Before that though, we went out for lunch in Nottingham. The Stage was our venue, and I was impressed to see that they were still fully decorated for Christmas. I opted for the full English breakfast, as I had only just woken up about an hour before. To be honest, and as something of a connoisseur of the fry up, I wasn't overly impressed. The bacon had been grilled rather than fried, and I had to make the choice between beans or tomatoes, when I'd prefer to have the two together. Asking for both causes confusion and confrontation, and the feeling that you might as well have asked the staff if you can take a shit in one of their shoes. At least I'd eaten something before going out tonight.
It was also pleasing to see that the Market Square's Christmas Wonderland was still playing Christmas tunes on the last day of the year. On the other hand, the monkey in the window of Gordon Scott had been stripped of his Santa suit. At least he has finally starting swinging around his bar again after being still since his relocation.
(None of the above paragraph will make any sense to people outside of Nottingham, it isn't a a real monkey by the way).
I had a little sleep on the sofa before we went out, I hadn't planned to but fell asleep while watching the television as Mandi got ready. The next thing I remembered was Mandi waking me up at seven o'clock. Two cups of tea and a shower did very little to wake me up, but the walk to the party did the trick. My (not really cousin, she's my dad's cousin but I refer to her a my cousin) cousin Pat and her husband Alan were hosting at their house. They normally have a gathering during Christmas week, but had decided to do New Year's Eve this year. It is always nice to see everyone who I only ever see at this house, as a family we spend most of our time promising to 'do this more often' but rarely do. By doing it more often, I of course mean meeting up socially, having more than one New Year's party a year would be mental.
Most of the guests were on a house party circuit, so by about half past ten the numbers were down. We were left with Mandi and myself, my dad, Pat, Alan, their son Daniel and his mate, and Pat's daughter Bek and her boyfriend Ben. We had a game of Articulate, which was thoroughly entertaining and a little heated. I, without wishing to sound grand, was brilliant at this game and took it a little too seriously. In a slight against the timer panic, I tried to pass Roger Daltry off as a James Bond actor, I was trying to shout the names of Roger Moore and Timothy Dalton, although who's to say that Roger Daltrey wouldn't have been a good Bond?
Their house is in a new build estate, which I'm not usually a fan of. However, the architects attempted to bring in a little old fashioned community by placing a circus in the middle of the houses. I mean circus in the round open space of grass sense, not in the clowns and acrobats sense. At midnight, one of the neighbours came out and played the bagpipes and we all went out to see him, another neighbour let off a load of fireworks. This made me fall in love with the area even more, although in reality they probably only meet up like this once a year. Things went a little downhill when one of the neighbours started talking to us about street lights and potholes. He came back to the house to complain about stuff some more, and I made a mental note to remember to call on his services next time I have a party that needs killing.
We woke up at half past twelve this morning, and got ready to go to my dad's house for a New Year's Day buffet. My own highlight of any New Year's Day is of course Mary Poppins. This has to be my second favourite film of all time, (The Blues Brothers being the first), and never fails to delight. It occurred to me for the first time ever, prompted by Mandi's suggestion that they should make a Mary Poppins Christmas film, that essentially the plot is that of a traditional Christmas film. George Banks is a detached father who doesn't understand his children, along comes the magic character who shows him the error of his ways and he becomes a dad, as opposed to a mere father, after losing the job that had taken up all of his attention. The kite flying finale was basically Christmas Eve, thus you have all of the ingredients of a Christmas tear-jerker.
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