BBQ 2009

Last year we missed the good barbecuing weather by a day. This year we missed it by an entire week. Yes last Saturday, as my UK-based readers will fondly recall, was a blisteringly hot and sunny 27° - perfect weather for a BBQ, garden games and sitting under the shade of a gazebo sipping Pimms, or your tipple of choice. Yesterday the only outdoor tippling was provided by the iron-grey clouds blanketing the city, which proceeded to dump their load on us from early morning until mid-afternoon.

Hardly the stuff to inspire thoughts of garden gallivanting, or to enthuse the weary salad-maker (me) as he chops his parsley and soaks his bulgur wheat for the tabouleh, or empties tins of assorted beans into a large stainless-steel bowl for the three-bean salad, especially when he'd been up since 5.30am to boil the potatoes and eggs for a classic potato salad.

Still, the late afternoon forecast was for the weather to dry up between 2-3pm and remain dry for the rest of the evening, so at least the day wasn't set to be a complete wash-out even if it didn't match the gloriousness of the previous weekend. Having sussed the weather, it was with some dismay we learned via neighbourhood runner that the BBQ - its early stages anyway - had been forcibly decamped to the local club for the hours of 3-6pm.

Our forlorn troop of salads wended its way down the road and around the corner shortly after 3pm to join the other cold food on a series of low tables, to be picked over while the kids were entertained with various games of musical chairs, bumps and egg & spoon races (Health-and-Safety-mandated plastic eggs, naturally).

After this brief exile we marched the remaining salads, quiches and trifles back down the road to their rightful home, alongside the soon-to-be grilled burgers, sausages, toasties, kebabs and an assortment of breads. At the urging of several neighbours I once again performed my erection in the garden - an impressive affair that can easily shelter 20 people - while other assorted male partners looked on with envy from their more traditional positions manning the barbecues.

It wasn't long before I'd put myself on the outside of three hot dogs, a burger, two toasties and two portions of tiramisu, at which point I realised I was almost incapable of sitting down so I'd better stop. Luckily it was time for the quiz, a marginally easier version of last year's organised into 26 questions whose answers began with successive letters of the alphabet. Our team - named Royal Jerseys in honour of the potato salad and other potato-related delights - won with 17/26. It would have been 18 if I'd been able to remember the Nikkei in time. Why is it when you need Nikkei all you can think of is Hang Seng?

All this tongue-in-cheek hilarity belies the fact that I was totally not in the mood for a social event yesterday. In fact all of us agreed we'd far rather be sat cosily in front of a good film than trying to find the other person in the room going "oink" (the Animal Game) or trying to pick up a rapidly-diminishing cereal carton using only our teeth, and without touching the floor with any part of our bodies other than feet (the Box Game). Looking on the bright side, we did manage to avoid any hint of Choo-Choo.

So for the second year running, we didn't stay until 3am. We didn't even stay until midnight. We left as soon as the Box Game had run its course (with five limber contortionists attempting to pick up a flat piece of cardboard from the floor), thereby relieving the remaining party-goers of our bah humbugnesses.