London Parties: 1

Let’s face it the most significant events in most people’s lives are parties. Obviously there are christenings, birthdays, weddings, funerals &c. but actually I’m talking about the weekly rounds of dinner parties, house parties, nights out, parrr-taays, do you like to party? parties (nearly-naked parties in St John’s Wood, blah, blah, blah) - whatever tickles your fancy or fancies your tickle - parties. So this year R&R will attempt to convey the character of some of the parties they have the good luck to be entertained at, hoping to catch the zeitgeist of 2012 amid the urban 26ish crowd.

Well, by the grace of God, Ramping was required in his slender house to host the leaving party of a highly-favoured civil servant+1, before they set sail for the Far East. It was an international affair the said +1 being a bona fide European, and it is a mark of our times that a europhile servant of her majesty’s civil service should find himself departing for a further shore.

As befits the foreign office there was a stack of ferrero rocher and tonic for quinine (though no one drank the gin [surprise joy in the morning]), as well as plenty of wannabe ambassadors. Roaring was in her element - there was wine - and as usual she sabotaged the playlist swapping my blues for jazz, and sneaking on her own tracks. Predictably half way through the evening, full of smiles, she closed my laptop and we had the Roaring music show, as always accompanied with furious dancing.

A refreshment trip to Nicholas brought us across some locals, enjoying a rare night out also with not a few glasses of wine and raucous stories. We stopped briefly for a glass of wine with them in Pardis a beautiful new restaurant on Connaught Street before leaving them to their booze and stories of being topless in Bromley. The hangovers didn’t seem quite to have left them on Sunday.

It was a lovely night, spoiled only by the imminent departure of friends. I am left even now with the brittle taste of adventure in my mouth, a little envious but also a little fatter on my couch, having mopped up the weekend’s booze with filthy domino’s pizza. But if I was thinking a couple of weeks ago how you can tell a person by their books, how much more can you tell a person by their friends? The evening ended with dancing irish girls, spilled red wine and three times as many empty wine glasses as there had been people. Oh and someone’s bag. Who forgets their bag? Turned out it was the same son of a bitch who drank a bottle of beer I’d been saving (in penance he did bring round a jolly nice beer the next day). The supremacy of said beer was verified that night by three superior people. It actually was the best beer ever, but now it’s recycled and I can’t remember what it was called. Still life has these perfect moments and it’s hopeless trying to recover them.