Chapter XIV

Why Josh should not be allowed to drink port.

Following my return from Tirol, I was faced with a rather quick turn around, with my flight back home for Easter the following day. Fortunately everything went swimmingly and I got home with nothing too untoward occurring. This was for the best, as I was going to see the glorious Gretchen Peters performing in Bristol the day after. The gig was in the most beautiful, old church, excellently lit, atmospheric and intimate. The support act, Ben Glover, was very enjoyable, and the concert itself was excellent. As Gretchen joked, she got the “happy song” out of the way early on, moving into her much more melancholy body of work, which is, after all, my favourite kind. She has a way of capturing your attention entirely, drawing you in until you’re oblivious to the rest of the audience. This was probably for the best, as my neighbour was a particularly peculiar specimen. One could have heard a pin drop, and the setting lent itself marvellously to St. Francis, a song from her latest album, which I must admit failing to fully appreciate before hearing its live performance. I was thrilled to that she decided to perform performed my two favourite songs, On a Bus to St. Cloud and Five Minutes, which both moved me to tears. As well as the Woman on the Wheel tracks, Gretchen performed a couple of older songs, and her re-vamped Independence Day was beautifully simple and pure. It was also a nice touch that Barry Walsh, her husband and band-mate, performed one of his own piano pieces, and whipped out the accordion for Matador, which was a real treat.

The concert rounded off with a performance of Wild Horses, which can only be called "big", with Ben Glover joining Gretchen and her band, encouraging the audience to join in. Gretchen is a terribly funny, charming woman and I was lucky enough to meet her after the concert, where she signed my LP of Woman on the Wheel. I'm not ashamed to say that I was a little starstruck. She’s such a lovely woman though, and had a photograph taken with me, thanking me for doing my bit to lower the average age of her fan-base, and for “raising [my parents] right”, whom I introduced to her music. I was also quite surprised to see Ruth Jones sitting at the table across from us as we were having a post-concert tipple.

Not long after the concert, I found myself once again in Oxford. There was an Alumni do on to celebrate Katrin’s 25 years at Jesus College, and since it fell during the time when I’d be back in the UK anyway, I thought it an excellent excuse to see the Oxford lot and spend a couple of days staying with Joe. At the event's reception, Lauren and I hit the cakes and champagne hard, employing our best tactics for maximising food intake and minimising inter-personal contact. Sadly, our attempts fell short of the mark and we were cornered by a particularly disagreeable alumnus who rambled at length, rather pleased with himself for his comments about German graduates and going to Germany in a post factum attempt to “learn the language”. Essentially all he had to say boiled down to: Linguistics good; German bad. We eventually got a reprieve in the form of Kazza & Cazza’s presentations. The former was naturally on top form, and the latter amused us all with a discussion of the Marquis de Sade. Unfortunately most alumni, and all current students, were made to stand up and discuss what they had done/ were planning to do with their lives. We present undergraduates dazzled the assemblage with our shared sentiment of “dunno... I’m sure something will turn up.” It was, however, quite satisfying when the aforementioned alumnus with whom I had taken such umbrage was put back in his box after interrupting another old boy. Although, this was after a protracted plugging of his new “acting” career.

College followed the event itself by treating us to Pizza Express for dinner, whilst the tutors and alumni were entertained in hall. It was jolly nice, and to improve matters, there was some confusion with the wine and we were brought too much. We left the restaurant a tad squiffy. We adjourned to Joe’s, where we finished with gin what was started with wine. Needless to say, I was my usual charming self, asking one gentleman in particular, whom I had not met before, what he was “for”. However,  we were drawn to the noise emanating from the Old Bursary, as moths to a flame, which was by now occupied by alumni. Wandering around with a wine-glass full of port is one of my last firm memories, the rest flashes of deep and meaningful conversations (with whom, I couldn’t say) and images like that of Caroline shaking salt over the carpet to counter everyone’s vinous stains. I believe Lauren and I were once again disgraces, and I woke up in a cot fashioned from Joe’s two armchairs. It was subsequently brought to my attention that I had fallen asleep at the bottom of Staircase XVII, below ground-level, with my snores to be heard throughout Third Quad. Chris the porter had attempted to rouse me, proved rather ineffectual, and washed his hands of me. It was Joe in the end who managed to slap me awake (to which I apparently reacted like a “sleepy dormouse”), tucking me in and watching The Simpsons at his desk. My phone woke me, in Joe’s room, from the Quad, where its incredibly aggressive alarm had been sounding for a full fifteen minutes, much to the bewilderment of casual bystanders. Having collected the little pile of my belongings from the lodge, I left for Cheltenham later that day, considerably worse for wear.

I had a lovely time being back home, in addition to a spa-outing with the parents and Oliver and a rather lovely visit to Manchester. This visit was largely to cheer up my little cousin, suffering terribly with chickenpox, and involved many the distracting activity, viz.: baking, trampolining, film watching and playing. However, it was also lovely seeing my aunt and uncle, Nana and my other little cousin, and we even managed to spend an afternoon with the Grandparents Booth, whom I hadn’t seen in an age. Back in Cheltenham, I also had the opportunity to see everyone (but for dear Amy), which had escaped me over Christmas, and I enjoyed myself thoroughly, both drunk and sober. It was particularly nice spending time with my brother, going to town and the cinema (as his new cinema card got us both in for free on Orange Wednesdays), although we did make the colossal mistake of seeing that dreadful Oz, the Great and Powerful film. Our mutual regression over Easter also warrants mention, namely the fact that, whilst out shopping for a present to cheer up the poorly cousin, we happened upon a huge LEGO-set, which we got for a steal as a present to us. It kept us well out of mischief for a good couple of days, sat quietly at the dining-room table. God, I love LEGO.

It was particularly nice catching up with Rosie, whom I had lately consistently managed to miss, and we had a lovely time catching up over afternoon tea in The Montpellier Chapter. It was terribly civilised, seated in the conservatory, with a lovely view of Montpellier, discussing our respective years abroad; mine in progress, hers upcoming. It was quite fortunate, in fact, as I was able to put her in contact with Anna, currently working in Frankfurt, as Rosie was slightly concerned about finding accommodation in the right area during her internship. As though this and plans for Rosie to visit me in Germany were not enough, the two of us organised a night on the tiles a couple of days later. The evening could not be described as “good” in any conventional sense of the word, but it was certainly rip-roaring good fun, made entirely by the company. Having pre-drunk at mine, we ended up in Embassy, the Cheltenham gay club, as most others are dreadful and I always seem to enjoy myself there. Unfortunately, there were only ten people or so in the whole club, and it was karaoke night. We weren't about to be defeated, however,  and, as once in a chilled Berlin club where everyone was sat on sofas, the two of us careered around, posing for the most bizarre photos (in which a delightfully vulgar, gold-painted bust featured heavily). It was not long before I was making my usual mistake, ordering wine in a club (uncharacteristically, they had no special on Jäger-bombs) and the two of us decided to rock the joint with a little number. Unsurprisingly, we became rather over-excited and rashly decided on Taylor Swift’s I Knew You Were Trouble. We didn’t allow ourselves to be held back by the fact that we only knew the chorus, and soon the whole club was digging it, all eight or so people cheering along to our mostly la-la-la’d performance.

 

Needless to say, the club was closed early and we were forced to find an alternative venue for fun, eventually arriving, much sodden, at The Vaults. It was dreadful and the two of us were forced to wander round in socks, due to our soaking footwear (I say forced…). Nevertheless, we had fun with the half-car built into the wall, until we were made to get off it and settled for the pole, where a couple of very insistent, overdressed lesbians joined us and hit on Rosie. All in all, it was a terribly good night, and ended with a cosy, if damp, sleepover.

This time around, I was also lucky enough to see a bit more of Katie, my boo. She finally had the opportunity to give me the satchel she brought back from Morocco for my birthday, which I loved and made sure to bring back to Germany with me. By our usual standards, it was gifted positively punctually! I shall have to consider carefully my counter-present for her approaching 21^st. Naturally our time spent together was divided between bitchy ramblings of madmen (i.e. coffee-dates) and borderline alcoholism. In this latter endeavour we were joined by the forces that are Chris and Jo. I think the following photograph rather speaks for itself…