We Are Family
Travelled down to Gosport on Friday for the annual gathering of the clan, albeit a muted one as none of the northerners travelled down this time, so it was just all the Gosport branch plus me, Sam and Dave.
We started with a meet-up at my cousin Gayle's on Friday night, with everyone bringing their own grog plus a contribution to the food. We started with board games, and soon found out that Aunt Jean plays board games like Richard Nixon - and that, even by her usual stroppy standards, she was in a very argumentative mood that persisted for the rest of the evening.
Food, including some excellent chicken and lamb made by Gayle, was followed by forming a circle for the parlour games the others used to play at Grandma's on Christmas Day (my father never let us go). There was a long game of 'This is a Tick'. When we got to 'This is a fuzzy duck' I tried to trap my mother by saying 'Does he?', as in the student drinking game of that name, but she just burst out laughing. Then when we were on 'This is a pheasant plucker' Sam, who I think had been considerably on the vino by that point, stumbled over the phrase twice first time round, then on the second round came right out with 'This is a pleasant fucker' - at a time when no-one else was speaking. Cue hysterics all round. Then it was 'Don't show Keith your teeth' - the category was cities; I couldn't believe no-one had heard of Den Haag when I said it. Finally came Deadpan, where you had to keep an absolute straight face, never laughing or smiling, while your neighbour touched you around the face and nearby; everyone around the circle then had to repeat the same action on their neighbour, and anyone smiling or laughing was eliminated. I won it when, having to start a new action, I blew a raspberry in Uncle Ron's face. Gayle, as referee, ruled that that was unbeatable.
We got the cards out next and spent the rest of the evening playing Ninety-Nine and Go Fish.
Saturday morning we went to Portsmouth Historic Dockyard. Sam, Dave and I went on HMS Warrior 1860 and saw a demonstration of how the guns used to be loaded and fired, and learned that the 'Captain of the Heads' was the ship's latrine cleaner. Then we went on a boat tour round the Harbour. The others did the Mary Rose. We'd agreed to all meet at the Boathouse 4 restaurant; we four plus Aunt Jean and Gayle headed for there, then as we were sitting with our drinks we got a text from my mother asking where we were. She and the other two were already eating - in the Boathouse 7 cafe. We decided we'd stay put and eat where we were. When the Boathouse 7 three had finished their meal they came up to 4 and joined us for coffees.
In the evening we went to see a local am-dram group do Grease at Ferneham Hall. The performers were very good, the singers had fine voices especially the two leads, and the whole show was lots of fun. The guy playing Roger ('Rump') actually mooned, both at the end of his 'Mooning' duet with Jan and at the end of the Flaming Dukes fight scene. My cousin Jackie was singing along to the songs and dancing in her seat, doing all the moves to Greased Lightning! At the end Jackie's 17 year old daughter India asked to see the programme. It turned out the lad playing Sonny had been in her year at school. She said she was going to message him on Snapchat.
We went over to the Isle of Wight on Sunday. In the morning some went to Ventnor Botanical Gardens while the rest, me included, went to Blackgang Chine, as it was celebrating its 175th anniversary, and while I'd gone there on a family holiday in 1983 I remembered nothing about it other than it had something to do with smugglers or pirates. It turned out to be a theme park really geared to kids, though India, and Gayle letting her inner child out, both really got into it and had a whale of a time. The model dinosaurs making realistic movements and noises were brilliant, and the colony of singing and dancing model dodos made me smile. We all had a laugh in the Hall of Mirrors and went for hair-raising high speed rides on the water slide.
We met up with the others at a pub in Godshill where we'd booked Sunday lunch for 2 pm. I went for garlic bread followed by pork fillet, since when our waitress told us there were only three roast sirloin beefs left three others in our party had been quicker to lay claim to them. The food was excellent, but we had to forgo pudding to make the half hour drive over to Osborne House in time for us to have a decent length visit there.
As it turned out, we arrived at Osborne House at 4.25 thinking it closed at 6, only to be told the house itself actually closed at 5 although the grounds remained open till 6. So we whizzed round the house, then when it shut we went for a wander round the gardens and a browse round the gift shop.
From there we drove on to the Fishbourne Inn for a drink, a chill and a chat before getting the ferry back. Mum had me, Sam and Dave as passengers; we all said our goodbyes to the others before dropping Sam and Dave at Aunt Cynthia's.
For me today, the long haul back to Bedfordshire and getting the groceries in.
We started with a meet-up at my cousin Gayle's on Friday night, with everyone bringing their own grog plus a contribution to the food. We started with board games, and soon found out that Aunt Jean plays board games like Richard Nixon - and that, even by her usual stroppy standards, she was in a very argumentative mood that persisted for the rest of the evening.
Food, including some excellent chicken and lamb made by Gayle, was followed by forming a circle for the parlour games the others used to play at Grandma's on Christmas Day (my father never let us go). There was a long game of 'This is a Tick'. When we got to 'This is a fuzzy duck' I tried to trap my mother by saying 'Does he?', as in the student drinking game of that name, but she just burst out laughing. Then when we were on 'This is a pheasant plucker' Sam, who I think had been considerably on the vino by that point, stumbled over the phrase twice first time round, then on the second round came right out with 'This is a pleasant fucker' - at a time when no-one else was speaking. Cue hysterics all round. Then it was 'Don't show Keith your teeth' - the category was cities; I couldn't believe no-one had heard of Den Haag when I said it. Finally came Deadpan, where you had to keep an absolute straight face, never laughing or smiling, while your neighbour touched you around the face and nearby; everyone around the circle then had to repeat the same action on their neighbour, and anyone smiling or laughing was eliminated. I won it when, having to start a new action, I blew a raspberry in Uncle Ron's face. Gayle, as referee, ruled that that was unbeatable.
We got the cards out next and spent the rest of the evening playing Ninety-Nine and Go Fish.
Saturday morning we went to Portsmouth Historic Dockyard. Sam, Dave and I went on HMS Warrior 1860 and saw a demonstration of how the guns used to be loaded and fired, and learned that the 'Captain of the Heads' was the ship's latrine cleaner. Then we went on a boat tour round the Harbour. The others did the Mary Rose. We'd agreed to all meet at the Boathouse 4 restaurant; we four plus Aunt Jean and Gayle headed for there, then as we were sitting with our drinks we got a text from my mother asking where we were. She and the other two were already eating - in the Boathouse 7 cafe. We decided we'd stay put and eat where we were. When the Boathouse 7 three had finished their meal they came up to 4 and joined us for coffees.
In the evening we went to see a local am-dram group do Grease at Ferneham Hall. The performers were very good, the singers had fine voices especially the two leads, and the whole show was lots of fun. The guy playing Roger ('Rump') actually mooned, both at the end of his 'Mooning' duet with Jan and at the end of the Flaming Dukes fight scene. My cousin Jackie was singing along to the songs and dancing in her seat, doing all the moves to Greased Lightning! At the end Jackie's 17 year old daughter India asked to see the programme. It turned out the lad playing Sonny had been in her year at school. She said she was going to message him on Snapchat.
We went over to the Isle of Wight on Sunday. In the morning some went to Ventnor Botanical Gardens while the rest, me included, went to Blackgang Chine, as it was celebrating its 175th anniversary, and while I'd gone there on a family holiday in 1983 I remembered nothing about it other than it had something to do with smugglers or pirates. It turned out to be a theme park really geared to kids, though India, and Gayle letting her inner child out, both really got into it and had a whale of a time. The model dinosaurs making realistic movements and noises were brilliant, and the colony of singing and dancing model dodos made me smile. We all had a laugh in the Hall of Mirrors and went for hair-raising high speed rides on the water slide.
We met up with the others at a pub in Godshill where we'd booked Sunday lunch for 2 pm. I went for garlic bread followed by pork fillet, since when our waitress told us there were only three roast sirloin beefs left three others in our party had been quicker to lay claim to them. The food was excellent, but we had to forgo pudding to make the half hour drive over to Osborne House in time for us to have a decent length visit there.
As it turned out, we arrived at Osborne House at 4.25 thinking it closed at 6, only to be told the house itself actually closed at 5 although the grounds remained open till 6. So we whizzed round the house, then when it shut we went for a wander round the gardens and a browse round the gift shop.
From there we drove on to the Fishbourne Inn for a drink, a chill and a chat before getting the ferry back. Mum had me, Sam and Dave as passengers; we all said our goodbyes to the others before dropping Sam and Dave at Aunt Cynthia's.
For me today, the long haul back to Bedfordshire and getting the groceries in.