Party fears two

Are parties any good?

As far as gatherings of lots of different people go, they're OK. There's some sort of common denominator that means all the guests should be relatively safe. So it's relatively OK to leave your coat unattended (but not your cans of pop or bottles of booze) without fear of anything going missing from the pockets.

But there are always worries about going out to that sort of thing: who'll be there; what time do I get there; what time can I leave; will there be food; will the toilet paper run out; is there a toilet; will I end up in a fight?

Of course, the apprehensions about partying in our thirties are a lot different to how they were in our late teens and early twenties.

• Food was never a worry because parties didn't start until the pubs closed, so you'd have had your tea and perhaps some crisps and pork scratchings to line your stomach prior to the final leg of the alcoholic onslaught. There may be some crisps.
  
• What not to wear. While other girls would spend hours choosing their outfits and getting dolled up, I would just put on whatever fit (I was having a ten year growth spurt). Jeans and a top for me.
• What do you talk about? Fuck only knows, I have no idea what sort of things we talked about back then. Probably the same shit we talk about today, only less informed/scarred by disappointment and failure.
  
• Getting off. I dreaded the idea of anybody making advances towards me, I just wasn't interested (I know why now). However, back then, as now, the last thing you wanted was to become the subject of all the gossip when you got back to college on the Monday. Fuck that. We'll talk about the mud stains on Paula Ashton's knees and the smile on her boyfriend's face instead. Or spend hours using a process of elimination to try to figure out who was having sex in the bathroom while Derys and Craig were shagging in the armchair.
  
• When to stop. You don't know when to stop drinking, so you drink until there's only the dregs of a bottle of Taboo left.
• How to get home. You tended to sleep where you dropped, or stumble to a mate's house where they'd provided a bed (and a bucket) for the night.
  

My main worries about going to parties these days are: will there be enough food; what time can I leave; should finally get round to telling these people that I'm queer?


Running buffet
Get that foil off so we can see what we've got! I love a running buffet. Essential items are:

• Chicken drumsticks
• Slices of ham and/or chicken
• Seafoody stuff - prawns, smoked salmon, tuna
• Bread rolls
• Pickles
• Sausages (on or off sticks, I'm not fussy)
• Cheese (crackers)
  
• Sausage rolls and mini pork pies
• Vol au vents (chicken & mushroom and prawn cocktail)
  
• Crisps
  
• Puddings

Would like in an ideal buffet

• A selection of fine pates, salamis and parma ham
• Continental cheeses drizzled with good olive oil (mozzarella ticolore, frexample)
• Varieties of olives
• Haywards continental mixed pickle and piccalilli
  
• Aubergine and feta involtine
• Tuna fish and onion sandwiches
• April's smoked salmon and Canadian dill pickles
  

Non-essential items

• Crudetes: high fat, high salt, that's what buffets are all about. Any fresh fruit or veg should be forgotten about, unless you want to go mad and do some garnish.
  
• Baked potatoes: nice, but not essential (and they have to be cooked to within an inch of their lives). Baked potatoes should be reserved for a different type of buffet, mixing the two constitutes unnecessary effort on the part of those preparing the feast and on the punters who have to make room to eat them.
  
• Dips: nah, they're shit
• Quiche: fuck off. Quiche is one of those things that is just a wobbly, soggy, tasteless eggy thing. Get it out of my buffet and get some vol au vents out there instead.

What time can I leave?
It's OK now that I don't drink because, unless I'm giving some pissheads a lift and I have to wait for them to finish "just another bottle of wine", I can leave when I like. Last night, I was ready to leave at 9.30 when my last can of pop had been stolen, but I stuck it out until 11.30 (quite good for me) when my contact lenses started failing dramatically. The consequence of this was that I kept blinking and winking at people and I didn't want to give anybody the wrong idea (especially the bloke who looked like a sex offender).


Out
Nah.

Of course, the good thing about being older is that I have (at last) the confidence to be such a flirt with the blokes, knowing that I've no intention of taking things further and that they can't because they're married. In fact, I flirt with everybody, but the women don't notice; too busy worrying about makeup and kids and that I reckon - nothing to do with me being crap at flirting or them being straight or owt.