The whanau gathered the following day for a small and extremely select 'dinner party'. It was dubbed an 'L' party (isn't it obvious? - L is 50 in roman numerals). Here's a round-up of what the clever people turned up as:
Murray thought out of the square and came as 'Elvis'; yours truly turned up as Loretta Swit (if you squint into the sun with your fingers crossed behind your back after swallowing a bottle of vino, you'd be fooled too).
Jenny made an extremely elegant Leopard, while Chris tried to make out he was a 'Lecherous Lothario' (you've either got it, or you haven't!)
Ian and Robyn were a 'Leopard' and a 'Litterbug' respectively (An entirely new twist on the meaning of 'kitty litter'...)
Philippa came as the 'Lotto Lady' (very clever) while Paul did his best to be a 'Lout'.
Ian had a back-up plan in case his leopard gear was too uncomfortable (which it was - or maybe he just has trouble making decisions?). In his second life he came back as a 'Long-distance runner'.
Judy came dressed as a 'Learner Driver' displaying not only 'L' plates, but also a newspaper headline of a car accident. Very appropriate, given the fact that she has just recently crashed the car and caused a fair degree of damage.
Winston made a particularly splendid 'Lighthouse' (Pencarrow, in case you were wondering).
The venue for this little shindig was a marquee on the back lawn which Murray insisted on calling the 'L' hole. Fortunately for us, the weather cooperated (no wind, no rain, not too cold) . Murray catered the entire meal - an upmarket barbeque menu of six courses - and did a fantastic job for which I would like to thank him publicly. He has no plans to repeat the performance in a hurry, but he was told on numerous occasions that he 'should have been in catering'. Yeah, right...
The menu was printed out and consisted of a Bloody 'L' (or Bloody Rosemary, take your pick) with a slice of Bruschetta; Butterflied prawns and bacon-wrapped scallops with wild rice; a pause (while the mains were cooking) which was filled with a frozen limoncello; a choice of steak with green peppercorn sauce, chicken breast with apricot and brie or pork and chargrilled pineapple, all served with green beans, barbecued whole tomato, potato and onion puffs, and a large mushroom with pesto and blue cheese. The dessert consisted of a choice of 3 different flavoured icecream balls, a baby pavlova with cream and raspberry coulis, or tiramisu. Then there was coffee with chocolates and liqueurs to finish off. We decided to have a disposable policy so that dishes weren't going to be an issue, so everything except the cutlery for the main course and the wine glasses were thrown out. We've blown NZ's carbon footprint for the foreseeable future!!!
Richard arrived just as dinner was starting (he'd had a conflict of interest - a 'stag do' to go to (the only one of us with a life?) and had had to rush to get here. He came as L Ron Hubbard (who knows what he looks like in real life???).
As the night went on, some people mixed and matched characters, some people just looked more like who they'd tried to be in the first place, some went to sleep, and some just had a good time... but everybody wanted to be blond - what does that tell you???
Wisely, Robyn waited till next morning to turn blond!
And I almost forgot - there was a surprise cake too! Very appropriately, it was a very big 'L'.
And that was it - all over bar breakfast the following morning. A-Once-In-50-Year-Event successfully concluded, with many thanks to all concerned.
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