In Dreams . .

Wow! I think I've just found the answer to the Great Teen Schoolboy Question.

If I'd known at 16 what I know now, I wouldn't . . .

(1) have had 12 whiskys,
(2) fallen into that ditch, and
(3) embarrassed Mz R with a drunken declaration of eternal love

. . . before vomiting in the back seat of the bus after that Young Conservative function way back when.

A tattoo! Why didn't I think of it. Duh! I would have been confident to the point of nonchalance. I'd have stopped drinking after two whiskeys. And I would surely have been laid by a grateful Young Tory . . . Maybe . . . Perhaps . . .

Um, got carried away there, with dreams-of-things-that-might-have-been. Jools found this sign close to one of our local high schools this morning. "Don't even dream. It wouldn't have worked," she says. "Not then. Definitely not now."

"Not even a small, tastefully rampant Mickey Mouse on my . . . ?"

"No chance. Don't even go there!"