Andy wasn't pleased to begin with because there were only about four of us at the start, but then, that's what happens. Dan came with a crossword, which Andy wouldn't let him do. Friends came bearing gifts which took his mind off things and there soon plenty of people to be going on with. I believe it was Bryony who made him a rather delectable Victoria sponge cake. I only bought two beers for myself - Andy's protestations notwithstanding I wasn't too keen on boozing for the third night in a row. However I made up for it in house punch and wine. I was drinking in quite a risky order I think, but I feel fine. I kept on crouching and sitting on the floor instead of getting a chair, which tends to confuse people for some reason. Barring Adam, next years 5 Cowley Bridge Road occupants were all there. That is, myself, James, Rob, Norris and Dan. Talked a bit of religion with John, but I wasn't thinking very straight. I don't think he minded though. As the evening went on, Andy did the predictable thing and got rather merry. He was hugging everybody for a while (he also sat on James' knee for a bit) and then moved on to throwing up in the toilet. No mess in there this morning. I like a man who can spew tidily. So he went off to crash at someone's house after that, as his brother Jim and his girlfriend Vic had his room for the night. Lucky old them.
I think it was after he left that the aforementioned Estate Patrol guy pitched up after receiving complaints from across the street. This was highly predictable. Andy wanted the back door open so the smokers could smoke without and also to have more room downstairs. It also afforded everyone the opportunity to shoot BB paintballs thorugh the windows and onto Andy's roof. Theoretically it would have been possible to have the music quiet enough to not annoy the neighbours, but it was never gonna happen. Especially when there was a run of The Buzzcocks, Monkees and Divinyls for everyone to chair-dance to. So we gathered everyone in, and it was suddenly a bit more crowded - no bad thing.
Someone mentioned that now Andy was gone, the party was in the very unsuitable hands of James and myself. A perturbing situation given that we didn't know that many people present. We opted for a laissez faire approach. There was a guy there who was a bit spaced out in a let's-talk-about-truth-and-the-fact-that-you're-Christians-and-that's-interesting. He remembered me from when I played harmonica for the CU, which was a very long time ago. James then proceeded to say some very nice things about my harmonica playing, which was odd. He thought he was embarassing me, but I think I must have been in a relatively prideful sort of mood, for I minded not. With the birthday boy gone things wound down until 0230 when the last guy left after a bit of persuading him to jump on a printer.
There you are. How was that? For my next trick, I'll blog the same thing as James about this morning!
