Yesterday's festival was an interesting experience. It's changed a bit since the year before last when I had last been, it's more of a younger crowd and less of a quirky, creative place and more of a standard music festival.
We arrived at lunchtime and I had brought in my own liter of water so had that with a festival burrito. As it was chilly with a strong breeze. Had a nice place of vegan food with more water so only started on beer around 6 PM, trying out a special one that was brewed for the festival.
As many people started at lunchtime there was much tipsiness all around us. It didn't really bother me but a few things of note:
1. There were various music tents where people were dancing, there were yoga tents, storytelling, all sorts of areas. We went into the comedy tent and enjoyed an act so stayed for a second one. During the 20 minute break between sets, people mill in and take seats or set up their blankets. A certain young lady was very vocal and proceeded to step on to the stage during this time. A young gentleman called out to her and it ended up being the two of them on stage, trying to get the soundman to turn on the mikes (he wouldn't).
We were near the front so could hear as she proceeded to tell everyone how drunk she was at that moment and would have a headache the next morning.
As it was getting closer in, I suspect the soundman was noticing the increasing number of people who may have been confused that she was the actual entertainment so he fetched the chief comedienne who was introducing the acts and warming up the crowds. Bad move to be an idiot in front of a sober comedienne.
She took the stage and the soundman turned on the mike and she said, "Welcome people, the next set starts soon so find a seat and a place. In the meantime, be entertained for the next three minutes by these drunk twats."
Said drunk twats were overly offended and scurried off the stage.
2. The festival was selling alcohol in their own cups, you had to pay a £1 deposit to get a cup. I'm guessing they did this to cut down on the cleanup later, since it cost a quid people would return the cups to them instead of leaving them all over the grounds. To be fair there were recycle bins around and the majority of people were using them for water bottles, paper plates etc.
The more drunk people became, the less they cared about their cups. The things got thrown and left everywhere, they just bought new ones when they purchased their next drink.
As I had only had two beers and was a bit antsy without the gym, I did a walk through the grounds, collecting cups along the way. My other half jokingly suggested that I could make up the cost of drinks at the rate I was going. I like a challenge...while he enjoyed being stuffed in an overfilled dance area listening to middle age music, I collected cups...and collected and collected. I ended up making £38 in £1 cup deposits so I more than covered my 4 beers plus his over the course of the evening.
To be fair, we have another big music event and people in charity bibs will collect stray cups, if there was something like that going on I would have left them to it.
3. As I was standing in the queue to return cups (it was also the 'purchase drink tokens' queue) a young man of 20ish looked at my stack of 10+ cups and assumed that I had drank all of them and started up a conversation. Sheesh. I don't think it would be physically possible at my size to swallow 10+ pints of beer without exploding.
In his drunken state he grabbed my forearm and asked if I was ok? Then he asked where I was from. His drunk friend came bounding in and bumped into me and he admonished his friend gesturing to the stack of glasses...and then he asked where I was from.
So overall, 4 pints, a controlled evening and I didn't feel like I missed out on anything.
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