All Partied Out

Laura was born 18 years ago on the 2nd of October. She was almost three months early and weighed a mere 28 ounces. She has mended up really well and could knock you into the middle of next week if she felt like it. Laura’s dad is called the Wee Manny. He and his wife Mrs Wee are among our oldest friends. So when Laura suggested that she hold her 18th birthday party in the room above our garage we were only too pleased to agree. Last night it came about. I don’t know how many came but I believe the garage was heaving. I went out at one point and there were so many milling around our yard looked like closing time at Tullyglass. All that was missing was the burger van.

Anyway having drank the better part of a bottle of Chardonnay I decided to take a little lie-down around 10pm. I thought that everything would wind down at about 1am and that the parents would all come and collect their little darlings. Well at 2am I woke up convinced the house was under machine gun attack. Coming to I realised it was the sound system. I got up and went downstairs to see what was going on. I discovered that the party was still going strong and that it had relocated to the kitchen. I also found that at least 20 people were staying the night. The very bossy Laura press-ganged me up to the hot press were every available blanket, duvet and quilt was trailed out.

After a while I decided to escape back to bed. But my bedroom is directly above the kitchen and the roars and shouts of them were indescribable. The worst offender was the Wee Manny himself closely followed by a Justin with the whole thing being stirred up by a Nicky. Well the things they talked about. Being a grammar school crowd they discussed racism, masturbation and hunting with dogs which both Laura and Justin have participated in though’ Justin says the Mid-Antrim only catches about three foxes a year. Hate mail may be sent c/o Bert, Cullybackey. At 4am I could bear the din no longer and got up and offered to drive them all home. Everyone declined as they were having too good a time. I then went to the loo to find that someone had smashed one of my plant pots and even worse put the plant in the bin, I had a rant about this and told them that when all the Academy ones came to Hannah’s parties that they were much better behaved and that Cambridge House were a pack of uncouth savages. Some were mildly stung but most took not a blind bit of notice so I grabbed a duvet and went out to sleep on a sofa in the garage.

It was dark and scary out there so I put on some fairy lights and settled down under my duvet to enjoy the blissful quiet. Before I went to sleep I pondered the difference between Hannah’s lovely civilised friends and Laura’s rowdy mates. On the surface they were all quite alike so what was the difference? Hannah’s friends packed the house many a night and all that got broke was the odd tumbler. Then it hit me. Alcohol. We created a teens only scene and allowed them to get pissed. That’s why they were boisterous and loud. Hannah’s friends were mostly stoners.

Postscript: I’ll write about the breakfast party later and will only add that this evening when I went to get my comfy trousers out of the dryer that it was full of vol-au-vents. The Academy ones would never have done that.