It was the kind of birthday party most of us can only dream about: in a real castle, with a hundred guests, gourmet food, attentive service, a ghost banging doors upstairs, and an age to celebrate of 136 years.
Hard to achieve? Especially the age: but that was a combined effort by two members of the Leslie family of Castle Leslie in Co Monaghan, who celebrated their birthdays in fine style early this month. Mark Leslie, the architect-designer proprietor of Martello Multimedia, contributed a youthful-looking 50 years; but the lion's share came from his uncle, the famous aristocratic disco-dancer, Sir Jack Leslie.
Guests came from far and near for this great occasion, and the neighbouring village of Glaslough was stuffed with visitors as it hasn't been since the lesser occasion of Paul McCartney's marriage to Heather Mills last June.
The luckier ones got to stay in Castle Leslie itself, and Sean Harrington and Emma Cullinan, style writer for The Irish Times's Property section, had the heady honour of being allocated the very bed in which the erstwhile Beatle and his second wife spent their honeymoon night.
Churchill's dress
But bed was the last thing most people were thinking of at 6 p.m. as drinks were served in the drawing-room, with Winston Churchill's baby dress, framed, looking down on the assembly. (The Churchills and the Leslies were related by marriage.) Sir Jack, so thin he appears two-dimensional, and yet possessed of astonishing and tranquil vitality, conducted a tour of the 350-year old house, peppered with anecdotes and even a spot of piano-playing.
Dinner was served in a candlelit dining room, with Leslie home movies starring both Mark and Jack, and genuine movies of Mark's late mother, the actress and chanteuse Agnes Bernelle, projected slightly off-puttingly on to a large faded tapestry of King Solomon.
There was a spontaneous round of applause (largely from the males) when a colour series of shots of Agnes in a black swimsuit, circa 1945, came on the screen. She was, it is not an exaggeration to say, stunningly beautiful, with creamy skin, black hair and dark eyes, and a regal manner which those who only got to know her in later years would remember well.
Great events of the last half-century were next on the projection menu: Mark's life-span was somewhat more manageable than that of Sir Jack, born in the year of the Easter Rising. The two birthday boys gave short and witty speeches, with Jack noting that he had stood on exactly the same spot in the great dining-room 65 years earlier to thank the many guests who had attended his 21st birthday party.
Tea and cakes
"But actually," he said to me later, "that was in the summer, in June, so we could have it outside. There was tea and cakes, we all sat at tables, and I don't think there was any drink at all." This could hardly be said of the 2002 shindig. Mark, a walking entertainment compendium at any time, was in especially good spirits even before the champagne: his company, which specialises in exhibition design, with computerised presentations and interactive exhibits (such as for the Victoria and Albert in London, and the bicentenary of the 1798 rebellions), had just learned of another industry award, its third in recent weeks.
With formal proceedings out of the way, the real business of the night could start: the dancing. A formidably good DJ commanded the stacks, and the hipsters put down their drinks, adjusted their costumes and shimmied on to the floor.
But who could compete with Sir Jack? As seen in a recent television documentary, he has the energy (and the musical taste) of a 20-year-old. He specialises in a sort of upright pogo, bouncing around the floor in his matching tartan waistcoat, trousers and beret. (The bright green Leslie tartan, somebody told me.)
The TV producers took Jack to Ibiza and the internationally famous Manumission club, where he was greeted with the respect, affection - and indeed amazement - that he elicits everywhere. Manumission was very nice, he confided, but "really Monaghan has the most wonderful discos. In Carrickmacross the Oasis can fit in 2,000 people. It's marvellous."
Restoring monastery
His other great passion in life is the ninth-century monastery he is restoring in Alatri, about 70 kilometres east of Rome. This was the subject of three beautiful technical drawings, done by Mark, which he presented framed to his uncle as a birthday gift. Sir Jack spends the summers down there, but, alas, the local discos are closed as it is too hot. It would take more than a spot of sun to stop Sir Jack, so the locals are obviously made of weaker stuff.
What is his secret? "I drink little, I don't eat very much, I go for lots of walks, I have plenty of rests, plenty of sleep, and a disco at least once a month." So there you have it, you wistful octogenarians whose wildest moment is the Late Late Show. But perhaps the stripling, nephew Mark, put his finger on the magic in his birthday speech. Looking not a day over 30, he said: "Either the Leslies are slow developers, or they live their lives backward, like Merlin."