Children's Party Survival Guide

It was Stan's first birthday on Sunday and we had a party to celebrate. I'm still recovering. I went to some wild parties at university and a fair few illegal raves, but they were nowhere near as messy as this.

Chaos was unconfined in our little house, with Mila and Frankie's friends playing musical statues to nosebleed techno (my fault - I'd left the CD on the stereo), off their heads on Coke and Monster Munch (half of which ended up stamped into the carpet). Then there were Stan's little mates ,who were engaged in trying to mash Cadbury's Mini-Rolls into the furniture with their little chocolate-besmirched fingers. When they weren't doing that, they were crying or just trying desperately to escape to somewhere suitably dangerous.

By mid-afternoon I'd decided that the only way to get through the party was to get as drunk as possible, so I was utterly muntered by the time we blew out the single candle on Stan's cake and sang happy birthday. In fact, I was barely able to blow the candle out for him as I couldn't actually align with the bloody thing. However, I had also stopped worrying about the carpet.

So there you go - that's my advice on surviving children's parties - get REALLY pissed! Can't see that making it into the Saturday Guardian's 'Family' section.