27 July, 2008 in Uncategorized by Aonghas

School Ball Round Two

I woke up this morning with the thought of the Avondale College Ball in mind. The weather outside was miserable and wet (hmm, I just thought about the weather outside, I mean it would have to be outside right? You can’t have weather inside…) and I didn’t really feel like going to violin lesson to be honest. But it was one of those things that I couldn’t get myself out of and usually when I feel like that, I end up actually enjoying violin lesson anyway. Mum came home just after 10am to take us to violin lesson. Afterwards we went to Pak’n Save on Lincoln Road and Mum spent forever in there. I think all three of us in the car were dazed and unconscious by the time she had returned, not to mention the fogged windows and smell of bodies in the car.

I didn’t do much for the rest of the afternoon when we finally got home, but I knew I had to pick Serenne up from her house at around 5:15pm so I made sure I allowed time to have a shower before I left. The storm outside was bustling and hurling around and I imagined arriving at the ball and seeing all the girls in their soaking dresses with smudged make-up running down their faces… it didn’t seem like a pretty sight.

When I arrived at Serenne’s house, she gave me the tie to wear that matched her dress material and colour. It took me three, maybe four attempts at tying the tie before it finally looked like it was the right length. Even then the skinny end of the tie was longer than the fat end at the front, so I just decided that I would tuck the thinner end into my shirt. We had a couple of photos taken before we left, and luckily for us, the rain wasn’t falling too hard at the time.

I forgot to bring the address of Serenne’s friend’s house where they were having the pre-ball and it didn’t help that the road map was left in our other car, so I was left to go with my gut instinct as well as listen to Serenne point me in the general direction. We ended up circling a few roads a couple of times, but finally managed to locate the house (which was lucky, because I was getting worried that we would be driving around in circles for the rest of the night)!.

When I walked into the house, I was introduced to the friend’s mother, and a few other parents were also there. I was ushered into the dining room where everyone else was, and Serenne introduced me to her school friends, some I had heard about before. It was a little unnerving being around some of her friends at first, because I didn’t know what Serenne had told her friends about me, and I didn’t know what sort of first impressions I was giving. I just tried to stay friendly and greet new people as I passed by. The photo shoot just before we all left for the ball made me feel like a celebrity! All the parents had their digital cameras out and there were flashes flashing all over the show for a good minute or two. I never realised how hard it was to keep a big smile on my face constantly for so long!

At first I thought I was going to be following someone else to the ball, because I had no idea where Eden Park was, but we weren’t sure who to follow and before long we were lost already. Serenne rang one of her friends who was still to come past us apparently, so her friend told us to stop on the side of the road and wait for them to honk their horn as they drove past. I stopped on the corner of the road (where it was perhaps not the safest place to stop) and sure enough a loud toooooot blazed past not long after (oh yeah, and I experienced the Doppler effect right there too).

Parking was not a problem at all because there were carparks within the premises that we could use. After walking up five flights of stairs, we walked across the red carpet and shook the hands of the head students and the College Principal. Serenne was on the look out for her friends to sit with, bumping into other people she knew on the way. We found her friends occupying a table on the other side of the dance floor so we joined them. After we had settled down in our places, someone suggested that we have our photos taken while it wasn’t too busy so we headed to the end of the ball room where the professional photographers were. First we had a group photo and then we had individual partner photos. Serenne and I were the last partners in the group to get our photo taken. I hope they looked all right…

The dance floor was being entertained by the live band they had up on the stage. I must say that the band was very professional and the standard of music they played was very good. I didn’t want to get too wasted before dinner though, so I made sure I didn’t pull out many of my signature dance moves too soon! There was a large variety of pastas, salads and meats to choose from at dinner time. Everything looked so appetising, but I didn’t want to over-eat and get too full. Dessert was served at our table after dinner. For dessert we had these cube-shaped ice cream-filled savoury things that tasted pretty good.

For the rest of the evening we spent most of the time dancing to the music either performed by the band or played by the DJ. It was very entertaining and a lot of fun, but as the saying goes “time flies when you’re having fun”, it sure did. I met up with a few old friends from Rangeview throughout the evening and I even got to have a photo taken with the Deputy Head Boy of Avondale which was very cool.

I just remembered that Carey was at the St Cuthbert’s ball tonight as well. I wonder how that went for him.

Oh and when I got home I heard about the All Blacks game. Disappointing 34-19 loss to the Wallabies in Sydney…

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