The Night

I must, of course, start from the beginning. Well, I could start from the end, but that would be awfully confusing, wouldn't it? Right, so, on the way to work in the morning, James and I went emergency clothes shopping (because my outfit was a mess and I needed a nice shirt) and braved Cotton On. I figured if the shirt was going to have beer spilled all over it (and that happened more times than I could count) it was only worth spending $30 on. Wise me. I got the shirt and went to work where I got slammed. Lovely. Knocked off at about 6 and went home. I dumped my stuff and went over to the boy's place, where James attempted to cook me dinner in the form of ham and cheese sandwiches, (which stuck to the grill) and Sean ironed my pants, because I had no clue how to iron in a crease.

We got all dressed up and I stole some of Erika's expensive mascara. (Ha! That'll teach her not to take it on holiday with her!) My face was bright red from hot shower plus vigorous exfoliating, so I stuck my face into the freezer for a minute. I don't think I was thinking very clearly, actually...

James, making sure to have the ticket in his pocket (I entrusted it to him, I would have lost it) herded me towards the tram. We ended up waiting for a bus or a tram for 45 goddamn minutes. I almost swore near and old lady. We finally caught the bus and got off at the other end of Crown. Actually, I fluttered my lashes at the driver, and he let us off at the crossing rather than about another 200m away where the stop actually is. Nice driver. We saw many many amazing fireworks from the Chinese New Year celebration they're having a Crown. It's been years since I saw good ones, actually. Seriously impressive, though. I wished I had a camera on me.

We arrived at Auto and found everyone sitting around having a drink while waiting for the closing staff to finish. After a very large vodka, we made our way up to Transport by walking along the river bank. Pretty, pretty city lights. We arrived to find the longest queue in the world out the front of Transport. With much grumbling and pushing in, we eventually made our way in.

Oh, did I mention that everyone looked great? They did. Seriously good! And everyone loved my hat. (I almost posted a Biped-esque 'I love my hat, I love my hat' the other day.)

So, we discovered that we were allowed all of the tap beers! Woo! That meant that James and I drank Asahi and Beez Neez and Cascade Blonde and Stella Artois instead of Carlton or VB. Thank god. We were given giant plastic steins. There was much quaffing involved.

Almost immediately after I entered the building, some guy knocked me into someone else and I got a blood nose. Idiot. Ran upstairs to tend to the bleeding and heard Annoying Bar Guy in cubical next to me (yes, he had wandered into the ladies) doing a line of coke. Yelled at him that I could hear what he was doing from my stall. Then I heard my supervisor shouting 'Is that you, Annoying Bar Guy?' Heh. Not that she really cared...

After I was better, I ran around and chatted and lost James, and found James, and danced like a maniac to Basement Jaxx and various other funky tunes. Had more beer. Had yet more beer. Watched the gay boys making out. Was then pounced upon by gay boys with intent. Attempted to fend them off. Got away with minimal kissing. Ran off to find James, who was dancing with some of my work friends.

The next couple of hours was pretty much just that, actually. At 4:30 am Lush got hold of the microphone and told everyone that the after party was at the Peel, (seedy gay club sort of near my house) so we all jumped in cabs and went there. I mostly just sat around drinking water and chatting while James cut a rug on the dance floor. Oh, wait, I think I was dancing on a podium at one stage with Punk Cashier.

We decided at about 5:15 that I wanted drunk food, so James and I left. We found Tranny (great kisser from all reports, and the nickname is from his last name, Trantor) sitting on a bench having a ciggie. James, Tranny and I went and got Maccas. The breakfast menu was on! I had a sulk about not being able to get a quarter pounder, but made up for it with hotcakes and hash browns. We left Tranny there buying Maccas for his boyfriend, and walked in the lightening morning to Nicholson Street. There was a pretty sunrise happening by the time we got back to Brunswick Road, actually. I drank some water and crashed and woke up three hours later feeling seedy as hell.

My heart was racing like mad so I sent a few panicked messages and got a lift to the doctor's with Age. Felt better after half an hour but wanted to make sure nothing was horribly wrong. I had to pee in a cup! They're doing tests to see if someone put something in my beer. I'll bloody kill someone if I find out they did! I was on a beer only night! I didn't feel like there was anything wrong at the time, so it was probably nothing, but just in case...

The highlight of the evening was an ex-staff member telling me that money cannot compare with the amazing benefits of travel.

All in all, I had a really good night. I'm not really even that hung over, but I'm sure tonight will be a bit nasty on the floor. I did have medicinal curry, though.

Oh, and I hope I don't worry anyone with the wacky doctor visit mention. I was just a bit worried, everything is fine!