#12 Book club

This is my second book club, and this is the third book I've read with it, and it's the first time it's been at my place. Last week I dusted all my book-shelves and straightened the books; on the weekend I vacuumed and got as much junk as possible out of the lounge-room; on Monday I bought booze and olives and ingredients for things; Tuesday after work I stripped naked and cleaned the bathroom - even under the washing machine, and cooked - I didn't get to bed until after midnight; and today I got a haircut, bought some nice loo paper, turned the heater on and finished reading the book.

Tonight 5 of my old friends and the 2 people who I only know from book club, came. Four of us are scientists, four of us aren't. We sat in a circle on two lounge chairs, three camp stools, an ikea chair and two cushions on the floor; we ate, and drank champagne, and ate, and drank, and caught up on people's travels, and gossip, though some people were silent.

Then we compared the covers of our copies of the book, and every single one was different. Then we discussed the book intelligently, and everyone brought up different points, and we agreed on its strengths, and on its strange weaknesses, and of course the narrator was gay, though in 1908 he wouldn't have known it; and then we gave it a mark out of five, and A took notes, and D rambled on, and then at ten o'clock everyone had gone.

And I was glad that no one had heard the neighbours or smelled the raw sewage.