Cold BBQ

There is such a think in Muzzaleeze as "a cold bbq". No, this is not an unused appliance rusting in the corner of the garden (THAT would be my latest work of art in progress, rust is such a beautiful medium to work with you understand...) No, "the cold BBQ" in our house is something that is long, drawn out, painful, most likely the last place on earth you want to be at that particular point in time and usually involves family members you can't normally be with for more than two hours without wanting to stab them .

The phrase was coined after Scott's father sank his yacht in the middle of the Tasman sea. He and his crew mate bobbed around in the freezing ocean in a force eight gale in a teensy weensy life raft for 22 hours. The only time they were warm was the minute and a half that followed them wetting their pants. They mistook the bailing sponge for a biscuit in their delirium and after being tossed out of the raft for the third time, said their goodbyes to each other, fairly certain this was the end of the road for them. They were injured, cold and traumatised.

What has all this got to do with a cold BBQ you might ask? Well, after we knew they had been rescued, a few of us were sitting around trying to imagine the horror of it all. I wracked my brain to try and think of something equally horrific and I said - totally serious and in my most Princess like way - that it would JUST be like being at a cold BBQ and you just couldn't leave even though you were freezing and bored to death. The others looked at me like I had grown another head. Like that didn't even begin to compare to the horrors of 22 hours lost at sea. Idiots. They have obviously never been to a really cold boring BBQ where it was rude to leave too early. Then they would have understood - it is almost EXACTLY the same sort of thing. No really. Almost identical in terms of trauma levels.

So anyhooooo, rightly or wrongly, "a cold bbq" now sums up any event we are less than enthusiastic about but are obligated to attend for one reason or another. I will write further about some of these events when I can bring myself to relive them, it won't be easy - they were VERY cold BBQ's in many cases, but as I have mentioned before, we Princesses are a hardy bunch, defending castles and fighting off dragons etc as necessary, so reliving the odd cold BBQ shouldn't be too much of a bother at all.