I wasn't planning on doing much on New Year's Eve. It's always a bit of an anticlimax isn't it? Last year I'd had a wonderful evening in Canterbury with good friends, and someone I thought I'd be seeing this year in with too. This wasn't to be and I was inevitably facing a New Year where I'd be running the comparisons through my head and feeling a little bit sad.
Plus, going out on NYE is always expensive, too busy and then there's the arse ache of getting home. I'd made loose plans to have a few people over, then during a very drunken evening round my oldest school friend's flat over Christmas back home, we hatched a plan for her to come down and spend it with me.
Thursday morning, Animal Girl and KiteBoy arrived outside my flat and I ran down excitedly to meet them. The car boot was opened to show enough stuff for a family of 6 for a week away. I pulled a case out of the car. Animal Girl commented,
"That's my makeup." I laughed, thinking she was joking. When the two of them had unpacked in my room and covered it in their stuff, it became clear that she did indeed have a separate suitcase for makeup.
We spent the day wandering through Shoreditch, Columbia Road, Brick Lane and Spitalfields and had a drink in Tracey Emin's local, The Golden Heart. I introduced Animal Girl to the wonders of the vintage shops in Brick Lane and made a resolution to get skinny enough to fit into a chic vintage dress this year.
So the plan for the evening was to just enjoy a civilised evening in, I'd cook something nice for dinner and we'd watch Jools Holland and pop some champagne at midnight. We watched the ITV drama 'Sleep With Me' which is based on one of my favourite books; it was a bit of a let down with some er, strange sex scenes.
We were all quite happy lounging around in our casual gear, but Animal Girl insisted on getting changed into a mini dress and 6 inch heels to see in the New Year. On my sofa.
Since the drinking had began around 3pm, we'd been careful to pace ourselves. Animal Girl had brought down Chinese lanterns to set off at midnight to float into the sky with our wishes for 2010. At five to midnight, the order was issued to get the Taittinger from the fridge and get the lantern lit. We excitedly switched to the live coverage from by the Thames to hear the Big Ben countdown. (Just a small side note, why on earth was Mylene Klass chosen to present that? She was atrocious.)
"Quick, get the lantern lit!" squealed Animal Girl. I prepped the bottle of champagne, poised over the balcony.
"Five, four, three, two, one, HAPPY NEW YEAAAAAARRRR!" we yelled out into the East London ether, as the champagne exploded over the neighbours' balconies below (sorry about that) and fireworks began to pop and crackle over the sky. We hugged and whooped and toasted what was sure to be a better year than last.
KiteBoy lit the firelighter in the lantern. They're much bigger than you think, aren't they? He kept it inside the flat to ensure it caught light properly, then took it out on to the balcony. Unfortunately, my balcony overlooks an enclosed courtyard so the wind gets caught in a trap of buildings. He held it, flapping over the balcony, about to let it go.
Me, worriedly: "Are you sure this won't float into my neighbours' balconies...?!"
Animal Girl: "No, Kite Boy let it go!! It's got all our hopes and dreams in!" (We were champagne drunk by this point)
The wind whipped the now raging firelighter encased in paper and the paper inevitably caught fire. We all yelled "Nooooooo!" KiteBoy was forced to drop the fire onto the dry wooden balcony floor for fear of burning his hands. (Or dropping his beer, priorities.)
Me, shrieking to Animal Girl who was just inside the doorway: "Get some water! GET SOME WATER!!"
Animal Girl totters out with half a tiny wine glass of water.
Luckily, this did actually do the job and our hopes and dreams lay fizzing and smoking on the balcony, a pile of half burned, soggy paper. Let's hope that this does not set the tone for the year and become a sad realisation of a metaphor.
However, something magical did happen. Just after we'd yelled our "Happy New Years!" the snow began to fall over East London, fat white flakes settling on my black cardigan. We grinned at each other and drank more champagne.
We spent the remainder of the evening watching Jools Holland and debating Florence & The Machine (Animal Girl hates her with a real passion, inexplicably.) We then enjoyed the 2009 highlights of Glasto and had more fizz when No'rn Ir'on came home from her Medieval Banquet evening (apparently, in a word, "shite.")
The Glasto coverage finished with Blur wowing the crowds with The Universal. Animal Girl and I came together as friends at 12, united by our love for 90s Indie, mainly the magnificent Blur. We've seen them together a few times, including their epic Hyde Park gig last summer. We ended the night singing The Universal at the top of our lungs and dancing to the live compilation of their perfomances over a decade.
What a way to end the year and see in a new one.
This is the next century
Where the universal's free
You can find it anywhere
Yes, the future has been sold
Every night we're gone
And to karaoke songs
How we like to sing a long
Although the words are wrong
It really, really, really could happen
Yes, it really, really, really could happen
When the days they seem to fall through you, well just let them go
No one here is alone, satellites in every home
Yes the universal's here, here for everyone
Every paper that you read
Says tomorrow is your lucky day
Well, here's your lucky day
It really, really, really could happen
Yes, it really, really, really could happen
When the days they seem to fall through you, well just let them go
Well, it really, really, really could happen
Yes, it really, really, really could happen
When the days they seem to fall through you, well just let them go
Just let them go
Animal Girl got put to bed by Kite Boy. Seeing as were all wrecked by this point, he wanted to put something by the bed in case she was poorly in the night. Rather than getting something from the kitchen he inexplicably chose the plantpot from the balcony which had been outside for 6 months and contained some manky soil and some rotting leaves.
She woke up in 2010 next to a fuschia pink plant pot; wondering just how drunk she'd been since she apparently had thrown up mud in the night.
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