Ten years ago I hadn’t even heard of a ‘baby shower’, but
then in a moment of weakness I watched an episode of American sitcom ‘Friends’
called appropriately ‘The One with the Baby Shower’. I vaguely recall that Jennifer
Aniston’s character Rachel was expecting Ross’s baby, and his sister Monica invited
Rachel’s friends and family along to drink wine and dispense wisdom on how to
bring up children. Their advice to Rachel wasn’t exactly free, as they had to
bring gifts to the party for mother and baby. I guess that’s the part of the
story that my wife liked, so last weekend her good friend Deneen organised a
secret one at our home. It wasn’t much of a secret though, especially after Deborah
caught me writing an email to Deneen about the arrangements and then loading
enough barbeque food in our supermarket trolley to feed her many friends that
made the 200 mile round trip from North London. 
Deneen did brilliantly pulling off the “surprise”, gaining
access to our home whilst we were at antenatal classes to decorate the living
room, hall and garden with blue balloons and ‘Baby Boy’ bunting. Best of all
though was the huge cup cake tower that made a fantastic centrepiece and served
as a nice lunch for me before the guests arrived. 
When the baby shower girls arrived I was told to make myself
scarce. From my garden office I could hear them having a good time – the
screeching reminded me of junior school sports day – the girls’ egg and spoon
race. And at the end of the party it was pretty obvious which of the ladies
present had never had any children themselves – they were the ones drunk on
Cava and begging me to give them a lift to the off-licence so they could buy
some beers for the late night party at their B&B.
Anyway, thanks to Jennifer Aniston and the lovely ladies,
Joe-Joe’s nursery is now overflowing with books, clothes, teddies and potties.
And I’m still eating cup cakes five days later!
 |
| Two fat teachers and three winos |
No comments:
Post a Comment