Just when you thought it couldn’t get any crazier than the Queen’s birthday, my own decade capping birthday has to come along and step everything up a notch further.

I turned thirty on Friday and guests started arriving in town a full two days before the event. So every night since then I’ve been out eating, drinking and being merry with various combinations of family and friends. And in keeping with the finest traditions of my family, we ate dinner. A lot.

It started on Wednesday with the arrival of my parents. I hadn’t seen them since Christmas, so naturally we went out to dinner to celebrate. That was lovely and a nice way to warm up for the craziness that was yet to come.

On Thursday my sister and her husband joined the party, along with my aunt, uncle and two cousins. Eh Steve had never been to Darwin before, so naturally there was trip down to Mindil Markets for dinner. Apparently there was no sunset. That was weird. I escaped this one and went to sepak takraw training. There was no sunset there either, largely because we were inside. And overnight the craziness was brought to a peak, as I headed out at midnight to pick up Kim – and Phil for some reason – from the airport.

Friday was the big day, and my nearest and dearest gathered to celebrate in fine style. I threw a costume party and had everything from Neo to Wolverine in attendance. It was certainly a colourful gathering with a cake baked and decorated by my truly excellent housemate. And would you believe it? We had dinner. I had ordered five platters of food, and the caterer showed up with seven for the same price, so we were handing out leftovers for people to take home left right and centre.

We all spent Saturday recovering. Well… Kim and I did. The rest of family thought a trip to Crocodylus Park might be in order. But we all gathered again that evening and… went out to dinner. This time we all went out for a sunset dinner cruise, again with no sunset. Something is obviously wrong with the Earth’s orbit just presently. It was a lovely evening all the same.

Sunday arrived, bringing with it my cousin’s thirteenth birthday. After church we had a celebratory lunch, which made a nice break in the pattern. We sat around for a while discussing this and that as families often do, and before we knew it it was time to go home and change just in time to … go out to dinner. This time it was down to the wharf for a chance for friends of my parents to drop by and say hello.

I took Monday off work to spend some extra time with Kim and the family, so we went to spend the day down at Litchfield park, which is my favourite place in the world. We visited Wangi and Buley, Florence and the Magnetic Termite Mounds, and headed home exhausted after a long day. We were all ready to crash and zone out for the night.

So naturally we went out to dinner. And sat down to a full Chinese banquet no less. I'm not even sure how that happened.

I’m spending most of today shipping them all off on various flights. By tomorrow everything might be back to normal, but we’ll see how long that lasts. Something will come up, no doubt. It always does. But have no fear. There appears to be no problem so great that it cannot be solved by going out to dinner.

Make of that what you will.

Garry with 2 Rs