Family Reunion

I went to a family reunion last night. It was truly bizarre. My family’s quite small but last night pretty much the whole lot of them crawled out of the woodwork. Except the ones that live too far away.

Something they say about my Mum’s side of the family is: “You can’t see them, but you can bloody well hear them”. Which, aside from being utterly true, also explains quite a bit. We’re all short, and loud. The men have a tendency to wear ridiculous hats and the women scream, sing and dance at every possible opportunity.

The reunion was held in one of those old pubs which haven’t changed since the early 70s. The ones that used to smell like cigarettes but since then smoking ban just smell nose-grabbingly musty. The DJ played some classics such as ‘Brown Eyed Girl’, ‘Baby Now That I’ve Found You’ and ‘I Got You Babe’. Me and my cousin had a little dance. It was all good.

Families are weird. Why would you want to spend time with people with whom you have nothing in common with except a dodgy nose and a squeaky voice? All I know is, they’re lovely people: odd, old, boring and lovely.

I’m pretty sure that British family gatherings are the same for everyone: dodgy music, dodgy food and a dodgy old uncle that tells you how big you’ve gotten. There's always the mandatory twat - every family's got one - the bloke that is just such a dickhead that even his own mother hates him. The children avoid the grown-ups, the grown-ups avoid the old people, and the old people get drunk.

Fun for all the family.