Just a normal Monday evening

Last year on this date was the famous and memorable soirée mousse. It was so successful that doing it again this year was a no-brainer. The village social club duly announced it with great fanfare about a month ago. To appeal to young people they decided to offer hamburger and chips, a drink, and an ice cream for 5 euros a head. Soon 200 people had signed up.

But then just about a week ago, in came water restrictions and a directive from the préfecture that they could not use foam. Worried that they would end up with loads of people not showing up, they came up with a plan B and a soirée surprise, asking everyone to dress in white. This was shrouded in secrecy to the extent that M-P asked me to be on hand to photograph the surprise but didn't tell me what it was.

I had my suspicions, and they turned out to be right. See the surprise in extra 1. V briefed me beforehand, and the DJ told me I could stand on the massive speaker at the front of the stage to take photos. The square was heaving with people, but from my vantage point I was spared the spray of brightly coloured powders. Just as well, as having done some test shots with the Olympus earlier, I went back home to get the Nikon with the very expensive lens. Getting results was pretty hit and miss because of the flashing lights (a few more shots in extras).

The evening was wild. As it was happening right outside our door there didn't seem much point in going to bed. Around half past midnight I went back to Sue's with her and some visiting friends and we sat on the terrace for a couple of drinks that somehow lasted till 2 a.m., by which time the music had stopped. Phew!