Team Deathmatch

It was a normal day at work with normal stuff and normal people doing normal things, for a given value of normal which isn't much.

But most of my cranial run-time was given over to planning the Team Deathmatch tonight. For 6 years or so I have been one of a group who reliably attend each other's birthday parties so that we never feel left out and the venue and style of each party has evolved over that period.

First we loved the soft play venues with the greasy chicken lumps for hot dinner as part of the party package, and we exhausted all local padded rooms from the little Sovereigns to the large Playzone with its giant slides, but by the time the Pyramids had built one, we'd grown out of it. Then we branched out into other activities such as Footballing at Rocco, Doughnutting in Southampton and Pool parties with the big bouncy castle but by the time the Pyramids had got one, we'd grown out of it. Boys and girls separated off into their differently-abled events, we don't go unicorn-shopping with them and they don't come zombie-killing with us.

So tonight, Ben wanted to have a serious Minecraft session with 10 minutes to build yourself a base in Creative, then all switch over to Survival and try to breach each other's defences and commit horrific acts of murder most foul with stone axes and stuff. We have generously allowed that the girls can exist downstairs having fun of their own. We planned our attack formations, I am Decoy #1 and Ben is Stealth Minelayer #1, although when we make user IDs, we are always called Buttbanger or PooBrain or similar, mostly butt-related.

We played Wii and X-box and Klash-of-Klans for ages while Erin and Johnny played guitar at us, an electric evening full of noise and trick birthday candles that re-light themselves. Jof picked us up so we didn't freeze on the way home. It was never going to snow but it did get cold.