From Glyndebourne to St Thomas’s Hospital

‘Don’t you think you’re drinking too much?’ said the nurse, contemplating the array of bottles. ‘But I feel so thirsty,’ I replied. A doctor arrived and concluded that powerful intravenous antibiotics did require a lot of liquid, so that the orange juice was acceptable as well as the water.
The trouble had started at Boisdale. We were having a modest lunch, to taste some new Spanish wines while working out which sherries would accompany haggis. A Palo Cortado from Gonzalez Byass won that prize. We then moved to Ranald’s cigar terrace to reaffirm the partnership between Speyside and Havana. Only problem: I was feeling increasingly wretched and it was showing. For weeks, my leg had been growing sorer. Ranald and the girls insisted that I should go home to bed. ‘Can’t: dining in the House of Lords.’

I did, but was unable to finish the Dover sole: a sinful waste. Only hope that it ended up in a cattie-bag.