Raw mode

Ashen, puffy faced, unkempt – the Ideal Housing crew struggle in late after last night’s bash at Restaurant Harkema in the Nes (theatre district). Although only twelve bottles of wine were consumed between the twenty of us, the fact that a small but determined alcoholic minority consumed most of the grog explains the wilder behaviour towards the end of the evening. In the normal run of the day, we all know Jimmy as well-meant, chubby, ineffective and basically harmless. Pour a little truth-drug into him however, then better take a step back. Loud – OK, who wasn’t. Very loud – border line OK, he wasn’t the only one. Screaming at top of voice for entire restaurant to “Shut-up. Everyone – shut-up” – not OK. Then, when a thousand eyes were boring into Jimmy’s swaying frame atop the dining table, he points to Eddie and says, “Eddie, the floor is yours.”

Marcus captured a terabyte of material on his top-of-the-range expensive camera. “I had the thing in ‘raw’ mode – got it all” – which, on reviewing some of the excruciating digital detail this morning added new meaning to “all.” As far as I could tell, there were range ranging wine-fuelled confessions whispered in confidence between courses but the action stopped short of impromptu snogging and, fortunately, there was no photocopier available for anyone to consider sitting on.

A former colleague – Vlad – had also managed to crash the gig claiming that Klaas had invited him. Vlad left a couple of months back to work in advertising. I wish he’d just come straight out with it and pitched me a “Can I do your new house style – by God, you need one.” Instead, he followed me around like a puppy, hoping for a quiet moment to sell his wares. I thought I’d dodged him but a wave of synchronous restroom breaks left me sitting alone under a halogen spot offering Vlad his moment.