The story I didn't sell to the Daily Mail.

Well hello, empty text field. It's been a while, and a while feels like a while.

Life in Farringdon is ticking along with increasing familiarity and I've inevitably mapped the names to the faces. I still feel like an outsider in the city though. As much as I love the buzz and hub of working in London, I never have been and never will be so blindly lost in my work that I become one of those typical yuppy sorts.

While most of the city workers are plotting their excuses for being late to dinner, I find it nigh on impossible to get that lost in what I do. It's just my way, I suppose. An hour rarely goes past without me glancing at the clock and willing it on faster.

I haven't found it that easy to settle in to the office group. Everybody is nice, and always civil, but I'm extremely good at seperating my work from my social life. Last Friday, for example, at nine o'clock...I was enjoying a dinner with my work mates. But instead of plunging myself in to a night out on the town, as was the plan, I couldn't help but scoot off to Waterloo and grab a ridiculously late train to Bournemouth to be with my own group of friends.

Speaking of which, if you haven't read about it already, Bournemouth turned in to quite the little night of mayhem. Arriving at the station for just gone Midnight, I grabbed a cab to Winton Street and met up with everybody in what can only be described as a riot of a house party.

300 people spilling on to the streets, coming from neighbourhoods both nearby and far away. I remember talking to a bloke from Worcester for Christ's sake.

To put the evening in to perspective, some absolute legend had gone as far as to set up a stool outside the house and tout beer to underage kids. Now, while I don't condone alcohol abuse amongst kids - or anybody - I admire the guy's entrepreneurism.

Having turned up so late, it didn't surprise me to find most of my friends completely monged out. I'd barely set foot in the kitchen before having a joint thrust up my nose and a can of Stella necked back with chants to down it. Apparently, I wasn't drunk enough but two hours on a train saw to that.

Eventually, the police crashed the house. And by crash, I mean spectacular scenes of rioting outside. Twenty officers called to the scene, pelted with bottles and forced back in to the street. They eventually sent out the meatwagons and helicopters while I stood at the end of the garden with a close friend - debating how best to deal with his slightly incriminating possession of skunk.

We considered climbing the back wall and running for it, but with police patrolling the entire premises and a 12 foot drop or so, it was never gonna happen. As the token sober guy, I settled for standing still and catching the hopelessly wasted party-goers who hadn't quite judged the extent of the garden slope. And I should be bloody well thanked for it if the stream of vomit that they didn't fall in to is any measure of my goodwill.

Needless to say, we made it to safety eventually. But not before walking aimlessly through the suburbs of Bournemouth in search of a mate's house. About two hours of kicking our heels, if I recall.

I came home on Saturday feeling tired, woozy, slightly drunk with red hair, and ominously ill-prepared for another night on the town - this time for my brother's birthday.

We plan to do it all again next month. But until then, I have an extremely busy March to look forward to. I'm in Norwich this weekend, followed by Hackney the week after, and Kent after that. Days are a blur and nights are slipping through my fingers but I'm happy, I think.

It would be nice to settle down for a little while and take my foot off the accelerator. But there's no sign of the finishing line and sometimes I worry that the finishing line is actually depression, addiction or a hospital bed.

Probably the later if I go to Quaser drunk as a skunk again.

But I'm looking forward to mellowing down and enjoying a hopefully quieter weekend with a friend who's had to endure much of my drunken phone-harrassment. It'll be nice to prove that I exist in sober form too.

Although she probably wouldn't believe it.