Tony Finch – blog

My birthday party on Saturday was great – food, drink, conversation, games. Friends I haven’t seen for a while came up from London, which was especially nice.

The morning started off interestingly with me trying to work out how to spile & tap the beer without an expert to hand. The spile went in without difficulty and without spraying beer over the ceiling. The tap was more tricky though: I don’t have a suitable mallet, so I ended up improvising with a copy of the Statutes and Ordinances of the University of Cambridge (to protect the tap) and a brick (to provide momentum). The first attempt just shifted the barrel, but the tap went in fine on the second attempt. However, I forgot to make sure that it was closed first, so I spilt a pint or so of beer on the floor. Oops.

The barbecue was fired up at about 13:00 and we fed the early arrivers. More people turned up at intervals over the afternoon, and some had to leave early for various reasons, but the party gradually ramped up to full-on fun in the evening. The last people left at 03:30…

I managed to emerge from bed at about midday to find that Peter had done almost all of the post-party cleanup (including the kitchen floor), which makes him even more of a star. We ate some of the left-over meat mountain for lunch, then I retreated back to bed for a bit more sleep. The rest of Sunday was relaxed :-)

Thanks to everyone for coming and making it a very good party.