2002-12-28 - 6:42 p.m.

Much as it pained me to distance myself from the near-constant enquiries into my (lack of) marital status, I arrive back in Olde Londone Towne with a bag full of pressies, a heart full of dreams and a liver the size and consistency of a ripe monkey nut. Christmas was themed by the discovery of a new drink, concocted in a pint pot from one measure of port (it�s the new brandy) and a bottle of some dubious alcopop that seems to be popular with the pre-teen dipso crowd � obviously this meant opening parcels on the merry day itself through a hangover fug like the smog over downtown Manila. My haul was a bit of a mixed bag � just the three copies of the scripts of a certain office-based sitcom, some nice cds and even nicer cold, hard currency and the latest additions to my mum�s ongoing obsession about the volume of underwear she obviously presumes I get through.

Interest in my singledom seems to have reached fever pitch, with even the doddery old scrotes living down the road that I haven�t seen in twenty years bringing it up within five tenths of a second when I passed them on the street. My mum has moved on from advice to stony-faced warnings about the perils of being left on the shelf � summed up in her �Don�t leave it too late� announcement about four minutes into day one, as if I�m constantly batting away hordes of suitable partners just to annoy her. At home, everyone of legal age is paired up � even my socially dysfunctional cousins are holding down steady girlfriends and one of them hasn�t left his bedroom since about 1983. Still, my mum became grudgingly more optimistic by about day four, pronouncing that �Well, I suppose you always meet someone when you least expect it�, what with her Cand*ce B*shell-esque experience of the world of modern dating. Easy for her to say - all my Dad had to do was buy her a bag of chips and a pickled egg and the next thing you know they�re getting a mortgage.

Next year I�m taking along a high-class escort, just for a quiet life.

The offers of marriage to dusky-skinned minor royals from far eastern principalities are surely going to come flooding in now, though, on the news that my entry into an international comedy writing competition received, er, an honourable mention (and cash prize!). Yes, I can now prefix myself with the words �(almost) award-winning�, having fended off all manner of other people wanting to come fourth, some from Wales and Costa Rica. OK, so it�s not exactly the big league, but it�s a start. And they all said I would never make any money from comedy�well, nobody's laughing now.