No photos at the moment because everyone is recovering from a hangover. What a New Year's Eve that was. Hubbie said 'it's fancy dress' - so we dressed up as surfer dudes and Helene as a Russian spy. What Grania meant it is 'dress fancily'. As most of the other guests had been drinking most of the day they didn't much notice but I am sure when they peruse their various selections of photos they will wonder who the heck those strangely dressed people with wigs on were.
We were welcomed in with champagne and smoked salmon on home-made bread (thank you Clive). I can't remember much of what happened between that and supper time because by then I had imbibed champagne, whiskey, white wine, red wine and then supper arrived. Clive yet again produced a feast - roast rib of beeef, brussels sprouts, roast potatoes, peas (which I always manage to flick everywhere) horseradish, mustard followed by mince pies, cream and caramalised oranges.
It was a spiffing time - rather like being back at the UN - the countries represented around the table were (in no particular order), Canada, USA (New England and Mid-West), Hong Kong, Ireland, Eire, Scotland, The Netherlands. Also the most of the 23 of us had some expertise in the medical field - from surgeons to operations managers, yoga teachers to therapists, from pharmaceutical field researchers (unfortunately he had no samples with him) to physiotherapists. If you had to go to hospital anywhere in the vicinity of Chelsea that evening then hard luck!
There was one architect and a chartered surveyor come battle field tour guide. We then played two games of Murder which was quite spooky in such a large house with an abundance of cupboards, heavy curtains and huge four poster beds. I armed myself in the kitchen with an oven glove and a roll of cling film hoping that someone would not creep up behind me and tap me on the shoulder.
Then came midnight and more champagne and then a surge into the garden to howl at the most beautiful of full moons. Clive, by then, was absolutely rat-arsed, I broke a chair, Piper almost broke his toe on a bed leg, someone broke a beautiful blue slate fireplace and someone else trod in dog poop in the garden and was trailing it around the house.
To end - Clive just before midnight said a wonderful thing to us all 'may your 2010 be as happy and as good as this moment in 2009' and then fell head first into the whipped cream. Happy New Year!
