Melbourne Cup Lunch 6.11.2012

The day started as expected. Mark had said he wanted to start early, so of course he started half an hour later than usual and then delayed morning work further by going for a coffee run (nice, but unnecessary and so not helping with getting done) instead of just hopping on his horse. After he was done riding, I hurried to get the other two done and to help Debbie finish up the stable.

The plan, at one point, was to leave at eleven or shortly after, but because of all the delays (thanks, boss), we only got ready at about 11.45 because we only have the one bathroom and we were required to look our glamorous best. Since neither of us brought any cocktail dresses and high heels, we had to buy our outfits especially for the occasion. I found a lovely off-white dress with a little bit of black pattern on it. Knee length, nice high waist and V-shaped top line always work well with my body shape, even if I eat a little more. For my shoe choice it came in handy that I always follow the fashion coverage for the big award shows, because the bloggers tend to slam the celebs who play it safe and add nude shoes to a neutral colored dress. I found lovely peep-toe wedges in bright red suede that added a little highlight to the look. To go with the outfit, I chose a black clutch that will also go with a lot of the clothes I left at home. With red shoes on, I didn’t want to add bright red lipstick because I felt that might be a little too much. So instead, I went big eyes in blue with even bigger lashes, using three different kinds of mascara and even more layers. For a minute I thought, ooh, maybe that’s a bit too much.

But then we got there, and it wasn’t too much. It was just a lunch in a marquee with the race on screens, but everybody was in full race day attire. And mind you, these were some of the richer folks of the Adelaide Hills. The Melbourne Cup Lunch was held at a manor about 20 minutes from Flaxley and the gardens looked like something you see on “90210” or MTV cribs. It was the fanciest thing I’ve ever been too. It was interesting, certainly, though I’m not sure that’s my kind of scene. The food was very, very good and the champagne as well. I didn’t have any wine (at the free bar) because I simply don’t like wine, but it was probably as fancy as the rest of the event. Mark’s firm had a table at the center and the other people there were super nice: two girls my age who work at the reception, Mark’s business partner, his brother and a friend, and Mark’s dad as well. Before the race started, they auctioned off the horses in some sort of betting game I didn’t quite understand. It was amazing to see people, including Mark and Belinda, just spend a thousand dollars on this like it’s nothing. I don’t remember much of the race because I needed to go to the toilet so bad that all I could think was “Don’t pee your pants”. An Australian horse won, sadly for Debbie and me; we kept our fingers crossed for the European horses, especially Godolphin’s Cavalry Man and the French Dunaden. But since we didn’t actually bet, it wasn’t too bad. After the race, they had a charity auction, and again, people spent ridiculous amounts of money on pictures, vacations, and toys. Fascinating. They also crowned the best dressed from the previous fashion parade (that we missed because we had to finish work first) which turned out to be more of a popularity contest of the rich daughters and sons. It’s like being in a TV show. A completely different world.

After the action in the marquee was mostly over, we moved closer to the bar and Mark and Debbie got really drunk. I chatted with the girls who work in Mark’s office; one of them is an eventer as well so we had something to talk about. Jon (Mark’s brother) joined us for a bit, and it’s creepy how much alike he and Mark are; the same way of talking, same mannerisms, they’re like twins except they don’t look that much alike and clearly aren’t as Mark is older. That part of the afternoon I like to call “freezer time”. There had been a thunder storm the night before and it was very chilly outside, especially in the shade. The others didn’t notice as much because they were warm/ drunk, but I slowly turned into an ice sculpture.

Towards the end of the event, Debbie and I met Killian again; he’s from Ireland and works for a polo player/ huntsman Mark is friends with. It was nice to talk to someone who is in a similar (work) situation and who is also from Europe and not usually this fancy ;) The three of us wanted to take a photo together and the girl behind the bar tried her best, but in a gazillion attempts, we never managed to keep our eyes open at the same time. There was always someone with their eyes closed or a weird look on their face, which in itself was so amusing that the end result didn’t even matter.

Mark tried to get me to drive them home, but his UTE is so incredibly huge and new and expensive and the roads so narrow that I refused to drive and so he did it, which was adventurous and very illegal, not just because of the alcohol, but also because he lost his license a couple of weeks ago. Back home we had to finish work. I had the clear advantage of being sober while Debbie really started to struggle when we had to bring all the horses in.