Saturday night trauma

As you might guess from the post heading, last night was a little bit traumatic for me.

Everything was going fine initially; popped over to see Sparky Ma and Pa after their holiday to Cornwall. Even with bad weather they somehow managed to get a tan - I ask you, what's that all about? I countered with my tanlines from the bike ride last week, but when Sparky Ma tans, she tans good. I looked like a half-arsed tanning spacker next to her.

So we had a lovely dinner, watched The X-Factor together as a family (somehow it's developed into a tradition), then I decided to head off. Bizarrely, as I stood on the pavement bidding Sparky Ma farewell, one of our former neighbours zoomed down the road in his car, almost hit me, waved hello, and zoomed off. It was very random.

Anyway, I got in the Sparky mobile, and decided to head to Kingston for a late coffee in Borders. So I get their, I wander in, have a look at some books, and am just about to go upstairs to Starbucks when the lights go off. "Borders is now closing," said a voice from the ether.

Huh? I thought. It usually stays open till 10. And then I saw the notice on the door: new opening times - 9am-9pm.

ARRRRGHH!!!!!! LATE NIGHT COFFEE IS NO MORE!!!!!

I literally fell to my knees beside the the top 10 bestsellers list, my hands clenched into fists, my eyes squeezed tightly closed, and screamed "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!! WHY MUST YOU TAUNT ME SO?!?!?!?!?!??!"

Then some student employee told me they were closing, and if I wanted to make any purchases could I take them to the till. I stood up, sneered at him, and departed for home.

Perhaps the only worthwhile part of the jaunt to Kingston was that I made a new friend. A pidgeon sat guard over my car while I was gone.


Anyway, with this disastrous news still ringing in my mind, I got home to find that some new neighboury people were having a party - a LOUD party - on their front lawn. Seemingly the entire female contingent of the party was made up of clones of Nikki from Big Brother; "I haven't HAD enough to DRINK!". For those unfamiliar with Nikki from Big Brother, just believe me that this is A BAD THING.

It was as I started writing my long-delayed Ambassador Soval article for the Japanese Star Trek Fact Files, that they began to sing.

And it was as they started singing a drunken rendition of Culture Club's 'Do you really want to hurt me?' that I lent back in my captain's chair, put my hands together in a Mr Burns stylee, and thought yes... yes, actually, I do...