wigging out

I was in Birthdays buying a 'blonde babe wig' and a rather sinister plastic pig mask. 'Just a quiet night in', I was going to say, if the woman at the counter happened to ask. She didn't ask.

The wig was for a wig party, Vicki's thirtieth. The mask was more of a whim. Nevertheless, I wondered if it might work with the wig. In order to test this, I donned both and stood silently in the shadowed hallway at home waiting for Dave to turn around and notice me. The effect (he all but dropped dead of fright) was not one which I cared to reproduce on the grand scale. Not quite yet.

In the wig alone I apparently bore a resemblance to: Rowan Atkinson in the first Blackadder, Andy Warhol, the villain in a film called Ninja Terminator, and - most bewilderingly - Charles Hawtrey. But it was good finally to be able to toss my hair, and not just into the bin.

Other people's wigs practically took root on their heads and demanded the same rights as their natural hair: Phil's mullet made it seem as though he'd never left his birthplace, Canvey Island. Last to arrive was Chad, and of course he outdid everyone by sporting the largest afro in history. He looked like an approaching thunderstorm as he loomed through the mists of dry ice.

Matandamanda went as Andy and Lou from Little Britain, and in doing so not only expressed something of the nature of their relationship but also lent this over-familiar routine a much-needed new direction. It's worryingly easy to imagine Mat saying: 'Are you sure you want a baby? It's a bit of a kerfuffle.' But I do hope Amanda's eventual reaction is more positive than: 'I don't like it.'