The First Time I ...

Cherished readers and vaguely interested blog-trawlers alike,

You’ve been patient. It’s been roughly two months since my last post.

You’ve waited long enough.

I’ve chosen this glorious day, the birthday of Strictly Speaking star Andrew J Hansen, to make my return to the blogosphere. I’ve spent those two months frantically working and frantically not working but still, for some reason, not blogging. Well, that time has finished. My sabbatical is done.

And so welcome back to the Wonderful World of the Life and Times of Stranger Things.

Ah, the semester holidays. That blissful time of year between the end of one long, exhaustive, work strewn period and the beginning of the next. These holidays begin as we are freed from exams to flit, swallow-like, from the hallowed halls of our esteemed school to parties, events, disco ice-skating, film premieres, laser tagging. To unceasing celebration and congratulation, four and a half magical weeks with no major commitments and no need to so much as pick up a pen.

Unless, like me, you keep a pretty thorough diary which needs daily updates.

And if, like me, you’re an incredibly lazy person and waited until six weeks after the holidays had finished to start writing the holiday post, you’re going to be increasingly glad of this diary as it would otherwise be virtually impossible to recall incidents that passed roughly two months ago. As I only have one real style of free writing, I’ve basically just quoted directly from what I wrote at the time. I am a LAZY PERSON. You know this.

 

The most interesting thing about these particular holidays was the extraordinary amount of things I did for the first time EVER. Hence, to get this post into some semblance of order, these things are the only ones I’ll be discussing. 

  

1. The first time I went extreme laser tagging

Obviously I’ve been laser tagging before, but always with parties. You know, where everyone gets into teams and then you all finish happily at the end with pizza and cake. Not the kind where everyone’s on their own, you’re playing with no music and a group of strangers, and it basically feels like you’re involved in an actual fire fight, the difference being that when you shoot your friends they run away muttering accusations about you instead of you having to make a follow-up apologetic visit to their family bearing their corpse.

Lala, Peanut, Phoenix and I went laser tagging directly after exams. We’d all crammed spare clothes into our schoolbags along with our calculators and protractors and the moment they announced ‘You can leave the hall,’ we sprang up, leapt gleefully down to the bus stop and right on to a bus to the closer of the main shopping centres in our city. It was crowded with fellow exam-free Year 11s. Most of them hadn’t thought to bring extra clothes and so were fairly obvious. After arriving at the centre we found a public bathroom and changed out of school uniform, a subtle ploy that, as I later realised, was rendered completely pointless by the massive school logo on my bag.

We began by going to Max Brenner and eating waffles. Aviator, Giuseppe, Bob Dylan and a couple of other people were at a table across from us. Aviator came over at one point to chat to us. As one, everyone else at the table rose silently, collected their things, and slipped out the door, pausing only to motion us to be silent. They didn’t return. Aviator only noticed when an old woman noticed his schoolbag sitting alone under the now-empty table and stopped to harangue him about the importance of taking care of your possessions.

Shortly after that we headed off for Zone 3, the laser tagging place-to-be, with only minor injuries along the way (Peanut rolled her ankle in the middle of a zebra crossing and Phoenix cut her finger on the button of a traffic light. Lala had concussed herself on a cupboard the day before. Seriously. My friends are all idiots).

The first game we shared with a couple who appeared friendly until we’d been exposed to their technique of appearing behind you at inopportune moments, shooting you, and then melting away into nothing. Peanut and Lala’s team came first, then the other couple, then Phoenix and myself. The second game we played individually and Peanut more than doubled the next score down. This was a blow, as we’d been hoping her insurmountable self-confidence would prove a hindrance rather than a boon. Whenever she shot someone she’d skip away laughing.

And that, waffles and hidden violence and not so hidden confidence, was my first time at proper laser tagging.

2. The first time I hosted a Beatle birthday

Giuseppe, Marie-Clare and I have a fine tradition of making cakes to celebrate significant dates in the Beatle calendar. To anyone wishing to track these:

 

Feb 24/25 – George Harrison’s birthday (the 25^th is also the birthday of James and Oliver Phelps, the Weasley twins in Harry Potter. If you’re interested)

June 18 – Paul McCartney’s birthday

July 7 – Ringo Starr’s birthday

October 9 – John Lennon’s birthday

November 29 – George Harrison’s deathday

December 8 – John Lennon’s deathday

 

Anyway, this was the first time I’d hosted a birthday one at my house. I think my last one was George Harrison’s deathday. Anyway, I made a fairly attractive cake for Paul McCartney’s 69^th, we got together and played Beatles board games for hours before watching heaps of the films. Marie-Clare managed not to cry upon Paul’s entrance in the Concert for George but was defeated by his and Ringo’s embrace at the end. Sad. Her behaviour, I mean.

And that, cake and dramatic heart-wrenching sobs from Marie-Clare at midnight, was my first time hosting a Beatles birthday party

 

3. The first time I went to a house with a tennis court

Eggleston has a TENNIS COURT at his house. AND a swimming pool. And a grand piano. He claimed to have a library, but Aviator and myself examined this closely and in reality it’s more like a medium-sized room with three shelves of books. Tennis courts aren’t really that exciting in real life. Sure, it’s fun to play tennis in the dark at 10 o’clock at night, listening to that Hi-5 L-O-V-E song on the speakers because Eggleston’s iPod is plugged in and he likes it. For about ten minutes. It gets a little wearing after that.

 

4. The first time I hosted a blog anniversary party 

Some time over my temporary hiatus, my blog had a birthday. Happy Anniversary, Stranger Things – may it be the first of many.

To celebrate I decided to have a blog party. Not a big thing, just something casual. I spent the day beforehand organising it. The idea was that Phoenix and Peanut would come over, and we’d plan slightly (or just talk about chocolate, as it turned out), and then go into Civic to purchase supplies.

I meant to wake up at 6:30 a.m. in order to have time to prepare before my friends’ arrival. It didn’t work out quite like that. Instead I awoke at 9:21 with Peanut standing outside my bedroom door.

I got ready in record time and, when Phoenix arrived, we headed into Civic and spent the whole day buying suspiciously cheap items from Hot Dollar and these amazing chocolate bars called ‘Titan Bars’. They’re like Mars Bars, but ten times cheaper AND are far more referential to Gattaca. We also found some insanely cheap, glittery shirts, and kept them for use in the pass-the-parcel.

 

The party was on the 1^st of July and those present were Ness, Marie-Clare, Brandine, Gwen, Aviator, Falcon, Phoenix, Giuseppe, and Shoelace. Phoenix had arrived earlier to help me stick streamers up and blow up some Christmassy balloons I’d found. She was also supplied with a camera. Thanks to her photo-taking abilities in conjunction with her subtle photo-editing abilities - in replacing all of our faces with blog-related images - I'm able to supply you, the reader, with some somewhat suspect images of the event. That's me on the left, hanging streamers. I don't know if you can tell but my jumper says 'Leslie M.' on the back.

We basically just played party games, such as Beatles musical chairs or ELO pass-the parcel. That's Marie-Clare and Ness in the picture, with Shoelace partially concealed in the background. Thanks to some fairly precise rigging of the music on my part, Aviator ended up with the glittery shirt. 

That's him in the picture - bear in mind he doesn't normally have Miley Cyrus's head. Phoenix just has a bizarre sense of humour. He tried it on (the shirt, not the head), decided he didn’t want it, and left it at my place. Now I have a shirt I have no idea what to do with. If anyone wants it, tell me.

We played a game in which we had to pin the head on Andrew Hansen. In hindsight this wasn’t the greatest idea. Not only was it fairly creepy, I now have about thirty little Hansen heads scattered all over my kitchen. There's about ten on a jar of macadamia nuts. The weirdest one is the one stuck over the head of a Barbie fridge magnet.

We also had a Secret Santa thing I rather enterprisingly called Hidden Harper. Aviator wrote me a letter. I’d given Marie-Clare a bottle of clear liquid labelled ‘DANGER: CHLOROFORM’. Giuseppe was given a can of minestrone. Falcon got an interesting feathery hat Phoenix had designed for him. Aviator's wearing it in the picture, along with a fake pirate hook and the ghastly scarf I knitted for Falcon after I lost that Doctor Who bet. I can't even begin to explain why.

Shoelace had brought a pinata stick for Vyvyan, which turned out to be very convenient.

I’d spent the past couple days creating a pinata of Matt Smith’s head. Much as I loved my creation, my personal favourite part of the party was when we got to bash his head open and basically consume his brains.

I have to admit I did a killer job on the papier mache, though. The pinata stick broke before the esteemed Messr Smith was so much as dented. We had to play cricket with it before we got it to open.

Finally, we had a Mystery Auction. Phoenix and myself were the auctioneers. The deal with a mystery auction is that you give out a very vague description of the object – such as ‘It’s convenient and basically a holy object’ for a mug with Jesus’ face on it – and then let people bid on it. Obviously we had to allocate a basic kind of money for this. I designed it myself. You could kind of tell. Not many regular banks include Stephen Fry’s face on the notes. And the TARDIS was a dead giveaway.

Anyway, this part got pretty interesting. Giuseppe was delighted with the Jesus mug. Gwen got an exact copy of one of our Relay4life umbrellas. Someone got a pair of odd, fluffy socks and a rain poncho, and one of those stamps librarians use to mark the dates in the back of books. Aviator bid outrageous amounts for what turned out to be an image of the painting of the TARDIS from the final of the last series in a plastic frame.

The second he realised what it was he raged madly, and then claimed he would take it home and destroy it. Turned out he forgot about that. It’s been on my bedside table for the past three months.

Oh yeah, and that's the creepy Hansen jar.

And that, with the conclusion of my first year’s exploration into the blogosphere, was the first anniversary of Stranger Things.

There was actually something I noticed about the party several weeks on. Nobody had really wanted to take anything home, except for Giuseppe and her Jesus mug, so I hung on to most of it and chucked most of it out. Yes, Ness, I ate your chocolates. Sorry about that. Anyway, school had begun again and I was casually walking along, shivering in the early morning, when Aviator hallooed me.

‘You look pretty cold there, Leslie.’

‘It’s a cold morning.’

‘Not for me it isn’t,’ he said cheerfully, and pulled up one of his trouser legs to reveal his socks. They were pink, fluffy, and indubitably the ones from the blog party. He moved on before I could (a) comment or (b) laugh.

You can say many things about Aviator, but you can’t deny he has a certain style.

 

5. The first time I dyed my hair

I dyed my hair red. Not permanently red, just temporarily so I could figure out if I liked it or not. That was a little while ago and I’m still not sure whether to go permanent or not. Anyway, it was a relatively simple thing to do. So far as I can tell, dying your hair consists of:

(i) wash your hair. Put on those bizarre plastic gloves. Apply dye to hair. Apply dye to ears accidentally. Remove dye from ears.

(ii) chill for about an hour by reading gripping Raymond Chandler novel. I went with The Big Sleep.

(iii) wash remaining dye out of hair.

(iv) take pictures of new, coloured hair. Post on Facebook.

It only lasted three days, anyway. It had gone by the time we went disco ice skating.

 

And that, complete with the extra half an hour I accidentally spent with the dye in my hair because I’d gotten to an especially hair-raising bit in the book and didn’t want to stop, was my first time dying my hair.

 

6. The first time I went disco ice-skating

For the record: disco ice-skating is EXACTLY like regular ice-skating but with loud modern music pumped into the ring and a couple of occasional disco lights. And the ice-skating rink I go to has music anyway. Sure it was a little later than usual, and it was a Friday night, but that was basically it.

Getting there was interesting. Lala’s sister Helga was giving her, me, Aviator and Kevin a lift. Once Lala called front I was forced to cram into the back with Aviator and Kevin on either side of me. It’s not a large car. The rink was a relief.

Reedy, the virtually professional ice-skater, had organised the night. Also there were:

Hitler (also a virtual professional), Sharona, Latte, Bob Dylan, Shoelace, Ness, and Cthulu, not counting Lala, Aviator, Kevin and myself. I think that was everyone. Also Beartrap, whom I’ve barely seen (bearly seen … hilarious) since he left the school several months ago. Employment seems to be suiting him.

Actually, Eggleston was there as well, something I would’ve thought I’d find hard to forget, given a certain incident that occurred.

 

EGGLESTON (E): Leslie, you can’t just skate around the edges all night.

LESLIE (L): Why not?

E: Try coming out to where we are.

(I come out to where he is and frantically grab his arm to prevent a collapse)

E: Ok, you’re fine now.

(He lets go and skates away)

L: What? Where are you AAAARRRGH OH F***

(I fall over backwards, as may have been evident from the sudden change in dialogue)

E: Oh, sorry.

L: Can I have a hand up?

(He tries to help and then awkwardly drops me again)

L: ARE YOU KIDDING ME?

 

And that, in no real way different to my normal ice-skating experiences, was my first disco ice-skating session.

 

7. First time at a dinner party

Obviously I’ve been to dinner parties before, but it’s always been tagging along with my parents, never one of my own friends. At least until this holidays.

Ariane hosted a dinner party for a few choice acquaintances during the holidays. I’ve a sneaking suspicion she invited those she considered least likely to offend her mother’s sensibilities.

I arrived at Ariane’s house before anyone else: she’d laid the table elaborately, complete with napkins and champagne glasses. To be clear, the glasses contained sparkling apple juice. But they looked effective. The others all arrived in the next half an hour.

It was a fairly posh occasion. Both Aviator and Ram, the only boys, were wearing bow ties and suits. I’d opted for my semi-formal dress as it’s the only remotely dressy thing I own. It was topped off neatly by a weird, spiky necklace I made when I was nine and spent two years unsuccessfully trying to palm off on to people.

The guests were Brandine, Peanut – the first time I’d seen her since she’d returned from Melbourne – Marie-Clare, Hitler, Aviator and Ram. There were three complete courses. Little tomato-and-feta pastry squares, then chicken (despite the fact that Ariane herself is a vegetarian), and, finally, tiramisu. I’d never been to a dinner party like that before, with just my friends, but I certainly hope to again. They’re a classy lot. The conversation wasn’t memorable enough that I can recall anything we talked about, except for Aviator giving an intriguing example of ‘grippening’ on Hitler, yet was simultaneously so funny I had trouble not elegantly propelling a mouthful of tiramisu across the exquisitely laid table on a number of occasions. Sparkling, I suppose you’d call it, if not totally clean. When the meal was over we experimented with Ariane’s espresso machine, Brandine and I doing our very best to make Marie-Clare a latte. On the first attempt we ended up with two extra-concentrated coffee drops.

And that, elegant table laying and classy company, was my first proper dinner party.

 

8. First time at a midnight Harry Potter premiere

The return of Phoenix to the country, the school, and my group of friends has wrought a number of significant changes in my life. The most relevant one to the above sub-title is that of her obsession with Harry Potter. I like Harry Potter. I’ve always liked it. Phoenix, however, loves it.

Hence her return means I’m far more involved in the Pottersphere than I would be otherwise. I’ve re-read the books, re-seen the films. My favourite characters are George Weasley and Fabian Prewett. I have developed a deep, unchangeable love for the Phelps twins, actors for Fred and George, more so the moment I realised they were on Kingdom as well. The moment the Magic Quill challenge on Pottermore came up I made my early access account and celebrated wildly when I was allowed in. My username is QuillStorm 142. If I actually know you, send me a friend request on it, we can do wizards duels and brew potions together and do crazy things like that. I may go into more detail about Harry Potter in relation to me in ensuing posts, but for now, all you need to know is that Harry Potter is becoming an increasingly large aspect of my life.

This is most noticeably relevant to the release of the last ever Potter film, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows 2. I went to see the last one with a phenomenally large group of friends, as is mentioned in the post ‘Formalities’. But never before had I gone to the Australian midnight premiere of a Potter film, and I’d decided that this time, the last opportunity I would ever have, I would.

Of course, it’s not just as issue of seeing the film. The midnight premiere is when all the hardcore fans turn up and give of their best. Costume-wise, I mean. And we were determined to match them.

There were six of us going: Peanut, Lala, Helga (Lala’s older sister), Phoenix, Phoenix’s friend Tonks, and myself. Peanut was in Melbourne until shortly before the premiere and had already decided to go as Trelawney. Tonks, surprisingly, had opted for Tonks. This left the remaining for of us without a plan.

And so, five days before the premiere, Lala, Phoenix and I turned up at the shopping centre we also went to before laser tagging in an attempt to search for costumes.

Phoenix and I got there first and amused ourselves by looking at this weird Ken-doll thing that repeats your words in a disturbingly lower-pitched voice. Laura arrived shortly afterwards and told us about the idea her sister had had: that we all come as the founders of Hogwarts. Phoenix and I respectively called Slytherin and Ravenclaw the moment this was suggested, which Lala followed up by deciding on Gryffindor, leaving Helga to take up the part of Hufflepuff. To this end we all decided to knit scarves with our house colours. In five days. Not an easy task.

So that we’d all match, we all bought sparkly lengths of material in our respective colours, which we somehow managed to sew into capes over the next few days. Mine was the best. It really was. We wandered into Toys R Us to see if we could find soft toys of all the animals associated with the houses. Snakes, birds, and lions are relatively easy. You know how freaking difficult it is to find a toy badger? The closest we could find was a penguin and a panda. In hindsight, the penguin wasn’t all that badger-like. Actually, I was its only advocate.

Having done this, we bought props. I had a dodgy fairy tiara plus magic wand to act as Ravenclaw’s sacred diadem. Phoenix got a locket half-price because it was broken and Lala a foam sword and a plastic cup.

The next time we all met up was before the premiere itself. We arrived at Phoenix’s house beforehand – although Lala was two HOURS late – and prepared for the big event. Everyone else had put slightly more effort into their costumes than I had. Tonks had a Matrix-like coat and purple hair, and Peanut’s hair had to be seen to be believed. Phoenix and I had fun putting all the tangles in. Peanut probably had less fun removing them. I’d glued a bit of paper to the ‘diadem’ saying ‘Wit beyond measure is man’s greatest treasure’ in biro. My scarf wasn’t finished so I just threaded some wool through where the needle had been. It looked dodgy. Super dodgy. Especially in conjunction with the lurid blue lipstick I was wearing. I didn’t look wise and noble so much as badly frostbitten.

We were the only people in the cinema dressed as the founders. There were Voldemorts, Gryffindors, a surprisingly small number of Harrys, Whomping Willows, two Snitches and one enterprising trio dressed as the Hallows. Phoenix thought it would be a wonderful idea to truly enter into the character of Salazar Slytherin and wander around telling the Voldemorts how proud she was of her descendants. By the time we’d left, the letters Lala had glitter-glued onto her sword, spelling ‘GODRIC GRYFFINDOR’, spelt ‘ORIC RFINDR’. Helga had brought individual packets of tissues as preparation for all the death scenes.

And then we went into the film. It was fantastic (although I always think every film I see at the cinema is fantastic. It’s only later I have second thoughts). I actually went to see it again with my family later that week. It’s the end of an age. Probably symbolic of the end of childhood. Most of us are 17 now – I certainly am – which makes us legally adults in the wizarding world.

Doesn’t really cross over into reality, but even so.

And that, sparkly capes and bizarre make up and Potter-loving friends, was my first – and last – time at a Harry Potter midnight premiere.

 

And that was my holidays, a collection of first-times and last-times and I-do-this-all-the-times. Not to mention my first time going over a month without posting.

So welcome back everyone, and let’s just hope it’s the last time as well.

It won’t be, but I’ve always considered myself to be a bit of a pessimist, and I’d like to have a go at unsubstantiated hopefulness for a little.

After all, there’s a first time for everything.

What I Did In My Holidays

I would like to take a moment to apologise to my small number of fans, and slightly larger number of easily enraged readers, for the long time period I've left between my published posts. Clearly you people have a collective power I hadn't bargained on. For my own personal safety (and yes, Marie-Clare, the threats have mainly come from you), I am now presenting you with a post summing up my holidays, from the last day of school up to the present moment, so far. I could publish it in a number of smaller posts. That would keep you all off my back (metaphorically speaking) for any number of weeks. However, I have decided to do the noble thing and instead write a single post in sections. Some of what I've written was actually finished at the time, I just never got around to publishing it.

I would also like to take a moment out of my busy schedule to thank Giuseppe for standing up for my blogging integrity against the combined forces of everyone else, who really should have known better.

So, now I've frustrated all of you with this needlessly long description and apology (serves you right, too - you know who you are. Clogging up my Facebook page with negative comments regarding my blogging consistency. NESS. MARIE-CLARE), I present you with:

What I Did In My Holidays

an epic saga in four parts

1. Part the First - last day of school

Last day of school, thank you - for lack of a God - whatever it is you thank when you're an atheist. It coincided magically with the day I (a) brought my iPod to school and (b) discovered that my iPod has a video camera. I may do Media, but I think I have a great deal to learn in the filming department. I took a film of Chinny running away, one of me asking Shoelace to dance (for the sake of interesting filming - she gave me a quick jig and then gave up), and a two-second one of me confronting Aviator, yelling 'Smile!', with him responding 'Please don't'.

As it was the last day of school, the teachers should, by rights, have been just as keen to get out as us. They should have shared this feeling of approaching freedom by showing movies, playing games in class and maybe even letting us out early into the relatively glorious beginning-of-spring weather.

Unfortunately, teachers are also very unpredictable.

In English we analysed a poem of that most excellent of English writers, Robert Browning, entitled 'My Last Duchess'. Oh, yes. Nothing like spending your last day studying a poem about a man who hated - and possibly killed - his wife for being too nice to others. Wahay!

Following an entree of English was the main, double Geography. Actually, that wasn't too bad. We watched an Australian mini-series called 'Marking Time'. I quite enjoyed it. For an Australian series, I mean. Obviously it has nothing on Fry & Laurie.

Marie-Clare was sitting next to me. The main actor in the series wasn't too attractive, so I settled down for a peaceful hour and a half of watching, knowing that she would be unlikely to disturb me. Unfortunately - and he really should have known better - the father in the TV show mentioned George Harrison in passing, while discussing his love for the guitar. She didn't calm down again for a good few minutes, after disturbing most of the multiple Geography classes watching with her excited cries.

PE, then Chemistry to finish with. In PE we are playing lacrosse. WHY? I'd thought that game had gone out of fashion way back in the 1950s. In England it's only played by posh girls in private schools. In England, they have more sense.

Can I catch a lacrosse ball? No. Can I throw a lacrosse ball? No. Can I pick up a lacrosse ball from the ground with one of those ridiculous little nets on the ends of sticks you're supposed to play with? Yes. Barely. After several goes.

Half of the horror of this PE lesson stemmed from my inability to wield this stick with anything approaching competence. The rest, from Vyvyan.

Vyvyan is not a good person to have around while playing sport. When we did badminton, she hit me in the face with the racquet. When we did table tennis, she hit me on the wrist with the racquet while trying to give me a 'racquet hi-five' and then again in the face (this time without the racquet) when trying to give me an actual hi-five. I'm not sure if it's uncoordination or malice. Probably some sick combination of the two. All I know is that within ten minutes of picking up a lacrosse stick (or 'crosse', as I've just discovered they're called), she'd hit me once in the forehead with a ball, hit me twice in the shins with a crosse, and then hit me on the head with the net on the end of the crosse because it 'made a good hat'. This is what they look like.

Lethal, aren't they? All you need is a bit of a spike on the end and you'd have the perfect weapon. Assuming you were fighting people who didn't have guns, poison gas or long range artillery, that is. In that case it might not be such a perfect weapon.

Anyway, the second lesson - which is the one we had on the final day - I was more prepared.

Also in our PE class is a friend of ours called Beartrap (his chosen name. I didn't choose it. Still, it seems to work for him). He frequently claims to have either no heart or a heart made of complete evil. I'm a little confused about this, actually. I mean, he can't have both. Maybe he's just conflicted. Anyway, he seemed the perfect person for the job I had in mind.

LESLIE (L): Beartrap? Can you do a job for me?

BEARTRAP (B): What is it?

L: I need you to act as a bodyguard.

B: I could assassinate someone for you if you'd like. I'm not so sure about the paid protection thing.

L: That would work too. Can you assassinate Vyvyan?

B: No! I can't kill a girl. Why would you want me to kill her?

L: Well, it's like this - hey! Give that back!

(Vyvyan steals my shoe. I threaten her with my sock and then push her off the bench. Shoe is thankfully retrieved)

B: I can see why you might need personal protection. Can you pay me?

L: Yes. In a non-literal sense, of course.

B: I can't do it then.

L: Well, how about instead of paying for my retirement in fifty years time you give me personal protection now?

(Long story, but earlier this term we made a bet, the deal being that the loser would have to pay for the winner's retirement. Beartrap lost)

B: That sounds . . . reasonable.

That made this lesson far more bearable. Entertaining, too, as Vyvyan took grave exception to my having hired protection against her. Luckily, Beartrap took the brunt of it. I don't think I'll be missing my retirement money.

Last in the day was Chemistry. Not my best subject, especially on the last day of school. I made up three elements in the quick quiz our teacher gave us (although I'll be pleasantly surprised if 'Thithium' turns out to be real) and then spent the rest of the lesson talking to Falcon about the epic battle we intended to have later in the holidays. Read below for more. Anyway, the bell went, we followed shortly, and school was OVER for another term.

2. Part the Second - post-birthday dinner

The last day was over, school was complete, and I could now relax for the holiday? Not so. For I had organised a dinner at a restaurant near my house to celebrate both my birthday - despite the fact that it was weeks afterwards - and the end of term.

I had invited about eleven people, but only five ended up making it - Gwen was at the opera, Chinny was 'busy', Midgie, Shoelace and Vyvyan couldn't come for reasons I have now forgotten (but they must have been good ones, as otherwise I would've remembered), and Peanut somehow expected me to believe the flimsy excuse she gave of no longer being in the country. I'm serious. To show how committed she is, she even posted on HER blog about how she's gone to America - all lies, obviously. I mean, we all know she's just hiding in her house, refusing to answer the phone. Still, what can you do with someone like that? She even left school a day early, claiming 'that's the day the aeroplane is leaving'. Ridiculous.

Aviator had wanted to be invited. After I turned him down point-blank the first time he asked, he decided to use slightly more subtle techniques, such as this one.

AVIATOR (A): Hello, Leslie. How was your afternoon yesterday?

LESLIE (L): Good, thank you. And yours?

A: Oh, well, I didn't have dinner last night. My parents never give me dinner. It's terrible, it really is. So hungry . . . so very hungry . . . if only there was some way in which I could get dinner, maybe go to a restaurant with a kind friend . . . but that's probably just a crazy dream.

L: Nice try, but no.

Anyway, the point I'm trying to get across here is that the only persons in attendance were Marie-Clare, Ness, Lala, Ariane, Giuseppe, and myself. Ness arrived first. I gave her a quick tour of the house - featuring Drummer Boy, doing what his name suggests, as the main attraction - and we then retired to the kitchen, where we played with the magnetic letters on the fridge. We may be 16, but we're no more mature. Ness was considerably annoyed at the way there were no 'm's on the fridge. 'I mean, how can you spell words properly?' she complained, after fruitlessly searching for the letter that would change the phrase she was working on from 'happy en' to 'happy men', for reasons best known to herself.

I was perplexed. 'There are lots of 'm's.'

'I can't see any.'

'Look, there's one here!'

'That's not an 'm'!' she said indignantly. 'That's an upside-down 'w'.'

Ariane arrived shortly afterwards and changed it from 'happy men' to 'hoppy men'. After that, Marie-Clare and Lala arrived together. Lala had ignored my express wishes and brought me a present. I unwrapped it suspiciously.

'Have you nearly got the paper off?' Lala inquired cheerfully.

'Nearly - what's this?'

'Yeah, I wrapped it twice,' she explained. 'Once in proper paper and once in newspaper.'

Ariane, standing nearby, laughed. 'Why couldn't you just have used the paper or the newspaper? You didn't need both.'

'You know, I have no idea,' Lala told her thoughtfully. So nice to have this insight into the minds of my friends.

Anyway, once the present was unwrapped, it was revealed to contain (a) a pen that looked like a pencil (b) a stuffed panda and (c) a small box. Lala promptly seized the box, got down on one knee, and proposed to me with the ring that was inside. I accepted. Obviously we were married before, but it's nice to have it made official. I wore the ring for the rest of the evening and most of the next day. Then it got uncomfortable, so I took it off. It's still a commitment.

At this point, all necessary persons had arrived, and we made our way to the Vietnamese restaurant we'd chosen. I hadn't originally meant it to be the Vietnamese restaurant. I'd wanted to book at an Italian restaurant, for the sole reason that Marie-Clare is incapable of eating Asian foods. I'll never know how she managed to survive her sojourn in Japan: I suppose it's just one of life's mysteries. However, that restaurant had been booked out. Which left me a little worried as to what Marie-Clare was going to be able to eat. Still, we'd face that when we came to it.

We got to the restaurant in good time, and had ordered before Giuseppe arrived. Marie-Clare had decided that she actually quite liked the idea of sweet-and-sour pork, and ordered that. I don't have time to devote all that much to Marie-Clare's bizarre eating habits. In fact, I'm considering writing a post all about that - what to do when escorting Marie-Clare to a movie or restaurant. It could be invaluable to 25, you never know. However, I won't discuss it now. Enough to say that she got by mainly on the rice, which, thank goodness, was plentiful.

There's not a lot to say about the dinner, except that Lala and Ariane decided to try and convince Ness that Ariane was red-green colourblind, and enlisted everyone else to maintain this illusion. Sorry, Ness, if you're reading this now.

After the dinner we returned to my house, to await the arrival of various parents in an hour's time. We decided to pass the time by playing Monopoly. Lala was bank, I was property, and Ness suggested that Ariane take houses. Ariane looked at her sorrowfully. 'How can I give the houses and hotels out when I can't even tell them apart?'

'What are you talking about? They're different colours -' I began, before suddenly remembering the colourblind thing. 'Which, of course, you are unable to tell apart.'

'Don't worry,' Ariane assured me. 'I'm used to people not knowing.'

Anyway, Lala got a little carried away with the whole 'banker' thing. Being keen to play Monopoly I can understand. Putting a pimp hat on, drawing a moustache on in eyeliner, and glaring suspiciously at anyone trying to take money out of the bank is a little harder.

I was the one actually drawing with the eyeliner. We kind of forgot about the Monopoly then. I gave Ness a heart on her forehead (never know when it might come in handy), drew a flower on myself (which is harder than it sounds - it came out like a diseased cloud), and the Ariane and I collaborated in drawing on Marie-Clare. We drew her initials on one cheek and the initials of 25 on the other. We never got around to drawing on Giuseppe because she left early. Before she left, she presented me with a present, which was from her, Marie-Clare, Ness, and Shoelace (in absentia): a hard drive, with about 300GB of music, TV shows and movies on it. Does nobody pay attention to anything I say? I'm not complaining, though, I now have about three times as much music as I ever considered existed, as well as the complete series of The Chaser's War On Everything. In fact, I think it's about time for a gratuitous Chaser picture (yes, that time again):

Anyway, thank you again, Giuseppe. After Giuseppe left, we decided to completely forget the Monopoly game, much to Marie-Clare's annoyance. It seems fated that I am never to finish a game of Monopoly I have with Marie-Clare. Very strange. At any rate, I got my iPod out and made a number of short films of everyone. People left one by one, until finally only Lala remained. We'd decided to film a nature documentary with my panda, and were just setting up, when her sister arrived to take her home. Tragic.

3. Part the Third - an epic battle

For a long time, Falcon and I have had quite a serious argument going. He sees it one way, I see it the other, and there doesn't seem to be any way of compromising our views. Eventually, we decided we would have to take this argument to the next level and sort it out, once and for all. Permanently. No turning back.

The subject we argue over is 'Who is the best Doctor Who?', and the battle we intended to have would be one of watching television.

The problem is this. Falcon believes that David Tennant is the best doctor of all time. I, on the other hand, believe it is Matt Smith. There seemed no way of making a decision.

We managed to think of one, thought.

Early in the morning in the first week of the holidays - early, that is, for a group of teenagers not on school time, which is to say at about 9:30 - I, Falcon, and our chosen three judges arrived at my place of residence. Well, I was already there, but you know what I mean. The judges had been selected individually on the basis of their Doctor Who-ignorance. Aviator, the first judge, had never seen an episode and was openly sceptical of the concept. I personally am of the opinion that he only turned up in the first place for the sake of the bet contract he'd made. More about that later. Our second judge, Giuseppe, is easily the most ignorant of all the people I know. She was once yelled at by her entire English class for not knowing what a Dalek was. Our third and final judge was Marie-Clare. I'd opted to have her on the basis that she owned all the series of Doctor Who except for the Matt Smith ones, meaning I'd only have to hire the latest series. Also, although she didn't have a particular favourite Doctor, she was inclined to lean towards Matt Smith. Falcon was indignant when he found this out. 'Are you trying to cheat, Leslie?' However, he soon came around and we settled down to watch. It was extremely hard first of all. Giuseppe and Marie-Clare tried to continue an argument they'd been having as to whether it was appropriate to celebrate John Lennon's birthday with a shop-bought cake or not, only stopping when Giuseppe got a call on her mobile and was forced to answer that for a few minutes. We managed to get a few minutes further in before Aviator pretended to get a call on his mobile and talk loudly on it for a few minutes. Eventually, we put subtitles on, and managed to get through four episodes, two for each of our chosen Doctors, with only major interruptions between episodes.

Of the people who read my blog, I'm not sure how many of you watch Doctor Who. I was going to add a list of the episodes we watched, but reconsidered it on the basis that most of you wouldn't understand it. So here is a clarified version for you non-Whovians.

EPISODE #1: THE GIRL IN THE FIREPLACE

DOCTOR: David Tennant

ACTUAL PLOT: Clockwork, humanoid monsters invade the life of Madame de Pompadour, mistress to Louis XV of France, via a number of time windows contained on board a spaceship, in the hopes of removing her brain and using it to power the ship.

SIMPLIFIED PLOT: Ticking things try and kill the king of France's girlfriend. They don't manage to. The Doctor saves the day.

COMMENTS:

GIUSEPPE (G): I don't think that was a proper episode.

LESLIE (L): Why not?

G: There weren't any Daneks.

L: It's pronounced 'Daleks'. And the Daleks aren't present in every episode.

G: What? Are you serious?

MARIE-CLARE (MC): Giuseppe! How can you not know that?

L: Right. What did you think, Aviator?

AVIATOR (A): Well, the girl was pretty hot.

FALCON (F): She was, actually.

A: Can we watch another one with a hot girl?

EPISODE #2: THE ELEVENTH HOUR

DOCTOR: Matt Smith

ACTUAL PLOT: The Doctor appears to a young girl, and fixes a crack made in space and time in her wall. He comes back to her as a woman, and discovers an alien called Prisoner Zero hiding in her house. The Atraxi, who originally held Prisoner Zero hostage, threaten to incinerate the Earth unless Prisoner Zero is returned to them. The Doctor eventually takes on the woman (Amy) as a new assistant.

SIMPLIFIED PLOT: The Doctor mends a wall, finds a snake-thing, and gives the snake-thing to a giant eye-thing. The Doctor saves the day.

COMMENTS:

A: WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH THIS GUY?

F: You're right. What do you mean?

A: He comes out of his box -

MC: TARDIS, it's called.

A: - finds a little Scottish girl, and forces her to cook for him, then spits yoghurt in her face. Why would you do that to a kid? She was adorable. I want a kid just like her.

L: Really?

A: A kid that can cook, AND has a Scottish accent? That would be both awesome and hilarious.

G: Yeah, he doesn't come across as a nice person.

A: Although when she grew up she was pretty hot. Let's watch another one with a hot girl.

EPISODE #3: FEAR HER

DOCTOR: David Tennant

ACTUAL PLOT: The Doctor and Rose (his companion) discover a girl with the ability to trap people in drawings. After she traps an entire stadium full of people from the 2012 London Olympics in a picture, the Doctor realises she is possessed by an Isolus and is able to free her of it, as well as releasing everyone in the pictures.

SIMPLIFIED PLOT: Girl possesses creepy powers. Doctor discovers she has been taken over by small white annoying flower-thing. The Doctor saves the day.

COMMENTS:

F: Did they know that the 2012 Olympics were going to be in London when they filmed this?

MC: Maybe they didn't! Maybe the writers have secret powers.

A: No, I think they knew. They have these things organised way in advance. Who was the blonde girl, again? She was in the first one we watched as well.

L: Rose. Well, Billie Piper.

A: Wasn't she in that TV series about a prostitute? It was called something like 'The Life of a Prostitute'.

L: 'The Secret Diary of a Call-Girl'.

A: Yeah, she was pretty hot.

EPISODE #4: THE BEAST BELOW

DOCTOR: Matt Smith

ACTUAL PLOT: The Doctor and his companion (Amy) arrive on the Starship UK. After some investigation, after which they are almost fed to a mysterious beast (which is 'below' the rest of the ship - oh, you cunning, cunning title writers), they discover the animal is actually a Star Whale and is being tortured in order to fly the ship. Amy prevents the Doctor from killing it, and proves that it doesn't need to be tortured to fly.

SIMPLIFIED PLOT: The Doctor and friend arrive on what is basically England on a space ship. They wander around a little, are shoved into the mouth of giant mystical space whale-like creature, escape from the mouth of giant mystical space whale-like creature, and generally make everything good. Amy saves the day.

COMMENTS:

A: I'm serious. There is something very, very wrong with this guy.

L: How do you mean, exactly?

A: Did you see in the beginning, how the Scottish girl was floating around in space? Well, he was looking up her skirt. And she was in her NIGHTDRESS.

MC: How does that make it any different?

A: Well, who wears underwear to bed?

L: What are you talking about? Who doesn't wear underwear to bed?

A: Actually, I -

L: I don't want to hear it!

G: He's right. That is unduly creepy. At least David Tennant never did that to any of his assistants.

MC: No, but he did kiss Madame de Pompadour. Which is a bit strange.

A: That's acceptable, though. And not creepy.

F: What did you think of Amy, though?

A: I thought she was hot!

The watching over, it was time to vote. Before we did that, though, Aviator had a suggestion to make. 'Look. I made this bet contract yesterday. Basically, whoever loses has to do something. I don't know what yet. I thought we could decide now.'

We considered this for a good while. Aviator was unhelpful.

A: I think if Falcon loses, he should have to pull his pants down and run around Leslie's house.

MC: How can he run with his pants down?

A: That's part of the fun!

L: He'd have a hard time getting around my house, there's a fence and a garage in the way. I don't think it's a good idea, anyway. My family are easily scared.

A: It's a serious bet here, Leslie. It needs serious consequences.

F: I'm not doing that.

A: Come on, Falcon, we won't film it. Actually, that's a great idea! Leslie, do you have a video camera?

G: Forget it, Aviator.

A: You'll come round to my point of view eventually.

We didn't.

Eventually we decided that if Falcon won, I would have to knit him a scarf, and if I won, we'd get to spray Falcon with the hose for a minute and a half while filming it, and put it on Facebook.

Then, it was time to vote. I gave out voting slips, people filled them in, and then we put them in a pimp hat (actually, this hat has previously made an appearance in this post, as the one Lala donned to feel more like a banker. That hat has lead a rich and varied life). Here is the final result:

DAVID TENNANT: 4

MATT SMITH: 1

Remembering that I'd voted for Matt Smith, that meant everyone else had voted against me. 'All of you? Really?' I asked despairingly. 'I demand a recount.' It was still the same result.

'It was the yoghurt thing that did it, really,' confessed Aviator. 'I would have liked to see Falcon sprayed with a hose. But I just couldn't understand why Matt Smith would spit yoghurt at a Scottish girl. I mean, with that accent?'

This left me, then, having to knit Falcon a scarf. I did, however, manage to extract a promise from him that he would wear the scarf for at least one day at school. What's more, I would be able to pick any colours I wanted.

There IS such a thing as small victories.

Anyway, we had to stop at this point, as Aviator and Falcon were shortly going bowling and Marie-Clare was going to get her nails done. We spent the remaining time in my room, despite the fact that I'd done all I could to keep them out: I'm not the tidiest person. I showed everyone a love letter Marie-Clare had written for James McCartney the previous year, and that I had saved for an occasion such as this one. Aviator tried to convince us (a) he was an amazing jazz Irish whistle player and (b) he had syphilis (this is an extremely disconcerting thing to hear from someone when they've spent the last ten minutes playing your Irish whistle). Then everyone else tried to convince me that Matt Smith was gay.

'Come on! He's practically admitted it!' Aviator enthused.

'How has he admitted it?' I asked, annoyed.

'It's the hair,' said Falcon solemnly. 'Nobody can have hair like that and be straight. Google 'matt smith gay' and you'll get your answer.'

We did, and came up with an article he'd done for the Gay Times.

'That proves it!'

'No, it doesn't! Look, he's going out with an underwear model!' I said.

'A male underwear model,' Giuseppe contributed.

'No, a female one - look, here's a picture of her -'

We found a picture. Aviator sighed. 'All right, you win.'

'I do?'

'Yes, you're right. He's definitely bisexual.'

I was quite glad when they all left.

Everyone but Giuseppe, that is. For we had a nobler purpose in mind. We went into Civic with but a single thought: to buy the wool for Falcon's scarf. That is to say, our single thought was 'buy wool for scarf'. When it got down to the actual details of the thing, it got a little confusing.

G: You should knit his name into the scarf.

L: Not sure my knitting abilities are up to that.

G: You know what you should do - you should knit David Tennant's face into the scarf. Or Matt Smith's.

L: Again, my knitting skills aren't up to much. Either way, I'd end up with a blobby pink face and various distorted features. I'm not sure you'd be able to tell who it was.

G: That's probably right. It was a nice thought, though.

L: I think I'll just stick to stripes.

G: Well, you should make it vomit coloured. Or just generally hideous.

L: Sounds good.

We entered the wool shop. First of all, I settled on a charming lime green wool. Giuseppe approved. We then found some of that wool that changes colours as you knit, in a number of exciting colours and flavours. I went for one that swapped between lime green/dark pink/light pink. We were just deciding the last one when we accidentally stumbled across a type of wool that - well, it's hard to describe. It's essentially a think cord of thread. Except every five centimetres or so is a large pompom of wool. Obviously, this was hard to resist. Giuseppe was keen to go along the 'vomit coloured' route and buy the orange. I, however, decided that I wanted it to match, and went for some that swapped between green, white, and pink. I started the scarf when I got home. That was a week ago, and I'm already more than half done. It truly is a thing of beauty, insofar is it is impossible to look at for more than a few minutes without your eyes watering at the hideousness of it. I have to wear protective goggles while knitting. I'll have it done for the first day of school, Falcon, promise. I look forward to seeing you wear it. Serves you right for thinking David Tennant is the best Doctor. I may be down, but I'm not out.

4. Part the Fourth - family holiday

I've spent the past few days on holiday with my family. Not much to do. We watched many movies ('Brazil' was awesome. Everyone must watch it. With the proper director's cut ending, though, not the happy American one), played table tennis - I knitted and listened to my iPod.

Actually, a bizarre thing happened pertaining to my iPod (the blue one). One night, I was listening to it, perfectly innocently, when it completely cut out. The screen went black, none of the buttons worked, it wouldn't appear on my computer desktop, etc. I considered it to be dead and duly mourned it. The strange thing is that the next night, at about the same time, it came back to life again. I was pleasantly astounded. I would have been happy for it to stay that way, but it was not to be. The next night, again, at about the same time, it cut out again, right in the middle of what I was listening to. This time it still makes the clickety-click noises when I press the buttons. It just doesn't do anything. Not so much dead as comatose. I've a sneaking suspicion that it was what I was forcing it to play. Both times, it was halfway through an episode of BBC radio comedy.

Actually, come to think of it, that's not all that coincidental, seeing as that's basically all I listen to.

That was exactly a day ago. I'm hoping it'll come back to life in a matter of minutes. I'm not optimistic. Still, you never know.

And there you have it, dear friends and less dear friends (Ness. Marie-Clare. NO COMMENT). My holidays as they've been so far. There are only four days left now, so not a great deal more to sum up. There is, of course, a great deal I haven't mentioned here - mostly, it must be said, the unexciting stuff. For example, I briefly created a Wikipedia page for Gwen explaining how she was an expert on the use of hard 'g's is the English language. The Wikifolk have taken it down now, but I've still got a screen shot of the page if anyone's interested. I also created a page for one of 'my' comedians, Lee Simpson, which is still up - I thought it was about time he had one, although the Wikifolk clearly don't approve and have covered the page in irrelevant tags. The way I see it, I'm fighting against internet oppression. Nice to have achieved something. I'm also friends with two of 'my' British comedians on Facebook. Well, I'm friends with one, and friends with the alter-ego of the other. Yes, one of them has an alter-ego who is a therapist. Sound familiar?

I suppose it's not actual friends, really. I mean, they'd probably take umbrage if I turned up at their houses in the middle of the night asking to come in. But it's a start.

And so, I hope this puts to rest all the complaints and complainees of the world - at least, all the ones pestering me - and convinces them to let me sleep for another couple of weeks.