I Blog Therefore I Am (AM ©)

There are plenty of places at square du Lux where you can eat, drink and be merry but let’s stick to lucky number 7 that is "O' Flannell's". Little wonder Tippler chose this particular place as our meeting point last Thursday evening, it is probably the favourite of his many second residences.

Right after a long tiring day's work nearby, I arrived on the premises before 8 pm to be warmly welcomed by our evening host. Nice haircut, T, you do look much younger, have yet another haircut, by all means, Laura would appreciate her toyboy even more. By the way, it is a pity we were not given the opportunity to meet the object of your lust in person...

In the absence of a hostess, Kiwi Ed kept me good company before I was introduced to gregarious Aunty Marianne who was already sipping a G&T with lime whilst Tippler was examining her classy walking stick... and much more than that, it goes without saying.

Kiwi Ed is UP Front’s webmaster and Tippler’s best mate. He is also a fanatic book reader, who is usually rather silent and captivated by his books’ real or imaginary world he's travelling into. Kiwi Ed is a fine man, rather quiet and sometimes looking a tad helpless, like a lost child. But this is the reason why he is the kind of man whose immense sweetness and blamelessness makes you feel like taking him by the hand and walking him back home in order to tuck him in, singing a lullaby after reading him a bed time story.

Tarquin, the young and talented UP Front photographer, was in attendance but we didn’t give him a flash since he was wearing his bartender hat and apron that evening. The place was packed and so we were standing at the bar when yet another UP Front member made his appearance. I had already met Aloisius months ago and have seen him many times since but I never realised he is so tall, I was rather impressed. After standing right beside me, he sat on a stool and still looked as tall as a cypress, which is not that odd, after all, considering he is a member of the press corps. A fine chap with a great sense of humour and a lovely smile, who gives much appreciated affectionate kisses on cheeks, the perfect handsome gentleman to be chosen as a double in Bond’s next movie, of which he will have of course to publish a review to the attention of the UP Front Readers. I had the opportunity to tell him we travelled on the same train to the UK last December. He confirmed having had a good time with his family during his Christmas holiday and I had to refrain a giggle when picturing him wearing a paper hat and reading out loud a fire cracker joke.... as if he wasn’t tall and humorous enough as it is...

Come to think of it, I now realise why Goth Master used the expression “Minky was cunningly disguised as a shrub” in his version of the facts. I can easily imagine that from the angle he was standing in front of the bar, having just arrived with his exquisite and beloved Mariposa, he couldn’t possibly see me behind Aloisius. As weird as it may seem, I’ll have you know that gothic elegance exists; we had the living proof amongst us.

Meanwhile, Lady Daphne had joined in, spreading her illustrious wit all around. Without a shadow of a doubt, she is a Lady, a bright and clever one may I add, who is in possession of a remarkable collection of pearls of wisdom. We had two girls nights out before and realised we have a lot in common, which made me feel I knew her for years already. The O’Flannell kitchen was already closed by the time we thought we could use another drink to wash down some food, so our dinner turned up to be one portion of chips we shared. I sure look forward to at least a traditional “paquet de frites” during our next girls’ time out in Brussels. Daphne is adorable and therefore, one can do nothing else than just become very fond of her. Her French is perfect, as well as Marianne’s, who finally took me out of the shrub in order to be introduced to Mrs Elaib who was chatting with an exceptional butterfly also known as Mariposa.

I had been wondering for a while who this gorgeous person could be. I was not aware of her presence that very day, as England was expected to be entertained by Tippler alone the next evening. So the lovely couple appeared to be eventually able to join us on Thursday, to our great pleasure. Elaib arrived later on, as smart as can be. He is undeniably a true rhetorician. He seemed not to recognise me at first or at all, but we had met in O’Flannell’s months ago, where he even bought me a drink, as part of a round to our table shared with Kiwi Ed, Tippler and someone called J, I think. Despite the fact that we had not been introduced properly, J stole two cheek kisses that day, saying “à bientôt” to me as I was leaving, a while after having raised my glass to Elaib’s wife and childrens’ safe journey back to Brussels. J! And there was me thinking all English men are gentlemen like Elaib, who then kissed my hand, as a proper Knight of the Goddess would do. Apparently, English men like the Belgian kissing-when-we-meet-routine very much...

All in all, I didn’t have the opportunity to chat a lot with Marianne whom I was meeting for the first time. She noticed very quickly I looked exhausted and was not fully participating to the conversation. There was a moment when I really felt I was about to faint and had to take some fresh air outside. I was indeed extremely tired after many long days of hard work this week in office, and having to stand up and put up with the hullabaloo made me feel very uncomfortable, not to mention that I had to make a tremendous effort to understand what people were talking about. As Daphne was saying to me, when Brit people meet, they tend to speak very fast, but I assure you I can follow a fast conversation easily as long as I can HEAR what you guys are saying. Right, I may be deaf, I won’t deny it... But that place is definitely not a quiet one, especially when the music covers up your foreign to me tone. There you go, Tippler, some more criticism that is not to be mistaken for denigration. There is always room for improvement, so let the girls organise the next do, this is a women’s business, our business, isn’t it Daphne?

Anyway, God bless Daphne and Marianne for providing me with stamina, thanks to some chips and a vitamine C sweet. Some food supply and a place to sit at last made me feel much better and smiling again, to which Tippler remarked I ought to smile more because it makes me look lovelier. Well thanks very much for the compliment, T, I just wish I could find more reasons to smile all the time...

One of them good reasons to smile was the rose Goth Master kind-heartedly offered me, in compensation for not having received anything the day before as I have no Valentine. But I might have received something if only Tippler had introduced me to Lynx, as he was supposed to... Find out more about Lynx, Drama Queen's guest blogger on 12 February 2007. By the way, Tippler, I am nearly fully convinced that Lynx is a real character... “Nearly” because I haven’t seen him yet!

Absentees aside (we missed you DQ, Z & Q and look forward to seeing you as soon as possible), it was a good evening, as Tippler recalls, especially that it was topped off by the “unexpected” late arrival of “She-with-the-legs-that-form-the-ladder-to-heaven”. Obviously, Tippler is not superstitious and to be frank, he was too pissed to notice that she had left her coat right behind him so that she would have to eventually come again to take it back, probably attempting a -sticking-your-hands-inside-my-bra session. She's French you said? Well, after having been extremely polite with her at the time, I feel like having a last word with her: Madame, je vous saurai gré de ne plus interrompre de conversation de la sorte et vous fais grâce de mes commentaires les plus pointus, par souci de préserver votre réputation. I ask you, how effortlessly French does this sound?

So I left with Goth Master and Mariposa, leaving Tippler behind, living in hope and sorting out his way to Heaven. That would be home, indubitably. My taxi was not a compact coupé and its driver was not sexy but he also drove me home at last, after such a long and memorable day...

There I sat in peace and quiet, assessing the evening and thinking about how it all began. I was happy as a browser and never meant to start my own blog. It is rather time consuming but worth the while, after all. I must admit it is a fantastic way of communicating with people from all around the world and I feel lucky to have met several people through this blog experience.

I thank you T, DQ and Daphne but most of all, I thank you, D, from the bottom of my heart. Now if I see you deserting your office to come into mine next week, trying not to burst into laughter in the corridor, I’ll just know you’ve been reading me...

Thank you also for making me practise my English on a daily basis, thank you for the slang qualification (O-level so far). Thank you All, it was a pleasure meeting or seeing you again and I look forward to our next get-together.

Oh, by the way.... isn’t it high tea time yet? DQ, you know what I mean, just one more guest blogger, pleeeeeease!!