Today was never going to be the day of action that so many people claim the first day of the year to be. We didn’t wake up until around noon, although I could have quite happily stayed in bed all day. Last night was a family New Year’s Eve party at my cousin Pat’s house, where I finally lost my Jagerbomb virginity and found that it actually tastes like cough medicine that you’d give a child (although best not to get the two confused, they are probably equally as effective for a child’s cough). I was drinking John Smith’s too, and despite the mixtures I didn’t feel especially drunk. Obviously the Red Bull was helping to balance the alcohol intake, (a lot like an alco-pop I remember from the early 2000s called Red Square, basically a bottle of vodka and Red Bull that due to the combination of its sweetness and ease of drinking, and the fact that most places sold it for a pound, you didn’t get falling down drunk but did spend a lot of time once you’d got home wondering what the hell was happening to your body when half of it was pissed and the other half wanted to stay awake), so it wasn’t until we were walking home that I realised that I couldn’t walk in a straight line. According to Mandi I was slurring my words, but I do that after a wine gum to be honest so that isn’t a reliable indicator of my sobriety or lack of.

So that we didn’t spend the whole day eating the Christmas party food, Mandi cooked a shepherd’s pie while I took Jack for his belated morning walk. We ate watching Friends for the millionth time. This is a programme that we have the DVD box set of, so there is no excuse for getting so engrossed in it, but for some reason we do. I don’t know if the show has this hold over everybody, but we can’t leave it alone. It can’t possibly still have the viewing figures that it once enjoyed, but Comedy Central (and E4 before it in this country) surely wouldn’t persist with it if it wasn’t popular. Even now, I still do the handclap during the opening theme tune as we all did in the old days.

Friends finished at the right time, sometimes there will be an episode shown from about halfway through its life when the show took a real nosedive in terms of quality and relied on big name guest stars to prop it up. The best example of them getting it so horribly wrong was the pointless pre-title sequence with Robin Williams and Billy Crystal. Towards the end of the ten years they had pulled their socks up and thankfully ended the show with a respectable legacy. It’s weird now when you watch it because you just know that it is frozen in time, and as soon as they all leave the apartment for the final time to go their separate ways you just know that the next day they are all going to be ten years younger again and Rachael will be entering Central Perk in her rain soaked wedding dress. There was talk of a reunion episode/film, but the cast rather sensibly refuted this story. Everyone who watched the show can now have their own idea and opinion of what became of the six of them, (seven if you include Phoebe’s husband Mike), that doesn’t involve appearing in shit romantic comedy films.

The time freeze becomes even weirder when you consider the ages everyone would be now, with Ross and Phoebe being the oldest at roughly (depending on a rather shaky continuity) 47 years old. Monica and Chandler’s twins would be 10 this year, Emma 12, and Ben 19.

I remember learning from an interview with a cast member that even nowadays, the six principal actors receive ten thousand pounds every time an episode is repeated. From the UK alone that’s got to be around fifty grand a day, (assuming that +1 channels don’t count). They can certainly afford to be choosy, which doesn’t explain Jennifer Aniston’s film roles.

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