Friday, May 23, 2008

Peter's Party

On Tuesday I drove all the way to Brighton for Peter's 50th birthday do. It was a sunny, beautiful evening and I caught a brief spell looking at the sea from the beach in Hove; the sea was the most incredible shade of greeny blue, or bluey green, and looked like liquid jade.
It was a Hawaiian themed party, to which I turned up in my 1960s drip-dry red and green tartan dress. Aw shucks, just call it style and look the other way. Peter was buzzing; he'd been given a ukelele and some more extraordinary gifts, including a pottery mug that looked like it had Easter Island heads on it. People had fake leis festooned around their necks and the bar was decorated in true Tiki style- a bit like the Beat Route in Soho used to be, though probably more fireproof! Blow me if Nick Pearson wasn't there, he of the 'Frighteners' that featured in Shingles magazine back in 1979, little poems you could order from him to send to a friend, anonymously. There was a rockabilly band, rockabillying away and looking painfully stylish, and lots of excited chatter, partly from me, I have to say. Alas, fearing the coach turning into a pumpkin on the strike of twelve, I sped back home just as the joint started jumping, a bushel of loud shirts screaming at each other as I left. Worth the journey? Well worth it. Happy Birthday Peter, many happy returns!

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