A Knight On The Tiles

I Can Justify The Pun, Honestly
Last night was a farewell party for Simona (already gone) and Suzi & Kay (yet to go) and Conrad was going to be along for the event since they needed someone old and stiff and starchy to mock, and nobody comes better-equipped to be a comedy foil than your author, dear audience.

A foil.  No, hang on -

Preparation
Thanks to an in with a staff member, Conrad got an hotel room going at a reduced rate, and a free breakfast for the morning after.  No mystery signs on the walls this time, but the room did come with an iron and ironing board, much needed as Conrad's concession to the night out, a red shirt*, had gotten rather creased.

Still life with bag of shopping

     There you go.  And only a minute's walk from the Black Dog Ballroom.  Why is this significant?  That's where our party was due to meet up.

For veracity

     Actually as Conrad arrived, Kay and Suzi were leaving, because it was too noisy.  They planned to go to Noho, which is odd as the sound levels there induce bleeding from the ears, fainting and coma.  But! it was their do.  Conrad slunk down the steps and yes, it was noisy, but not that noisy**.
  After establishing that Simona's new job was bad, in that she couldn't eat or drink at her desk, and yet good in that it involved huge responsibility and a gigantic salary, Conrad did a bit of mixing.  No!  Not a cocktail - social mixing, with Dan Firestarter and Mike Collins.  Dan has been learning at his grandmother's apron strings, how to cook and bake, how to pick up things and put them away, and why you don't leave an empty Pot Noodle container sitting on the windowledge for a fortnight.  Mike is working: for a large company that makes breakfast cereals; on learning more Tagalog; on building a super-shed***.

Terraced
On our party moved, shedding and acquiring more members, moving to Terrace, where it really was noisy.  Of course the younger members of our group, with better hearing and an innate ability to lip-read it seems, were quite happy -

Look at 'em being happy, the b******s!

     Conrad was in the position of a man without his hearing aid, and vented on a menu:

Not sure why I censored "Flaming"

     But his natural sunny nature won through, despite being described by Katie in her selfie of us as "a terrifying Santa Claus".
     Not sure about that - but if one is to be Santa Claus, how much better it is to be a terrifying one^!
     Also a random stranger wearing an extremely bushy beard invited Conrad to investigate it visually and physically.  Fortunately Anna was on hand to intervene and the hirsute handyman bowed out.  This type of happening is rare, as Conrad normally looks so angry and hateful (even when having a good time) that most people avoid him.

Sophie, Dave, Dan, Chan,Mark, Anna, Dan , Katie, Becca, Mina and Kris

     I mentioned about the music being loud?  It got louder when the DJ decided that causing temporary deafness would be a terrific hoot, tee hee.  People were communicating with signs and written notes, before passing out from sonic overload^^.
     The party then decided to move to Noho, shedding members along the way until only a hard core remained, including your correspondent.
     Another strange random encounter at the bar:  "Are you German?" asked another reveller.
     Not at all, I replied, wondering where such a question originated.  I had waxed my moustache ends - perhaps that gave me an especially Prussian look?

Judge for yourself, gentle reader.
(also note non-Star Trek red shirt)

Now, the "Knight" bit.  Katie, as I think she will agree, had drunk quite a lot by hometime.  So had Conrad, but there's a lot more of him to spread the alcohol around, and his lava-and-nitromethane substitute for blood helps him cope better than humans.  Anyway, I offered to escort her over to the taxi rendezvous and wait until it turned up, as an attractive single lady alone at night can be a focus for unwanted attention.  It wasn't a long wait, and there wasn't any trouble, but I had to find justification for that pun -

"Conrad scrabbled to find an excuse ..."

* Not that kind of red shirt - Conrad is not an expendable on a little-known TV  series.
** We shall return to this theme.  O yes indeed!
*** A man's got to have a hobby.
^ There's an amusing and entertaining Finnish horror film about an evil Santa Claus - "Rare Exports"
^^ To be fair, some of this may have been due to beer.