Parties are the death of conversation

NOW that the nights are drawing out and we’re safely away from the festive season, I can come clean – I can do without parties.

The music is usually too loud – and too terrible – and there are people who drink a lot, which is fine if you can hold it and not become an irritating buffoon but that’s rarely the case.

There’s also the food, which might be bought from M&S or prepared painstakingly by the hostess from the word according to St Jamie, but either way has to be balanced on knee or elbowcrook while negotiating a glass of wine or beer and a conversation.

Which brings me to the real reason I don’t like parties. Polite conversation.

I just can’t do it – well, not with any conviction, anyway.

Maybe this is a fault in me and yet another reason why I will go to the bad fire, but I find that once you’ve said hello to most people, and they’ve said hello back, that’s about all you want to know about them.

OK, yes, there are some people who have done interesting things that are worth talking about but they generally have better things to do than turn up at parties, and

The danger is you fall back on jokes – which is a big risk

are content to let you read about them in the papers over a cup of tea and a bun, which suits me.

So no, for most people it’s all about work and kids and cars and Strictly and football and their holidays.

Even if you stray towards Brexit, Trump or Prince Andrew and his children, it can never get too interesting because you can never be sure how much offence you might cause, making yourself more of a pariah than you already are. So you keep it bland and comfort yourself with the thought that no one lives forever and with luck you might drop dead before you have to think of a response to that remark about the new pedestrian crossing they’re proposing round at the shops.

If you don’t, the danger is that you might fall back on jokes, which is a heck of a risk unless you’re sure the person has a National Sense of Humour Certificate. The blank stare after the punch-line can easily drive one to another glass of wine.

Which is how one finds oneself becoming the irritating buffoon who can’t hold his drink, I imagine.