm, seaweed! Then to a bar. Then home.