Naval and Military Dinner

This evening was a dinner at the Naval and Military Club, also known as the In-and-Out Club. Nice enough place, although in the somewhat shabby way that all really old men's clubs tend to be.

We had a champagne reception before dinner, and then horns piped us up into dinner, where we had to remain seated for the entire meal.

That was the most interesting bit of the night, in that at the dinner, they had informed people that if they got up from the table during the meal, they would be fined a bottle of port. And so there was this one chap, Navy Guy (actually a member of my own club) who got up from the table and left the room, which meant that they removed his chair and wrote on his name card that he'd been fined a bottle of port. Yet he thought to be more clever than the organizers, and planned to not return to the table. Instead he wandered the club and sat downstairs in the bar having loads of G&Ts. But somebody came and found him anyway, and dragged him back to the dinner, where he went and got his bottle of port. Yet, they didn't take it from him, just insisted that he buy it, which then pretty much left him open to drink an entire bottle of port throughout the evening.

Needless to say, he was quite a wreck by the end of the evening, yet even when I left at 12:30 AM, he protested mightily to my departure and seemed to show no signs of slowing down himself. (I, at least, drank only the wine I'd been served at the table and finished in the bar later with water. I will say one thing about hanging with the Young Dutchman: It's making me ridiculously responsible when I'm not around him!)

Overall, the dinner was quite good. Very nice setting, and they had musicians playing live music (string quartet kind of stuff) throughout the entire dinner, which lent the whole evening an incredibly sophisticated vibe. I now want all dinners I attend to have live music playing throughout! I ended up sitting with some students from St. Andrew's, and was at the catty-corner with the military-host types. Not the most amazing evening, but not the worst either. Although I was fortunate that almost all of my table was there, as there were quite a few pockets where guests had failed to turn up, which I think somewhat diminished the enjoyment of the evening for those with empty places beside them. I know their flatmate, the American Guy I Once Hooked-Up With, was moaning a bit to me about the evening and left early, I think because he'd been bored sitting next to empty chairs. Oh well, I shall be seeing him on Saturday for the ball I'm going to in the evening, so I shall have to do my best to make sure he has a better time then!