On the Occasion of a 40th Birthday
After work yesterday evening we broke all kinds of unwritten rules, and went out for a meal with friends at the pub -on a school night. Consequently this morning my head feels like somebody removed my brain and replaced it with cotton wool. I don't have a hangover – I just have this all pervading fog that seems to be preventing any kind of useful thought processes from going on.
As the title of the post hints, we were out to celebrate a good friend's 40th birthday. Forty years on this ball of mud, spinning around a mid-level star on the western spiral arm of a spiral galaxy we like to call the Milky Way. It's the kind of achievement that should be celebrated by eating the stodgiest plate of food you can possibly order, washed down with several pints of real ale, followed by a pudding dense enough that it should probably appear among the super heavy elements on the periodic table.
Imagine that – a periodic table of food stuffs. Up the top you're going to find the crisp-breads and puff pastries. Over to the left you'll find the reactive stuff – the baking soda, and moon dust – and then down towards the bottom you're going to find the super heavies – the sticky toffee puddings, and the russian cake.
Towards the end of the evening we became the only people left in the pub – save for one very drunk scotsman propping the bar up, and trying desperately to engage any of the girls in conversation whenever they visited the ladies. Before we knew it, he was standing at the edge of our table, telling a long and meandering joke dressed up as a story. Unfortunately I can't remember any of it because I was laughing too much – mostly because everybody else was laughing. We weren't necessarily laughingat him – more laughing at his enthusiastic delivery of the story. When he finally got to the punchline there was a pregnant pause.
“You all want me to f*ck off, don't you”
Before I could say it, almost everybody shouted “Yes!”, and fell about laughing again.