Booze, a “dodgy” cigarette, and “writhing, thrusting extremities” sounds like every parent’s teen party from hell, which is exactly the horror that Michael Gove and his wife faced, with police being called to break up the bash.
Gove’s wife, Daily Mail columnist Sarah Vine, took to prose to detail the horrors of the weekend – a crowd of raucous boys intent on spoiling her darling 15-year-old’s birthday party.
“I had a notion that at least if I held it at my house, I would be able to exercise some control,” Vine said. Boy, was she wrong.
Despite a handful of trusted A-level sixth formers and a house empty of alcohol, some naughty substances managed to slip past detection thanks to groups of boys from, according to Vine, a “prestigious private London day school” with parents who are, presumably, “wealthy professional people” who “afford the school fees.”
“You read a lot about the pressures young girls face in this age of internet porn,” she wrote. “But it is not until you see the effects for yourself that you realize how much the social landscape of the modern teenager has changed.
“First, the dancing. Forget the awkward jerkiness of my youth: this was properly provocative, a mass of writhing, thrusting extremities.
“As the boys began to infiltrate the groups of girls, the kitchen became a fug of pheromones. My bouncers were doing good job of repelling anyone who wasn’t on the list. But some must have slipped through, because the next time I checked the atmosphere had taken a turn for the worse.
“I descended into the pit, fighting my way through a mass of naked limbs. By the time I emerged I had confiscated several bottles of vodka, one Amaretto (obviously pinched from a parent’s drink cabinet), a bottle of Veuve Clicquot and some Lambrusco.
“Oh, and one very dodgy-looking cigarette,” she added.
Eventually, she had enough and Vine began to herd the rowdy group of testosterone-fuelled teens out the door – just as the police arrived to deal with the noise complaints from neighbors.
Vine did not reveal what her husband, the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, thought about the raging shindig. However one can assume, as the minister responsible for protecting the public from pesky noise, Gove was unimpressed.
Like this story? Share it with a friend!