At my grandparent's 50th wedding anniversary...
...my mother's godmother, 'S' hadn't seen us all for a good 20 years or so. I'm reliably informed she'd been pre-gaming with the other dust-farters (stolen from the brilliant Mandrill) which may explain the following.
My sister and I had been getting the venue ready - only the most fun jobs for us young 'uns! We were both excessively warm – the heating was set to a temperature more commonly found three feet above molten lava – and exhausted, as my sisters one-year-old crotchfruit doesn’t travel well and had chosen to make his displeasure known several times an hour -every fucking hour- between approximately 2am and 7am.

Finally the venue is ready; the guests arrive and the wine begins to flow.
As my sister and I are recuperating (definitely not dozing…) in a quiet corner, S rushes up to my older sister and exclaims 'Denise! (for that is my mother's name) How lovely to see you - you look well!'.

I’ve never seen someone so tired move so fast. My sister span round with a face like a slapped arse, and spat 'it's Natalie, actually - I'm Denise's eldest.'
A look of buttock-trembling horror crept across S’ flushed and powdered face.
‘oooh. Erm. Hello, dear! It’s, err, been a while. How have you been, Natasha?’
‘Natalie. And I’m fine thankyou. Denise is over there.’
They flee in opposite directions, and I realise S hasn’t even recognised me.

To be fair, that isn’t that unusual. There’s an relatively nice photo from that evening of the womenfolk; my gran, my mum, my sister and myself. You can plainly see the family resemblance in their faces; it's almost uncanny, like some kind of special effect. Except for me.

I look like the child they got from the orphanage.

I count myself lucky though. My sister knows exactly what she'll look like in 20 years time...
(berk, Wed 6 May 2009, 13:41, Reply)