27/03 - I woke up before 9, feeling a little woozy. I was confused as I thought I hadn't had that much, but then I remembered the glass of wine at the airport, the complimentary bottle on the plane, the cava with dinner and the few pints in the merchant - as they had all occurred in different places with little gaps between them, I had not considered the possibility that they would have a combined effect. They did.
I had a delicious but unusual breakfast of leftover salad, coronation chicken and a cup of tea, and Kelly and I pottered around the house for a while before heading off to Westfield - we had jokingly proposed it last night, but in the cold light of day it seemed much less tempting. My intent was to go and get some shoes and a few items, but in the end I didn't find anything I wanted. Upon walking in I could smell a combination of floor polish, air conditioning and an odd citrus scent which, combined, gave me a headache and reminded me of all the big malls in Singapore and Bangkok. It wasn't a very pleasant place, and although it is on a grand scale architecturally I found it to be pretty oppressive and grim. When the time came to leave, we headed to the exit and found that it was pouring down with rain, so stayed inside, weaving between the throngs, and dashed across the road to the station, accidentally stomping in a number of puddles along the way.
Next on our agenda we went to meet Gordon, the head of Kelly's MBPhD course, in The Lamb. He has helped her enormously during the last year or so, and was a very smart and interesting guy. I wasn't sure what we would talk about, but luckily I had some random knowledge of the pay structure of Somalian pirates which I was able to pull out, as well as knowing some stuff about positrons, which popped up in conversation too. At half six we met Clare, Frau, Ed, Joe & Adam and went for Ed's birthday dinner next door at Ciao Bella (without Gordon), where I had a rather disappointing meal (again - the gnocchi last time was slimy, the penne putanesca was pretty bland. Everyone else's looked delicious, I am going to let other people decide for me next time).
Our next stop was Bloomsbury Bowling Lanes, for the main event of the evening - bowling and a Fun Lovin' Criminals gig. This turned out to be fraught with more disappointment. Firstly they had no cocktails, which meant no white russians. Then all the draught beers were off, so we were confined to bottles of everything. Then we found out that our lane had been cancelled, as Fun Lovin' Criminals wanted to film the gig and didn't want any sound feedback from bowling. Our lane was therefore moved from 2130 to midnight, which was a bit unsatisfactory. We were given a round of drinks, which was scant compensation. When the band came on we realised that this was maybe the least appropriate gig venue possible, as it has a low ceiling and is in a basement. It was rammed and boiling, and we couldn't see a thing. Clare decided to leave, as it was too hot and she hadn't heard of the band anyway. Kelly and I snuck round the side, and ended up standing on top of the ball return of one of the lanes, the only place from which one could actually see the band. After a shaky start (of new material) they broke into the songs that everyone know (Scooby Snacks, King Of New York, Fun Lovin' Criminals etc.) which were pretty awesome. The actual bowling was fun, I opened with a strike and a spare and followed it by two frames of gutterballs. We entered into a row with a massive bloke on the next lane about 'ownership' of the 12 lb ball. In the end a security guard stepped in and told us to ask him, and he would get any ball we wanted. We did pretty awfully actually, Frau won with 92, not a particularly impressive score. We left at one, intending to head to the Evaristo for a drink, but as it was closed we ended up having expensive sandwiches from Valentino's and getting the bus home.
28/03 - Kelly and I woke up at 1245, which wasn't unreasonable as we had gone to bed at 0345, but this was still pretty late. Too late for lunch, in fact, as I immediately received texts telling me that Ed, Bob and Joe were going for lunch, had gone for lunch, and were heading back from lunch. They were already back by the time we had sorted ourselves out with showers and tea, so we said goodbye to Joe and went off for our Sunday activity - the Imperial War Museum. On our way there we walked past a hostel of some description outside which there was an unconscious man on the pavement, next to whom someone was having a wee. Outside the museum there were a huge number of drunken, possibly homeless, people sitting and lying about on the grass. Kelly said she thought there was a Polish holiday going on (all the beers I saw were Polish brands, and most people were speaking Polish, but a quick Google has yielded no results).
The museum itself was really good - I was surprised at how much I enjoyed it. There was a Terry Deary based exhibition called Terrible Trenches, which was designed for children but during which I improved my rather insufficient knowledge of the first world war. Our next stop was the WWI history section, including 'The Trench Experience'. We didn't have time to go through to WWII (and 'The Blitz Experience'), as the museum closed and we had to leave. We had a pretty good curry for dinner and, after a rather long debate, watched Tigerland, a film about Colin Farrell's character going through training before the Vietnam war, pretty much entirely unwillingly. I really enjoyed it, mainly because the protagonist hated everything about the army and refused to bend to the will of various drill sergeants etc. Bob thought it was rubbish, maybe for exactly the same reason.
1 comment:
Very well.
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