411: A Head

Brian Whelan depicted an angel and a devil drinking poitín. 

The weekend brought with it two sore heads: both mine. These were self-inflicted, not by cracking coconuts or by challenging a masonry drill to ten rounds of Thai boxing (you know, the usual ways one hurts one's head), but by imbibing drinking ethanol to euphoria-inducing quantities. Weekends are precious beautiful things; perfect little slices of freedom. They are delicate, fleeting and rare these days. The Man that employs you no longer holds the two day weekend to the high regard he should. He is ready, willing and able to steal it; make you work through it, break it down into single days to be taken at random intervals. My day job is in retail, and has been on and off for many years. Every retail job I've had has been provided by vicious weekend-stealing mentalpaths. But now I have that sacred privilege: the Monday-Friday retail job – who knew there was such a thing? So spend those weekends wisely, kids, cos you may not always have them.

Chorlton provided Friday night's play ground. I live close by and it turns out to be a pretty nice place, despite it's reputation as being a home for pretentious arseholes (pretentious, watashi desu ka). Whiskey is my friend. There was people to, but mainly whiskey – and dancing. My fiancee, bless her, attempted to teach me some very basic steps. See, when I dance (which is painfully too often, but thankfully pretty rare) I sort of move my arms a bit, and maybe click my fingers if I'm feeling especially saucy, but I never move my feet. The very though of doing a dance in which my feet move terrifies me; I just can't comprehend how it would be done. She managed to get me moving side to side in some sort of cha cha cha or the like, and I discovered the cliche about stepping on toes is, as is often the case with chiches, true. I giggled with glee at my own ability to stumble awkwardly; if she could have stuck my dance on the fridge and given me a gold star sticker, she would have done.

Sunday we played host to a party (which took place in the afternoon and early evening, as opposed to evening and night time) to celebrate/commemorate our friends leaving (possibly) permanently to Tanzania. We cooked all sorts of curries, saag aloo, Punjabi masala lamb ribs, chicken legs, and a bunch of other sides, dips and salads. Got in some beers, and stuffed about twenty people into our tiny little flat, which has no real living room, just a sort of square hallway with a sofa and some chairs in it. The heat from having the gas oven and hobs on all day, and a house full of people was too much. We had intended to have a barbecue but the rains came. I wanted to stick burgers in the grill but the thought of bringing more fire into the flat was too much for some people. Burgers were off until the flat was nearly empty. Thanks to every one who came, it was a great day, must do it again some time. Fell asleep with a hangover and slept for almost twelve hours. Woke with a bit of a head on.

Neck Face