Party time

[deborah_c]

Yesterday was elise's birthday, and in honour of the occasion a number of friends descended on The London Stone.

devalmont was acting as one of the three DJs for the evening, so I'd agreed to drive down to save him from arriving with stretched arms from carrying far too many CDs. (It's odd: when discussing CD collections, it had never occurred to me to use the unit "stone" before...) So the two of us, davefish and necro_angel shared an agreeable, and surprisingly simple journey down to London. I did cause a certain amount of consternation when attempting to remove a huge black hairy marauding spider [1] that was attempting to savage Kaiyan, by managing instead to drop it on her, and a phone call at a slightly inopportune moment led to rather more circuits of a roundabout somewhere near Aldgate than might be conventional, but all in all a pleasant trip.

I'd not previously been there (or, indeed, heard of it!) but the London Stone is a basement pub just opposite Cannon Street station, and was really rather wonderfully apposite. It's decorated in a rather Addams Family-ish style -- iron chandeliers, gargoyles, doors hidden in bookcases, and pillars full of ancient-looking scientific glassware bubbling merrily away to itself. It sort of feels as if it somehow ought to feel irredeemably cheesy, but manages to stay impeccable on the right side of that line [2]. Lots of little niches for quiet conversations, but with plenty of open space for general intermingling and groups.

We got there to find Elise, her sister (WINOLJ, as far as I know...), deliberateblank and a moderate amount of immoderately loud PA kit. Pausing only for a quick [3] visit to the local McDonalds for food [3] (at which the music far outweighed the cheesiness of the worst excesses of the DJs [4] -- I'm sorry, but you'll have to try harder next time!), we plunged into the fray, to discover many more people there than when we'd left. A lovely evening ensued, with plenty of opportunity to get to know a number of people who I've only previously seen here -- mrph, mooism, fiona_kitty and feanelwa -- to meet entirely new and shiny people (hi, dreamfracture and actionreplay!), and generally to chat with, and get to know lots of others who I've met in varying degrees before. Lots of entertaining music (if sometimes pushing the boundaries of good taste :). Closing time arrived far too soon.

A large crowd disappeared in the general direction of railway stations, while we shoehorned bacchos and areia into the car, mostly by virtue of folding davefish up quite small... Much amusement from random conversations in the back as we wended our way back toward Cambridge, at least until the lure of Dangermouse proved too much for those in the back... (When people start asking "are we nearly there?", Dangermouse is almost always a good idea :)

A fun evening, home to bed, and I slept very soundly.


[1] At least three millimeters across...
[2] OK, possibly excepting the gargoyles
[3] ish
[4] Steps and S-Club pick-a-number [5]
[5] I have children: I have an excuse for recognising them, honestly

Comments

[verte.livejournal.com]

Yes, the spooky pubs are perfect for birthday gatherings, especially goth gatherings, of course. I remember the first time we found Ben Crouch (which is just off Oxford Street), aged about sixteen, and after that ended up going there so often that the manager started giving us a bottle of champagne whenever it was someone's birthday (we frequently pretended). My general squee for the spooky pubs is that they're pubs that have proper pints and cocktails, even if - despite the decor - most of the people in them are decidedly ungoth. Glad you had fun.

[deborah_c]

Ah yes, the cocktails... that was one of the few annoyances of the evening. They looked wonderful, but they're not really compatible with driving home afterwards.

I must go back some time when (a) I'm on public transport, and (b) I'm slightly less broke. Or maybe I could inveigle someone into showing me the delights of more of London's spooky pubs...