Tea, Stags and
Oh man. Good party. Coherence may not be my friend right now. Words are probably joining coherence in a little "we hate Aoife" anti-fanclub. Just to enumerate the total membership of this club, I figure moderation and sense might have been recent recruits this morning, especially as I was sitting out last night with some people drinking and smoking like chimney stacks at the height of the industrial revolution.
Yesterday was the stag party of a friend of a friend. Well, I wouldn't discount him as a friend myself, but the party was for people far closer to him than I was. So Saturday involved meeting folks in the tea gardens before escorting one of the FOAF's best friends. Ignoring the stuff that happened on the way to the party, or the fact that I successfully, and unintentionally attempted the spectacularly special stunt of dropping my bandanna into the toilet bowl (let's add grace and co-ordination to that club, shall we?), it was a very good night. I brought what I thought was an inhuman amount of alcohol (my discovery of the day was that Tesco might actually be an ok place for booze, I got 4 cans of Kopparberg for €7 - I call that a win), and was plied with cocktails and lethally potent jelly shots (when jelly stings the bits of your mouth that may be a bit sore already, you know it's strong).
After games like Cranium and Never Have I Ever, a game in which someone gives a particular situation or action or state of mind, and anyone who's been in that sort of situation must drink - it's like Truth or Dare without the dare, but with more drinking. As is wont to be the case in such situations, the level dropped almost immediately, and let's just say modesty was one of the founding members of my special little club. Also, never have I ever met someone who got so insanely antsy about people taking a smoke break during a game (Cranium).
Once that was done, all reverted to goodness. As people made their goodbyes, it basically wound down to the stag, easydiesel and Viv. Then at some stupidly early hour like 3am (I'll leave you to determine the context in which I mean early), the stag decided to sleep, and the rest of us sat, drank, smoked and chatted in the garden. Come about something like half six in the morning, we decided to take a walk. By this stage, class was provisionally accepted into the society, and was poring over the final paperwork, but only signed when we decided to keep drinking while we walked.
So, in a park, drinking, smoking, chatting and wandering, we were all pretty surprised by the other park-goers. I mean, here were these absolutely bleary-eyed twenty-somethings in a park, stooped, cigarette in one hand, can in the other (By this point, class was in the society bar, drinking itself into a stupor before it got up to belt out "I will survive" on the non-existant kareoke), but just chatting and assuming a non-threatening demeanour (I'd hope) and the passers-by would say hi in a cheery way, and we'd reply similarly, and/or fawn over the dog they were invariably walking. Sometimes they'd comment on the cans saying "I wish I was young enough to go all night like ye", but they weren't being thick about it. That actually took us aback.
Anyway, once it started looking like a scarily reasonable hour, like 9am or so, we went back to start making a ways to a shop for a breakfast roll. Instead we saw a hotel advertising a full Irish. So much better than a breakfast roll. That diet of mine lies shattered, in pieces, on the floor but it was so worth it. Our tiredness, and everything else was kicking in at the time, and we sat outside the hotel drinking either tea or coffee, nursing a cigarette (seriously, like a freaking chimney that night), continuing to have fantastic conversations while our food was being cooked.
About an hour later, we part ways, except that I walked diesel home, and we just chatted for ages. So, picture this, a bleary-eyed tranny, presumably stinking like nothing else, decided that, at noon, it was probably a good idea to walk into town and to look at the pretty colours of the city. You see, at that point, I was already entertaining the wild notion of burning through my sleepless state and getting to bed early, thereby not disrupting my sleep patterns - realism was hanging out in the old boys club, signed into the lounge by one of the regulars. I got home at about 3pm, and already wanted to sleep. So I allowed myself one and a half hours, and woke up 2 hours overtime. But I was in such a deep, comfortable slumber that it felt completely worth it, so long as I can get to bed soon.
So, overall, it was a fantastic weekend. Now, I shower, then strategically keel over.
Yesterday was the stag party of a friend of a friend. Well, I wouldn't discount him as a friend myself, but the party was for people far closer to him than I was. So Saturday involved meeting folks in the tea gardens before escorting one of the FOAF's best friends. Ignoring the stuff that happened on the way to the party, or the fact that I successfully, and unintentionally attempted the spectacularly special stunt of dropping my bandanna into the toilet bowl (let's add grace and co-ordination to that club, shall we?), it was a very good night. I brought what I thought was an inhuman amount of alcohol (my discovery of the day was that Tesco might actually be an ok place for booze, I got 4 cans of Kopparberg for €7 - I call that a win), and was plied with cocktails and lethally potent jelly shots (when jelly stings the bits of your mouth that may be a bit sore already, you know it's strong).
After games like Cranium and Never Have I Ever, a game in which someone gives a particular situation or action or state of mind, and anyone who's been in that sort of situation must drink - it's like Truth or Dare without the dare, but with more drinking. As is wont to be the case in such situations, the level dropped almost immediately, and let's just say modesty was one of the founding members of my special little club. Also, never have I ever met someone who got so insanely antsy about people taking a smoke break during a game (Cranium).
Once that was done, all reverted to goodness. As people made their goodbyes, it basically wound down to the stag, easydiesel and Viv. Then at some stupidly early hour like 3am (I'll leave you to determine the context in which I mean early), the stag decided to sleep, and the rest of us sat, drank, smoked and chatted in the garden. Come about something like half six in the morning, we decided to take a walk. By this stage, class was provisionally accepted into the society, and was poring over the final paperwork, but only signed when we decided to keep drinking while we walked.
So, in a park, drinking, smoking, chatting and wandering, we were all pretty surprised by the other park-goers. I mean, here were these absolutely bleary-eyed twenty-somethings in a park, stooped, cigarette in one hand, can in the other (By this point, class was in the society bar, drinking itself into a stupor before it got up to belt out "I will survive" on the non-existant kareoke), but just chatting and assuming a non-threatening demeanour (I'd hope) and the passers-by would say hi in a cheery way, and we'd reply similarly, and/or fawn over the dog they were invariably walking. Sometimes they'd comment on the cans saying "I wish I was young enough to go all night like ye", but they weren't being thick about it. That actually took us aback.
Anyway, once it started looking like a scarily reasonable hour, like 9am or so, we went back to start making a ways to a shop for a breakfast roll. Instead we saw a hotel advertising a full Irish. So much better than a breakfast roll. That diet of mine lies shattered, in pieces, on the floor but it was so worth it. Our tiredness, and everything else was kicking in at the time, and we sat outside the hotel drinking either tea or coffee, nursing a cigarette (seriously, like a freaking chimney that night), continuing to have fantastic conversations while our food was being cooked.
About an hour later, we part ways, except that I walked diesel home, and we just chatted for ages. So, picture this, a bleary-eyed tranny, presumably stinking like nothing else, decided that, at noon, it was probably a good idea to walk into town and to look at the pretty colours of the city. You see, at that point, I was already entertaining the wild notion of burning through my sleepless state and getting to bed early, thereby not disrupting my sleep patterns - realism was hanging out in the old boys club, signed into the lounge by one of the regulars. I got home at about 3pm, and already wanted to sleep. So I allowed myself one and a half hours, and woke up 2 hours overtime. But I was in such a deep, comfortable slumber that it felt completely worth it, so long as I can get to bed soon.
So, overall, it was a fantastic weekend. Now, I shower, then strategically keel over.