Scum

Last Sunday night I went to a wedding reception with a band. There were only a few guests and they were the scum of the earth. They were all unpleasantly drunk, and several of them were clearly high on cocaine. One charming woman thought that the way to start a conversation with the band was to stumble up to us and say "I bet you’re really shit singers". Another turned up with a gift bag containing two bottles of wine so that she didn't have to pay at the bar. One of the bottles, and the woman, was half drunk when she arrived.

Drunk common people are drawn to microphones like moths to a flame. One of the women used the mic to berate her fellow guests for stealing her mobile phone. She had actually put it down somewhere. Another man told us that he wanted to use a microphone to propose to his girlfriend. He actually wanted to ramble incoherently for several minutes.

The least charming guest was overly enthusiastic about the band and tried to bully everybody into dancing. He had to be ushered from the stage several times, and he showed us with great pride his football hooligan tattoos and the tracking tag around his ankle (he was on bail and under curfew).

I never expected that hell on earth would have a sprung dancefloor, a proscenium stage, and a buffet.

Richard "snob" B