Danny Katz: Throwing a New Year's party? You're an idiot

You’ve decided to have a New Year’s party. Yeah, you’re going to have it at your house and invite all your dearest friends to welcome in the new year with a night of laughter and dancing and joyous revelry, you massive massive idiot.

So you send out a text to everyone that says “Heyyyyy, I’m having a New Year’s par-tayyyyyyyy! Come along and bring a drink (or several!) PLS RSVP ASAP THX (phewwww!!!)” – the kooky comical tone giving people a little preview of the hilarity and good times they are sure to enjoy.

Then you sit back and wait for the replies to flood in.

A day passes, two days, a week, you hear nothing. That’s because all your dearest friends are waiting to get a better offer before they commit to yours.

There is all kinds of desperate stuff going on behind the scenes that you have no idea about: late-night calls, clandestine discussions, crisis negotiations. It’s intense.

You are not discouraged by the lack of replies. You figure that everyone must be too busy to text back immediately, or maybe there are mobile-tower outages across town – yeah that must be it – so you carry on with your party plans, you poor, deluded buffoon.

You go out and buy a fire pit to create a summery backyard ambience: it’s a big rust-toned one but all the colour comes off on your shirt when you carry it to the car and turns out, it’s just an enormous chef’s mixing bowl painted with insta-rust.

You also go into your shed and get out your festoon lights for glamorous outdoor mood lighting, but they’re all tangled together in a big lewd clump, all the sticky-outy bulbs snagged on each other.

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After two hours of untangling, you give up and throw the festoon lights back in the shed, close the door, and let them carry on with whatever they were doing in the dark.

You won’t let yourself be defeated by these setbacks. You prepare the house for partying by cleaning the bathroom, tidying the garden, and stocking up on plenty of food and beverages.

You even put together a party playlist: you want to be up to date so you throw in a few songs from your So Fresh: The Hits of Summer 2005 CD. And you fill it out with heaps of classic funky dance tracks: 10cc, Karen Carpenter, and selections from Miss Saigon for after midnight, when the dance floor really heats up.

Your New Year’s party goes ahead, but it doesn’t turn out quite like you had hoped. Not everyone shows up. Just the old Korean couple from next door, who pop around for 15 minutes. And your brother and sister-in-law who bring their three kids, a dog, and a six-pack of beer with two beers missing.

Also someone named Ivy shows up; she says she’s a friend of Alice’s but you don’t know anyone named Alice, so it’s all a bit of a mystery.

But still you make the most of it and have a great New Year’s party, laughing and dancing and revelling until dawn. All by yourself.