Shoes, pharaohs, tea and graves

Last Saturday marked the third of the Plurk meetups, and was probably the drunkest one yet - at least for Laura and I, who started tippling at about 3 o'clock in the afternoon and were still going 12 hours later.

Which, of course, meant we were terribly late to meet Loaf, Roxette and Johan (it's just rude to leave a vodka half-done) and were of absolutely no help in putting together the picnic in Tesco, mostly because we were more interested in chasing Rox around the aisles and finding the Bacardi Breezers. How we didn't get thrown out for hooliganism I shall never know.


Which sentiment carried us right through the evening. We had a lovely picnic, thankfully rescued by Loaf's cunning provision of a blanket and the more sensible shopping habits of everyone else (I think we ended up with 80 miniature sausages, mind you), tried not to steal rainbow socks from a tramp, annoyed the pub whose loo we kept staggering into and screeched a lot.

At one point Laura asked me a perfectly sane question about, as I recall, which pub we were planning to go to, at which I turned round and repeated, very earnestly, the last three words I'd said to Loaf, which were something like "and the cat". Which made no sense, was of no help and made me laugh so hard I dribbled.



We then went to The Lot, now accompanied by Danni (hurrah!), a student pub where the toilets are at the top of the most viciously steep staircase I've ever seen - and yes, we fell up them repeatedly.

Much rose wine was flung around the place, I managed to break my glow-in-the-dark bracelet and infect myself with radioactive liquid and Laura began a series of bag checks that was to continue all night long. It went something like this: "Cardigan (which later for no apparent reason changed to 'tights' even though it wasn't), wallet, wipes and phone. OK I've checked I have everything, now what I would like to do is check that I've got everything."

The more sensible members of the group at this point headed off to catch their various public transports, amid much hugging and genuine sorrow (I believe I actually begged Rox and Loaf to stay at one point, for shame). Meanwhile, Laura and I decided it would be a fantastic plan to talk like toffs all the way to the club ("oh BLOODY hell yes, I don't half think SO").

Once at the club, having queued up by basically propping one another up and grinning like lunatics, Laura managed to bottle an innocent dancing woman, I attracted the attention of a weirdo in a loud shirt who wanted to tell me I was doing well (gee thanks) and we danced for hours, clutching Smirnoff Ices.


You know that one guy in every club who's such a fantastic, flamboyant dancer that everyone half-watches him and backs away to give him space? He's always gorgeous and he's always dripping with inner confidence and charm and really enjoying himself, not giving a monkeys what everyone else thinks. Well, the one in this club decided he wanted to dance with me, and proceeded to fling and spin me round what wasn't really part of the dancefloor.

Now, I can't say I minded this, because fortunately he had strong hands and was good at guiding my drunken self in rather more elegant ways than I was managing for myself. In fact, I was somewhat euphoric as he twirled and shimmied me around, until a salsa came on and I was almost sick on his shoes.

We lurched out of the club and had a little sit on the doorstep, where a bouncer told Laura off for talking too loudly about making a nice cup of tea, and I went into the shop to get some water and was asked to confirm for some bloke that his friend had a head like a bell-end.

Which is where the guys we'd met inside found us, and spent some considerable time trying to convince us to go back to theirs for piri piri chicken (at which I believe Laura's response was "piriwhatsit what? but we've got a CHEESECAKE") before giving in and escorting us home. Barefoot, in Laura's case, while checking her belongings every 25 seconds. Note: she had them all.

Once home, I made a cup of tea that Laura denied she knew about... while drinking it. And I brought her a slice of cheesecake, which she threw at the poor man's crotch and then shouted "I can't eat that now, it's COCK CAKE".

At around 5am the most classic drunken sentence of all time was uttered, one that sends me into fits of giggles every single time I think about it. Laura looked at me, perfectly serenely, and said:

"I will stay with you forever, but only if you will supply me with shoes, pharaohs, tea and graves."

A prize for the person who works out what the hell she meant, because we really don't know.

My god did we feel rough the next day, but we still managed to make it round the Tutenkhamun exhibition with Ollie without vomiting on any ancient artifacts, which would have been a bit rude. Which spawned another classic from Laura, upon spotting one of a reported 25 model boats found in the tomb:

"25? Who kept putting them in?? Surely it would have been better to have one boat, and a boat repair kit. Voila."

All in all, a weekend I won't be forgetting in a hurry! Thanks to Johan for the pics, but not to Laura for refusing to feature in any of them :P