birthday parties, girly nights and refugee benefits

I had planned to have a quiet weekend. As of Thursday morning, I only had one thing on last weekend, and that was a birthday dinner on Friday night. But by Friday lunchtime, my weekend was completely booked up.

Friday

The Nymph organised drinks and dinner for us all to join her in celebrating her birthday. I was only going to go for dinner since the drinks were in a pub that I loathe, but I decided that it was petty of me to do that, so I rocked on up only 15 minutes late. Unfortunately, she was nearly 45 minutes late. Not a good start to the night, since this meant that I was sitting on my own in a pub I hate and drinking way too much to stave off the inevitable uncomfortable feeling I get by being on my own in a "meat market" style pub. Add to this that I was still very tired from Thursday night... well, I'm sure you can see where this is heading.

I got completely smashed. As in there are parts of the evening that are decidedly hazy for me completely smashed. I don't think I've been that drunk since I was in my early 20's. When I finally got home at about midnight, after many many beers, I fell asleep fully clothed, including my shoes and glasses. Now that is very drunk. And probably also very tired. But I suspect the very drunk had a lot more to do with it.

But I had fun. It was a good night once everyone else arrived and I chatted mostly to The Nymph's sister, her boyfriend, her ex-flatmate, and some girl who I met at dinner (I have no idea where she fit in and I can't remember her name for the life of me). I probably made a complete fool of myself. But I had fun.

Saturday

And the following day, I suffered the consequences. I was very hungover in that pounding headache sort of a way, not in the "I can't face food" sort of a way. So I ate greasy eggs on toast for breakfast, greasy chips for lunch, drank about 2 litres of water, ate an entire packet of lollies to negate the greasy taste and generally felt a lot better by 5pm (after moping around the house whimpering all day - it's times like these that I think that Markham has the right idea).

The Law Student came around for a girly night that night. We did the Thai take-away and DVD thing. We both wanted a quiet night and neither of us drank anything, so my body did have the chance to adjust a little. We watched The Notebook, which I had seen before, but thoroughly enjoyed again. Ryan Gosling is quite the hottie - especially with that beard.

Sunday

I was supposed to have lunch with TBF and TBFH on Sunday, but I got a call from TBFH Sunday morning to say they were both down with a tummy wog and would have to cancel. I little disappointing, since I was looking forward to catching up with them both. I've seen TBF for lunch a couple of times, but haven't caught up with TBFH in ages, or played with the child.

And then Sunday night, I went to the Refugee Benefit gig at The Troubadour with the girl I met up with last weekend that I hadn't seen in years (I'm going to have to make up a name for her and add her to the Cast of Characters since I think we're going to be hitting the town together a lot from now on, since she's one of the few friends I have who are single and I'm one of the few that she has - that can be her name, The Single Friend, TSF for short). The gig must have started really early since we missed the first couple of acts, but we did see 8-Ball Aitken, Aaron Hopper from Stringmansassy, Guy Webster, and another guy who I never figured out who he was.

8-ball Aitken is a very strange looking man. The fact that he arrived in a fluorescent green caftan didn't help that. But he's bloody good at what he does and what he does is steel-guitar country/blues. There's a specific name for it. I can't think of what it is right now. I may amend this post later if I do. Anyway, his style of music wasn't entirely to my taste, but I did enjoy his set.

I was pretty keen to see Aaron Hopper since I quite like his work with Stringmansassy, but have always found the vocal warblings of the chick (Casey?) a little annoying and very distracting. I like his solo work better. His songs have a sense of humour, he has a lovely voice, and his guitar work matches what he does with Stringmansassy. I'd go see him again. I'd probably buy his CD as well.

Guy Webster is just brilliant. You'll see from my side-bar that he's one of my favourite artists and I've never seen the man do a bad gig. He puts so much passion into his songs that they almost make me feel self-conscious for him. But I keep on going back. Love the man's work.

Throw in a couple of dates and that was basically my weekend. So much for a quiet one huh?

Listening to: Tylea - Colour Your Insecurities (the Light Album)