School of rock.

We had a bit of an open-house day at our flat last Saturday. An opportunity to catch up with all the people who've been wanting to visit over the past few months, but who we haven't been able to see because The Bullshit got in the way. It was what my Mum would call a 'gathering'. But then she'll do anything to avoid the word 'party'. Gathering implies Monopoly and Twiglets and last tube home. Party implies gatecrashers and irritated neighbours and fag burns in the sofa. But, given our worktop-long row of spirit bottles, a table full of cava, the Beastie Boys played at volume and the fact that I was wearing heels indoors, I think we can safely label Saturday the latter. (We had Twiglets as well, mind. I mean, bloody hell, it's not a party without Twiglets. Not even a gathering.)

And, as is customary at parties, I got drunk. Which, I'm sure, is just a normal Saturday night to many of you. But not for this cancer patient. For me, getting drunk at home with mates is positively throw-your-TV-out-the-window, set-fire-to-a-million-quid, drive-a-car-into-a-swimming-pool rock 'n' roll. Of course having had The Bullshit hardly does wonders for your drinking prowess (making me the perfect credit-crunch date). And, judging by my mammoth hangover the following day, it doesn't do an awful lot for your ability to shake it off, either. I felt sick, couldn't hold my brew for shaking, spoke in a voice that you could gravel a driveway with and had a head so painful I felt like I'd had a run-in with Chris Brown. (Ooh, topical.) Man, I felt like hell. But it was the sweetest hangover I've ever had.

Since June, whenever I've felt like shit, it's been for an equally shitty reason. But feeling like shit because I'd drunk too much (translation: a modest amount for most people) was marvellous; my emancipatory rebirth into normal life. And, baby, I worked it. I went to bed in full make-up. I made a grease-tastic bacon, egg and tomato ketchup sandwich when I got up. I watched sport on the sofa in the clothes I fell asleep in, then retired to my memory foam when sitting upright became too much effort. I watched the Sex and the City movie twice (second time with director's commentary) and ate an entire box of Green & Black's chocolates. To myself. (And I thought I wasn't girly.) I caught up on Coronation Street over a beef curry with egg fried rice and chips, then polished off the prawn crackers during an episode of Shameless. (Week five weigh-in: cancelled.) It was a glorious, lardy Sunday, and I went to bed early with a contented smile on my face, nestling my cheeks into a pillow of eyeliner-smudge and prawn-cracker dust. This, I thought, is what normal people do.

My flirt with normality didn't stop at the weekend. Because, just when I thought the reckless abandon of my cancer shackles had reached its Twiglet-eating, dancing-in-the-living-room pinnacle, I pushed ordinary life to its limits on Monday and went into the office for a few hours. And, lawks, things have changed since I've been holed up in my Bullshit bubble. Lots of lovely Soho shops have closed. There was a new security code on the front door. Different faces sat at different desks. I had a new log-in. Same old weak tea in chipped mugs, mind, but there's something quite poetic about that. I might be slowly rejoining an alien world with my blinking, newborn vision, but it's good to know that some of the old stuff remains the same. (Seems the baby metaphor extends further than my fluffy head, then.)

You might think all this rather boring of me. You probably had a Saturday night like an episode of Skins and ditched work on Monday morning to go drinking in Camden with the Gallaghers, and here's me harping on about getting pissed at home and enthusing about a day in the office as though I'm the new Keith Moon. But I guess it just depends on your perspective of what constitutes a good time. I appreciate that this is kids stuff, but given that over the last few months, my definition of a good time has been baking in my pyjamas during Women's Hour, these are lessons I need to re-learn. Right now I'm in party-school kindergarten (more McFly than Metallica). 

House parties and Twiglets and curries over Corrie... I know. It's hardly rock 'n' roll. But I like it.