Headlines
Dinner Party Disasters
14th March 2008
Tesco’s, the place of accidental reunions. Whether you’re spotted by a drab dressed godmother, far past their sell-by date, or an old probably purposely forgotten school friend, you will recognise somebody you know.
Normally people find me hovering around the chocolate section, or scouring the gins and vodkas, finding the best and cheapest bottle to be my friend for the night, but today was different. For the first time ever, I was sharing my thoughts with the highest quality salmons and smoked haddocks as I had thrown myself in at the deep end.
Oh yes, I had enthusiastically volunteered to hold a dinner party at my place. I wasn’t too worried about the cost, or even who I invited; I was much more concerned about my cooking skills, and whether my guests would leave the party alive.
A few near deaths, and a puff of strange coloured smoke later, I arrived home, in my antique road-mobile, with all my carefully chosen ingredients. Time check – OK, two o’clock, time for a post-luncheon drink to help me along my way...nobody saw, so no ‘alcoholic’ judgements made.
Right, potato salad. Half an hour’s hard graft left me with mushy potatoes and no gin and tonic left. Disaster.
After wrongly marinating the salmon and narrowly missing almost all my fingers with a nine inch kitchen knife, I had managed to prepare everything. Feeling a little stressed, I turned on the up-to-date beats of Radio 1. Before I knew it, I was throwing myself around the kitchen, making strange rigid movements (due to back problems) that slightly resembled 80’s ‘disco bop’. After pulling almost every muscle in my body, I decided to choose the most sensible alcohol for the night. You see, all my friends are ‘those types of friends’, almost guaranteed to be staggering, if not falling, out of my front door, hailing the nearest taxi, and in most extreme situations, lying in hospital waiting for a their stomach to be pumped! You get the picture. So my role is to choose the alcohol that gives you the ‘happiest hangover’, which involves mild rather than splitting headaches and not throwing up. So out come the gin and wine, and au revoir to the vodka.
Nearing seven o’clock now, and they will be arriving soon, time to focus on me. After changing my earrings, putting my hair up, and a quick spray of my trusty Dior, I am ready and raring to go.
First knock at the door and the party is officially open. Three hours later and all seven friends are shakily clasping their wine glasses, with flushed red faces and slurring at me all sorts of nonsense, about how my meal was spectacularly delicious. How kind.
The next stage for me, as the responsible adult, although feeling a little bit wobbly myself, was to remove these almost paralysed humans onto the sofas, where they could all happily slump in front of Bridget Jones, and complain about their failing love lives for the rest of the night… lucky me.
Emily Pryor