Last night I went to an 80s disco at the local golf club. Great stuff, I thought, as I rummaged around in the bottom of my wardrobe for my old pixie boots and pulled various sparkly scarves out of the back of drawers (hoarder? me? never!). I set to work with the scissors to hack the bottom and sleeve ends off an old t-shirt along with the collar, prior to turning it inside out (yes, I remember the old tricks, too!), as unfortunately my old 80s t-shirts seemed to have shrunk over the years... Out came the sparkly make-up, and I even sat and painted my nails with glitter nail-varnish, which believe me is a lot more effort than I usually go to - I'm just a tad too much on the lazy side to be particularly high maintenance!
Luckily the boots were old and stretched enough to fit over my bruised and bumpy ankle. Earlier in the week I had managed to fall over my own feet and twist my ankle whilst walking cold stone sober along a flat and even piece of pavement on the way home from the dentist - quite an achievement, I felt, having managed to return unscathed after trekking around various parts of Australia and New Zealand over the last month! Although changing colour rather interestingly on a daily basis, it was fine to walk on, probably not great for a boogie, but I was willing to give it a go.
Anyway, back to the disco. My friends and I arrived to compliments from the bar staff for our outfits, but lots of very strange looks from the rest of the disco-goers. It seemed that we were the only folk there who had decided to dress for the occasion - there were a few blokes in pale suits, but unfortunately not in an ironic sleeves rolled up Miami Vice kind of way. Not to worry, we got ourselves some drinks, found a table and got settled down for the evening's entertainment. The place filled up, as did the dance floor - in many ways it was just like our old school discos back in the 80s - the girls dancing in circles around their handbags (quite literally for one group!), and the boys standing around the edges looking slightly nervous, with the odd brave soul getting in there for a boogie every now and then. All very similar except that the ages had progressed from spotty teens to (dare I say it) verging on middle-aged (aaaaarrgghhhh! no, never!!!). Unfortunately, it seemed that the mentality of many hadn't progressed at all - after several rather catty looks and comments in the loos and at the bar, we decided to call it a night and leave at the ridiculously early hour of 10:30. We retired back to my friend's house for a few more drinks and music - we stayed with the 80s theme, but went for some slight variety from the constant "funk" that was all that had been played all evening - even the bouncers had commented on being a bit bored with the music when we were leaving. So, on with The Pogues to bring the energy level up, and onwards and upwards from there!
All in all it was an interesting evening, though rather a shame that what we had gone for as a bit of fun seemed to be such a problem for some. It was, after all, an 80s disco, and we had gone for a look that wouldn't have been out of place on Top of the Pops of the time - we certainly hadn't expected the reaction that we received. I'm sure that there's a valuable lesson about life to be learned here - when I work out what it is, I'll let you know!
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