Big Cake

Hmm... Where to start...? It's all a blur.

OK. The weekend. I got home from work on Thursday evening (weekends here are Friday and Saturday) and TOH was blustering about telling me we had to be ready to leave the apartment at 7.15pm sharp. I was a bit baffled as TOH is the world's most rubbish time-keeper and being hurried along by him was something especially alien to our lives.

Obviously we were late - despite rushing me, he couldn't help but ignore his own advice. I was hustled off to the Emirates Palace - an enormous swanky-as-ya-like hotel on the sea-front and was given a cocktail whilst TOH prattled into his phone to our friend Phil who was running late. Phil is never late. Phil likes booze too much and anything that cuts down on valuable drinking time is against all Phil holds dear. Phil arrived. Without Laura, his wife (also strange as Laura loves booze only a little bit less than Phil). After some extensive and incredibly pointless blathering on from Phil about Laura's tardy arrival my suspicions were tingling - let's call it 'cake-senses'. I needed another drink - it'd been one of those weeks - so I ordered one and then popped off to the gents. On my return Phil had disappeared to 'meet Laura and the girls' and my fresh drink had been snatched away and I was being jostled along away from my seat. Not only were my suspicions aroused but I was getting bloody cranky! All this shoving about and depriving me of a drink was really giving me the arse!

We moved on to another bar (Emirates Palace is enormous and has many). Laura was sat at the bar with Jane and Jess. All of them had nearly finished their drinks. How come? Laura was supposed to have been running late. Hmmm. I asked for a drink and someone offered to get me one. After some polite chit-chat my drink still hadn't arrived. It still hadn't been ordered. I decided to get one myself and was about to hop off my bar stool when some woman tapped me on the shoulder and asked if I could pass her the cocktail menu. Weirdly, she bore a strong resemblance to my friend Jayne. She was with a woman who looked like my friend Julie. They were smiling at me strangely. It just didn't add up and people were taking photos whilst I stood dazed and confused. It wasn't right. Jayne and Julie live in London. I needed a bit of a sit down whilst everyone guffawed and proclaimed this was the first time they've ever seen me speechless. Jayne gave me her drink. Thank fuck for that!

Next week it's my birthday. It's a significant one. Because most of my friends live a long way away I didn't see any point in having a massive event, so I decided I'd like to go to Petra to see the whole place lit with candlelight on my 40th birthday instead.

TOH agreed and booked it all for me. However, he had other plans for the weekend before my actual birthday and flew some of my friends out to celebrate. How he managed to keep it all a secret is beyond me - his ability to keep secrets is worse than his ability to keep time.

Amazing.

Everyone left this morning. When I got home from work this afternoon it only really dawned on me that my friends have just been here for the weekend and now they're gone. I felt happy and yet really sad. When I moved here I missed them all quite badly. I'd gotten over it but now, after this weekend...