The Party

It should be noted that I have a lot of fear and admiration for my tutor. It's the ultimate intellectual crush.

I quake in fear of her. I start to shake and sweat a little and I just want her to love me. I imagine myself to be a newly house-trained puppy on speed around her. You know, the big eyes, that willingness to please, and the shaking from fighting the urge to jump up and down and shout things like, 'Look at me! I love you! Will you love me?! Look! Squirrel!!'

Maybe not the 'Look! Squirrel!!' part.

Maybe.

This being said, at the end of semester party when she turned up I had to down about 3 glasses of bubbly before feeling cavalier enough to walk up and join the throng of my laughing classmates surrounding her.

We are all but moths to her flame.

(See?! I DO live in awe of her!)

Halfway through a very engrossing story about Tutor's personal life, one of my classmates pointed at a group students from another program sat on the ground with at least 7 wine bottles and 7 champagne bottles amongst them, so, 2 per person. Tutor was quick off the mark with, 'Ah yes, poor dears, drinking away their inheritance. No future for the lot of them.'

I started to laugh, maniacally, crying a little even...(yes, I am embarrassed for myself), and pushed out this:

'Omigodthatwassoamazingyoujustvalidatedmyentireexperiencehere.'

I'd like to say that either no one heard and was still laughing at the comment Tutor had made or that they thought what I said was funny in and of itself...but that's unlikely. People probably were laughing at me. Tutor was laughing. It may have been the first time she's ever experienced my hero worship untempered by good manners and sobriety.

I'm working with her on my dissertation all summer.

That's shaping up to be an interesting dynamic.

A little later Cocker Spaniel, Golden Retriever and I made our way to Dirty Martini in Covent Garden for the post-party party. I'll be honest, I picked my drinks based on what the bartenders stuck on them as garnish. First I went for pretty: a pansy in my martini. Then I went for fruity: sliced apples in my martini...

Luckily Cocker Spaniel saw the downward spiral of too much drink starting and mouthed 'Time to go?'

And it's a good thing she did. Who knows what I would have done to get martini garnishes? I think in favour of saving time, effort and money I would have gone for distract and grab. I would have found someone with a chocolate swizzle in their martini and said, 'Look! Mick Jagger and Cap'n Crunch are having a duel in the corner!' Then off I would have scurried with their chocolate swizzle in search of some salty olives in someone else's drink to counteract the sweets. God knows how many other rock stars I can pit against cereal box characters to get my hands on garnishes.

Tony the Tiger could so fuck up Lady Gaga's shit.

Cocker Spaniel didn't have to try too hard to get me out of the bar after I grabbed my phone saying, 'I just need to make one call. Wow, where'd all this blood come from? Who is bleeding on my phone?! It's on my dress too? Who is doing this?'

Turns out it was me. And I'd somehow managed to cut the top of my thumb.

It's still not better.

But Cocker Spaniel came back to mine to make sure that the downward spiral didn't go any further than the two of us eating half a chocolate mousse tart and drinking lots of tea.

As The Beatles (who would definitely take out Toucan Sam in a fight) once said, 'I get by with a little help from my friends.'