The Host

  You semi-forget the event is in your diary, until a week before having received a number of texts saying “what can I bring?”...”really looking forward...”, you leap off your feet and get your arse into gear. Cleaning,gardening, preparing the shopping list, then realising there are more guests than originally thought, and so preparing a second shopping list...and a third...worrying who you haven't invited, numbers, the WEATHER (particularly for my English readers), its all on the mind.

  The day before you frantically work, clean, polish, sweep, in order to enable a slight lay-in for the big day, so that you are fully ready for the party...midnight strikes and you have just about finished. You think it is all done, you think you can be chilled the next morning before the guests arrive, leisurely get prepared with little left to do, but NO. RUSH RUSH RUSH. The weather has failed you. What can you do now that wont get mouldy before the guests arrive? What do you need to do full stop? Too much to do, or is there? No, I think you're all done, everything set....OH LORDY, you're still in your pyjamas!! In five minutes you are miraculously ready. Looking half like a scarecrow who has been dragged through a field backwards and half OK, you sit down. Annnnnd breathe...

  The guests arrive, bringing all sorts of wondrous concoctions... that all require space in the fridge, THERE IS NO ROOM IN THE FIRDGE, cook a pizza to make space, BURN THAT PIZZA! The rain pours, but then the sun comes out, all the while you are lobbing a whole lot of wine down your neck. The phrase “Who wants a drink” turns into “whosh wantssaaa drinkisik”, utter “gobledy gook”, as the afternoon becomes evening, your hospitality lessens as the drunkenness increases. You are a lady and you look into your hand to find a can of Ale, you're a man and there is a cartoon of Blackcurrant ,and you look to your children who are pouring themselves a Gin and Tonic, what is going on?! The “one for the road”'s started about three hours ago, and still the phrase is being repeated over and over, until the last few guests stumble out of your gate. You sit down having had a splendid time, and you wonder why your garden is spinning, bed time calls, the clearing up can wait until morning.

  The bottle bank goes 'clink' 'clink' 'clink'- it is heard in the next village, town, city! The smell of beer makes you dizzy and the sight of the number of wine bottles consumed is just vile. The only pleasure is the left over desserts in the fridge.

  Aaaaaand sleep.....
(Not that this, in any way, shape or form, is written from past experience, AT ALL!)