Believing in yourself only gets you so far, particularly when half your stomach lining has been flushed down a toilet.

I’ve long held the belief that belief in itself can conquer most things. Sure, if your abilities aren’t there you’re not exactly going to nail it, but a bit of self-belief means you put in a reasonable effort. Believing you can reach that high note in Celine Dion’s It’s All Coming Back to Me Now helps you make the all-important serious-power-ballad face needed to kill it at karaoke. Believing you can run up that gentle slope which seems impossibly-steep usually gets you over the hill without peeing your pants. There are countless examples of people channelling their inner Little Train Engine getting over their own steep hills (whether said hill is a metaphor for trying to look like a professional in bright pink trackpants or doing something legitimate like finishing a triathlon is irrelevant). Most times they get over the hill, other times it’s a bloody trainwreck.

A simple barbecue buffet dinner turned into me grabbing the face of a complete stranger in an attempt to dramatise the Shannon Noll version of What About Me (which is a song essentially crying over spilt milk) before throwing myself on my knees on a two-metre square dance floor on a “quiet” night. As the majority of said buffet made its way from the toilet bowl through the septic pipes at the we staked out in, I aggressively danced the night away thinking the only drama that would befall me was the DJ cutting Daryl Braithwaite’s Horses short. How wrong I was.

“It’s mind over matter,” I was reminded the next morning as I clutched a giant cup of lemonade while trying to keep relatively still to stop my stomach bile from spraying out my nose.

It was only roughly 8.30am, but already it had been an eventful morning. I know I talk a lot about moments when I question my decision-making skills (or lack there of), but vomiting up my breakfast (a handful of tablets, as actual food would have been too harsh) after a “casual dinner”  certainly falls under that category.

There I was, hunched over the toilet bowl, mentally preparing myself for the onslaught of day ahead. I’d already become aware my stomach was entirely empty after a simple cough resulted in the splashback of acidic yellow gunk hitting the toilet water, so I assumed food would be out of the question. If I had been wearing my glasses as the time, I perhaps would have noticed the glowing red veins in what usually is the whites of my eyes spell out “you’re fucked”. But as I was seeing through the surprisingly flattering filter of poor vision, my reflection in the bathroom mirror was airbrushed to the point of delusion: I can totally make it through the day.

As a plucky young college student, my ability to bounce back from hangovers was astounding to the point of sheer annoyance for my friends. As they kept their blinds drawn and festered in bed for hours after a big night, I bounded through the morning with the energy of a bouncy ball and the sound effects of the talking toy aisle in a department store after a snot-nosed kid pressed the button on every Tickle-Me Elmo doll. I would bask in the sunshine and poison the grumpy world with my chirpy mood. Everything was funny and world was giving me a big thumbs up. Being “hungover” (if you cold call it that), for many years, put me in an excellent mood.

So imagine my shock when my nutritious breakfast, which included a couple of paracetamol capsules and a maxolin tablet, bubbled up in my throat like a bout of surprise rabies. Not five minutes after swallowing my “cereal” for the morning, I let out a small burp, which was followed by a foamy mass of disgusting bubbled out of my mouth, tasting like the belly button fluff of Satan. It was like I had swallowed a dishwasher tablet and washed it down with vinegar. There weren’t many positives to the experience, but at least I can say that I now know what those paper mache volcanoes feel like after being used for a year 7 science experiment.

“This is not how Dannielle does hangovers,” I told myself. I pulled myself together, whacked on some make up and made a mental note to text my roommate confirming that I would see her at our weights class that afternoon and walked out the front door with my head held high.

There are plenty of things to be learned from the first Spongebob Squarepants movie, but aside from wanting have a big night on the ice-cream, I left the theatre with an overwhelming feeling that you can do anything, you just gotta believe. After all, Scarlett Johansson wouldn’t lie to me about something like that, even if she was playing an illustrated mermaid at the time. it only cemented my ideals that mental strength equals actual, tangible strength and can result in powerful achievements. Like a baby mustering superhuman strength to pull their obese father from a rip in the ocean, I too could do great things if I put my mind to it.

But back to The Day After The Night Out: I had developed a crazy case of the shakes, making me look like an ice addict with nits. I sat, trying to contribute to discussion and worked like a dog to keep myself from falling off my chair (not from shock, but because apparently my head was now the weight of a four-door Hilux carting a load of firewood and an over-fed pigging dog). I wanted to stay strong, but my insides were calling for me to crumble into the admission that hangovers are real. I didn’t want to believe that this was my life, and kept trying to convince myself that my will to function was stronger than my sudden desire to lay in the foetal position in public. Inside my head a violent back-and-fourth dialogue echoed: one voice came from a figure wearing a Lorna Jane slogan singlet telling me not to give up, and the other sounded from a blob-like human being soaking in a cesspit of self-loathing and its own filth telling me I couldn’t do it. It isn’t often I take the word of my imagination’s equivalent of Bart Simpson washing himself with a rag on a stick, but apparently this time it was too tempting.

I tried hard, but this time self-belief/delusion could do nothing to conquer my physical state. Sure, I could (and did) use an over-sized water bottle to prop my head up, but nothing should keep my metaphorical chin up. I was defeated. Within ten minutes I had crashed into bed, after a rushed drive home with the windows down so i could “get some fresh air”.

With the clarity of hindsight, I am trying to salvage a life lesson from the rubble of my appalling life choices. It’s a difficult process, and I would be lying if I didn’t say I was clutching at straws in trying to make a positive from this steaming turd of a situation. And while the age-old proverb indicates to me that said turd cannot be polished, I choose to believe otherwise. Believing in myself got me less than a quarter of the way through the day before I collapsed into a heap of disappointment; just imagine the piss-stained wreck I would have been had I not believed in myself at all.

“Do the fingers,” I told the crowd – I knew this was a terrible idea.

Last night I was the Sonia Kruger in town, being a “host” for an event titled a copyright-breech-avoidant variation of channel 7’s Dancing With the Stars. Except while dear old Sonia was qualified for the gig by previous ballroom dancing and public event experience, I landed the role by being thrown under the bus by my boss, insistent on not going down alone after she reluctantly took on a role as a dancing judge.

As someone whose job it is to string together coherent sentences, talk to people and to generally not be a stain, I don’t exactly fit the role. I once had to interview a federal minister and told him to expect a few awkward silences because I’m not great at small talk citing that “I once started a conservation with someone by saying ‘have you ever got a chicken wing stuck in your beard?’” as justification. So while in theory I shouldn’t be terrible with a microphone, in practice I’m about as good of a choice to host an event as a plate of lukewarm skinless chicken thigh pieces soaking in their own juices.

This is because I clearly have a different view of what is funny than the Average Joe. My favourite jokes include saying, “Ted, Andy is on the phone – tell him to get off it before he brakes it!” and the classic, “I’m just going to put the kettle on – do you think it’ll fit?”. I also have a tendency to swear like a sailor instead of thinking of words to say which eloquently express my sentiments.

It’s now been more than 12 hours since I took to the stage, microphone in hand, and it’s only now that I’m sitting in the dark with 90s break up music blaring that I think I am ready to recount those shaky few hours.

I strutted in thinking I had it in the bag. I had myself a snazzed-up clipboard that looked like a mirrored disco ball emblazoned by a permanent marker with “disco and such” to sum up my knowledge of the world of bodily movements coordinated to music. I had a microphone with tape that matched my outfit. I was wearing hairspray for fuck’s sake. But all the seamless undies and breast tape in the world couldn’t smooth over my poor judgement or cover the erect nipples of bad puns.

I had initially decided to sail along stone cold sober, but it was when my co-host Tony threw to me to add something two minutes in and all I could reply with was “yeah, so do that” that I realised this was a poor choice. By the first break I was gagging for a stubby. I’m proud to say that I only missed one brief appearance to acquire said social lubrication.

There’s an old saying that my dad likes to bring out every now and then when a joke falls flat or a stupid suggestion is immediately shot down, being: “that went over like a lead fart”. I’m not entirely sure how that saying works, but I think it’s more than applicable to the majority of my quips from last night. And so, in the interests of keeping the word count down, here are the top three pun-related lead farts from last night:

1) “I don’t know about you Tony, but I’d dip my corn chip in that salsa” – said after a particular raunchy salsa dance routine.

2) “Hats off to that one” – proclaimed after a man threw his hat off in his dance routine.

3) “It looked like smooth sailing” – not so subtly slipped into a post-dance interview after a pair danced to Beyond The Sea.

But perhaps the biggest lead fart of all was when I applauded a man for rocking a pair of shorts and “getting his pins out”. “Not enough men wear shorts these days,” I told the audience before adding that, “his calves are so defined you could cut cheese with them”. That one was so bad that my co-host felt compelled to end my love sonnet to men in shorts by hastily cutting to the judges’ comments.

And while I promised not to swear so to avoid sullying the name of my workplace and being handed an offensive language charge by the table of cops (which would have made for an awkward time when I did the police rounds on Monday), I apparently need to work on my willpower. I seems it will take more than a few years at university to beat the bogan out of me.

“Get over there before those other bastards do,” I told the crowd when the script told me to encourage people to visit the photobooth. That was followed up by my suggestion for them to “do the fingers” in front of the camera, while unwittingly giving roughly 330 people the forks. I also apparently interpreted my instructions to “wrap up the event and encourage guests to dance” as telling middle-aged people to “hit the piss and tear it up”. Not to mention the countless times I quipped, “this isn’t on the farkin’ clipboard,” to my fellow dignified guests at the VIP table.

However, this kind of played in my favour, because said VIPs left almost immediately after the competition wrapped up and left a largely-untouched cheese platter for me to devour. And at least I’m not likely to be asked back to do it for a second time.

Everyone wins!

Someone is going to put a microphone in my hand and allow me to “talk how you normally do” in front of a crowd without a script.

This person is in charge of running a business, can be trust to drive an automobile without ploughing into pedestrians and kept like three children alive well into adulthood. People entrust this woman’s ability to make responsible, sensible decisions. And yet, I don’t know if I have any faith in their judgement. Because this woman suggested me to be an MC for an actual public event.

Now, since I’ve been able to coordinate my bodily excretions with finding a toilet, I’ve known that I was an MC. But the MC I am referring to is the Year 9 version: a mad *c-bomb drop*. And that kind of MC is very different from the MC this woman has in mind.

Being a Master of Ceremonies is a whole other kettle of fish. You have to be charismatic, knowledgeable and articulate (ei. not ending every sentence with “ya bastard”). As someone who has roughly 500 cards affirming that I’m some kind of professional, I’ve mastered this charade for the duration of a phone call, and even the occasional face-to-face exchange. However sustaining that kind of act for a whole night not is akin to keeping Tony Abbott’s inappropriate comments in check – it not only seems exhausting, but it’s borderline impossible.

Take this week, for example. I wore the same shirt to work two days in a row while answering questions with the likes of, “yeah good,” and, “I’ll have a sniff”. I had to spell the word “vicious” aloud and tried to put an “h” in there. We had work experience kids in the office, so I made a promise to myself that I wouldn’t swear – it took about three hours before I added fuck to almost every sentence. And this was only because the first three hours I was sitting in silence in court. Charisma, knowledge and a killer vocab – things I just don’t have in my MC utility belt.

I’ve seen many a good MC at work, so I know how it’s done. For my sister’s wedding, we had two MCs. They had a whole speech planned, but an off-hand remark about who was the best one turned into a dance off: complete with air thrusts and pants being thrown into the crowd. Unfortunately, there is only one Dannielle in the world (just imagine how beautiful it would be if there were more of me – I daresay it would be positively utopic) so I can’t go up against myself in a d-floor battle and female nudity just isn’t funny (think about it: it just isn’t the same when a woman wears just stockings to a recovery and a two-sizes-too-tight shirt that says “bitch”, but when a slightly chubby sporadically hairy man does it’s a riot).

This happened when these fellows had a script, whereas I will be riding solo. This isn’t a great strategy.

When put on the spot, weird things come out of my mouth. A guy at work dislocated his knee and he accidentally put weight on it when I told him to get up out of his chair so I could get at his computer. I kind of panicked after he made a noise like a dog-sized mouse being thrown at a wall, and the first thing I said was “do you want bite my hand?!”.

This isn’t going to end well.

But, I was able to strike a deal which took me out of the running as a candidate for the office pageant queen representative (because what in the world would I have for my talent be? Picking out people in the audience, asking them to tell me something positive about their lives and over thinking it on their behalf to obscure it into a raging negative in under 30 seconds?). The exchange was so tempting that I couldn’t turn it down. So I traded one night of awkward pun mumbling and ran out of the office victorious.

It may be excruciating for the audience to watch me fumble my way through Mastering their Ceremony, but their discomfort is a price I’m wiling to pay to keep me out of the evening gown section.

And if worse comes to worst, I’ll dance away the awkward with vodka as by d-floor partner.

I was having a perfectly relaxing weekend until I remembered one thing.

There I was, laying blissfully on the couch deciding what I should shovel into my mouth for dinner, and then I remembered. Just last week, I agreed to something awful. For the past few days, I’ve been repressing the memory of this verbal contract so I don’t have to deal with it. But today, it resurfaced out of nowhere like it was that seemingly endless piece of glass that was embedded in my foot more than five years ago.

And like that shard of glass poking its way through the layers of skin on my foot, it was an unwelcome and irksome, making me question the kind of life I lead. It hasn’t been a good few minutes.

I just made a face like I stepped on the boneless carcass of a kitten while wearing nothing but socks. Because that’s what this situation is like: there’s the initial unpleasantness of the sensation of having three-day-old organs form around your toes like one of those memory foam pillows, but there’s also the drawn out task of peeling off the bodily-fluid-soak sock off your feet and then figuring out how to dispose of the soiled tube of fabric.

So what could be so awful it is akin to desecrating the corpse of a beloved pet? I agreed to compete in some town festival queen contest.

The worst part? It has nothing to do with cross dressers.

It’ll just be me: cross in a dress.

From what I can gather, it will be your standard women’s-rights-backtracking beauty pageant forcing me to smile and care about something: hobbies I have never really taken to.

I sat in my manager’s office with frightening visions swirling in my head. Picture a grainy montage of Vasoline teeth smears, hair rollers and swimsuit parades cut violently to the soundtrack of Psycho. It was like some inspired person with Microsoft Movie Maker recut clips of Miss Congeniality into a horror movie. I was Sandra Bullock and Michael Caine was rousing on me for wearing my gravy-stained pony jumper and shooting me deathly glares every time I dropped a c-bomb. This re-cut was no romantic comedy, and there was no happy ending. The main character (me, obviously) would die in the belly of a giant swan.

But I still agreed.

Thankfully, there’s plenty of time until this thing gets underway. I have months up my sleeve in which I can weasel my way out of this.

I would stay here and rant some more, but I have things to do. I have to go find some people with glandular fever to lick.