Monday was a quiet day at work considering every sane person with vacation time made their weekend into a four day one. I, on the other hand, need all the vacation days I can get so I came into work which was like working at the Kapuskasing Cemetery.
The highlight of the night was to be Mike’s birthday party that evening at the Heart and Crown. Trish managed to reserve a table for twenty but they could only guarantee it if we showed up by 4PM and no one else wanted it if we didn’t have our full army of people there.
Luckily, enough people showed up by 4:30PM to ensure we had our table for the night. I showed up to see Mike sipping his beer. I brought some party hats and said “I know you won’t put one on now, but I assure you by night’s end, you’ll have enough peer pressure and maybe a little beer pressure in you to put it on.” Little did I know, this would become the catalyst of a turn of events later on in the night.
The crew showed up and fun times were had by all. It had been awhile since I had seen a few people as school and a trip out West had gotten the best of me. I heard interesting news bits about Holly and Alex, Duncan and an old roommate of mine. Of course, I have no idea if the news I heard is to be public so you’ll have to go talk to them if you want to know anything about them.
Vero’s cousin Melissa showed up with no Vero or Anne-Marie in sight so she was relieved to see me sitting at the table as she knew no one else. Vero and Anne-Marie eventually showed up looking more beautiful than ever and they ordered some dinner. Unfortunately for me, I was unaware that they had ordered dinner already and I had been waiting for them to order my meal so when there’s came I noticed a nice piece of fish on Mike’s plate that I ate. I also nabbed some fries from Vero’s plate and Carrie supplied me with some Thai noodles. In the end, that filled me up enough for the night!
Poor Mike had to deal with the onslaught of shots being bought for him on his birthday. I personally cannot stand shots but I think he takes them in stride. He didn’t appreciate the one with tequila though!
Good times were had by all and by 9PM we were asked to move our table out of the way of the dance floor where a U2 cover band would be playing that night. Where did the bands of yesteryear go to? Where was Fortune’s Hand or Shaydid? I found it an odd choice of a band for the night for their Pre-Canada Day Bash. They were a good band but to only play U2 songs was an odd mix for people out wanting to hear a variety of songs. I also had this fear that the singer would go into a Bono-ized political rant and Trish and Mike would have left the place.
Unfortunately, for me, I have this tendency to be very generous with my money at the bar when a few beer have hit me. I ended up spending all my money on getting drinks for others and I really have to look at myself and stop myself from doing it. It’s fine to be nice to a friend and buy them a beer, but that doesn’t have to happen all night long.
Also unfortunately for me, I was wearing a party hat. We managed to convince Mike to wear one later on in the night and there were a bunch of us with them on. After the first set of the U2 cover band I was coming off the dance floor and the bouncer comes up to me and says “We’re going to have to ask you to leave.” I was confused by this considering I had had my fair share of beer but wasn’t inebriated to the point where I was a nuisance to anyone. Not wanting to make a scene after asking him “Why?” I simply said “Very well.” and told Mike that I was being asked to leave. Mike had a chat with him and it turns out that he specifically said that “our party hats made us a target for getting kicked out.” So I don’t really know what this entirely means…does this mean that if we would have not worn the party hats for Mike’s birthday, we would have been fine to stay? Either way, Mike was so pissed off at this guy that we killed the party there and we all got up and left. May I also point out that being the most peaceful guy on Earth here, I didn’t really put up much of a fuss and the bouncer even said to me “You’re too calm with me kicking you out to NOT be drunk.” I don’t know what he was expecting with a comment like that. Did he just want me to retaliate so he can flex some muscle and have a real good reason to kick us out? I don’t know. Everyone we spoke to found it a little odd that we were being asked to leave. Ah well. In the end, I’m sure our heads thanked us for leaving the party at the hour we did. Vero drove us home and we sat up and watched some TV and then retired for the night.
Mike had a great time until then and that’s what counts. But in the end, we shouldn’t have worn those party hats! They were cursed from the beginning.
I have about 20 pages left in this book to read so I figure I can review it faithfully (unless it turns out that Eric Clapton was a woman all along and I don’t find it out until the last page).
