By the time I 'woke up' on Friday (ie after my fortnightly coffee kicked in), it was lunchtime on my editor's last day. So of course there was champagne. After a laughable couple of hours during which a significant minority of us genuinely attempted to do some work, we went to the Glenmore Hotel at The Rocks, which is a shabby rooftop pub with a million dollar view.
There, we praised my outgoing editor, drank some more and ordered food. This is where the night gets a bit blurry for me. Earlier in the afternoon my editor and I were talking about one of the ring-ins - a friend of one of our sales staff - who was happily knocking back the booze my boss was providing. We both thought that was a bit much, tagging along to an event you didn't have much to do with AND drinking on his generosity. She said she didn't even like it when ex-employees came to these sorts of things and drank on the boss' money but understood it better than a complete stranger doing it.
Anyway, we had ordered two bowls of chips, nachos and a plate of bread and dip but half an hour later it still hadn't arrived. One of my workmates went and asked the bar staff about it and they apologised saying that their computer system had gone down and the order may not have reached the kitchen. So we were sitting at our table and the food arrived and a bunch of us started tucking in.
I was talking to Amanda, one of the designers, and I heard someone to the left of me say "my nachos" and I kind of laughed and said "your nachos" as if it was a joke (like "I'm so hungry, these nachos in front of me are mine"). When I next looked in that direction, the person who said it was looking daggers in my direction. She was an ex-employee named Anna who I didn't know (she hadn't worked at Loyalty since I've been there but has come in to say 'hi' from time to time). Turns out they were her nachos, she'd ordered and paid for them and she didn't appreciate me insinuating that she was taking posession of something that wasn't hers.
So I apologised and explained that I thought she was joking because of the nachos we'd ordered (which, I might add, hadn't arrived in the lot that we had since decimated) and congratulated her for being scrupulous. But she wouldn't let it go. She spoke very curtly and said something like 'I buy my own food and I buy my own drinks. You're welcome to have some of my nachos if you want, but don't say they're not my nachos under your breath as if I'm taking them from you'.
I had two problems with this. First of all, I DO NOT speak 'under my breath'. Anyone who knows me knows that I have a very loud voice and if anything, when drunk, I get louder. Besides which, anything I say, I mean to be heard. Second of all, I'd already apologised directly AND explained that I'd made a mistake and why. Amanda and I then exchanged a look as if to say 'what the hell is she on about?' and fortunately more ex-workmates dropped by and I went to greet them.
Seriously though, I've just spent three paragraphs on this, why the hell does this kind of thing haunt me? Am I just afraid that people will think I'm cruel or snide or something? And why does SHE matter? I'm probably never going to see her again. Sigh.
Shortly after chatting to a couple of the new arrivals I had to make my exit and head to The Royal George where Gloria was having her birthday cum end-of-exams (chartered accountancy) drinks. I was wearing boots and I'd put the gel inserts under the balls of my feet so the end of the night wouldn't be painful. One of them had slipped under the arch of my foot so I sat down, took off my boot and rearranged it but when zipping myself back up, my hand caught on a sharp bit on the zipper and started dripping blood, which wasn't very elegant.
When I finally found The Royal George (it was on the other side of the road to where I thought it was), I had to ball my hand into a fist to prevent the bouncers seeing all the blood. Gloria was in good spirits and I bought a drink so I could be in good spirits too (the nacho thing followed by the zipper thing was a double blow) as well as ice my hand. What do you know, alcohol works!
The following I remember clearly: almost forgetting my jacket until someone rescued it for me, going across the road with the intent to enter Bar 333 but instead inexplicably ordering a cinnamon fun bun from Krispy Kreme (for the record: I hate that stuff, too much sugar) then dropping said fun bun (thankfully in a paper bag) between the counter and the ice cream fridge. Gloria's friend Andrew rescued it for me. I later paid my thanks by shredding the cigarette he tried to get Gloria to smoke outside (Gloria doesn't smoke but he gave her another one and she smoked it and got headspins - I ask, is there nothing that girl won't do when she's drunk?).
We eventually made it inside Bar 333, which is where we lost half our crew. I suggested Jager Bombs so the seven of us who were there got Jager Bombs (three of us went thirds) and then we went upstairs because we heard there was a dance floor and found the others commandeering a congregation of sofas in the middle of the room.
I remember drinking an Asahi beer (more expensive, would you believe, than the Jager Bomb) and shout/chatting to Andrew's friend Michael, 'the crazy Russian' who didn't seem crazy or Russian at all (but reportedly spoke Russian). Then I hit the dance floor with Gloria for about half an hour and then I needed to go to the bathroom (bizarrely there were people in front of the door stamping our wrists?) and then I needed to drink something non-alcoholic so went back and sat with the crowd.
Andrew's friend Chetan started taking photos of me, which I thought was strange because I felt trashed so I kept trying funny poses. Before he went he asked me for my number and he texted me yesterday so the photos mustn't have been that bad. (Oh yes, dr witmol is going on a date - gelato on Wednesday night).
Then five of us decided we wanted to go to karaoke (the lame ones went home or whatever) so we stumbled down to Echo Point and had an hour there. Gloria was pretty good, Michael was pretty bad, Gloria's friends Danielle and Evelyn didn't really try at all and I was okay but unable to find the rhythm to any song that I didn't choose.
By the time we spilled out onto the street it was 2am and I'd just missed the night ride bus so decided to use my last $20 to catch a taxi instead of wait for another hour. I don't know what happened to the rest of them. I may have just walked away.
I woke up too soon to go to the zoo (I walked to Neutral Bay to catch a bus). Not only was my pass about to expire, I found out Sarah's friend Diane worked there and she offered to do a private tour for a bunch of us (Sarah's friend Siv and fiance Ray, Di's cousin and his squeeze). She worked in the Australia mammals section but started us off in the education centre with a snake and a lizard, then moved onto bilbies and potoroos, an emu, echidna and a quokka. She also got us tickets to the Giraffe Encounter before she had to traipse off to her shift as tour host.
Siv, Ray and I wandered around for a bit. We saw the bird show (which I'd seen a few weeks ago but this time with Leslie, the condor) and then I split from them to go and see the condor enclosure (I sponsor them, so I felt we needed to spend some quality time 'together'). The Giraffe Encounter involved feeding carrots to four clamouring giraffes and then taking a photo with the matriarch (left). It was fun, even though my hands did get covered in giraffe slobber.The gorilla feeding followed shortly after, then there was a period where I kind of wandered around a bit, and I found the tree shrews (they'd been moved from the top to a cool aviary-like enclosure near the bottom). I went up to see the reptile house before collecting my giraffe pic (the one above is a photo of the photo taken by the Taronga photographer) and I met up with Siv and Ray again and they offered me a lift to Neutral Bay.
Earth Hour consisted of me turning off all the lights and everything except the fridge off at the wall and promptly falling asleep on the couch.
Today I had yum cha with my parents, Rachel and Anton, did a bit of shopping for unexciting things like socks (though spent half an hour in Mr Vitamins sniffing all the essential oils and trying all the natural moisturisers). And I have no idea why this entry has taken about four hours to write. Quite possibly far slower than I thought today. And now to bed...
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