So, I’ve not been drinking so much coffee recently, but today I ended up having my usual breakfast cup, and a huge mocha in Starbucks (don’t all tell me off at once…), then some ice-tea in a cafe on the Strand and finally another huge mocha from Upper Crust before catching the early morning train back. See, I needed to stay awake ‘cos I’m on nights tomorrow (well, technically today), so I need to sleep late – aiming for 5, 5:30ish heading to bed.
But all that coffee’s keeping me awake in a woozy ‘are my legs still attached’ / ‘I don’t feel 100% brilliant’ kind of way. I was pretty good…until I got home. But where was I? And what was I doing in the Strand?
Before I tell you, I have to introduce to what I originally thought might be a myth in my bathroom. But it turned out to be a moth:
It came in late a couple of nights ago, and lurked there until the morning when I scooped it into a glass and set it free. I also have the urge to share this with you:
My choice of cheese seems less, well, appealing when described like that.
So yeah.
Well, this weekend has been something that’s been approaching and which I’ve been both excited and nervous about. See, this weekend I met Kathryn’s mom. She’s over from the U.S. for a week (I think, my vague memory is vague on details), before heading off on holiday further afield, and so I had a chance to meet her.
Given how much I care about Kathryn, meeting her mom was kinda important – and so I’ve been nervously waiting for it… Kathryn came down yesterday (well, technically the day before, given that it’s technically Sunday) and we uh, well, went to Kwik-Fit. Normally I ring round and find the best price for tyres, but I only decided I wanted new tyres on the way to the station (I was going to get part-worn’s, but at around 1500 miles a month it’s probably a false economy), hence Kwik-Fit was used. Brick now has semi-decent, good tyres. This is better than the cracked sidewall and had-reached-chunks-flaking-off-of-the-tread-10-year-old-remoulds that were on there. Uh, then we headed home and curled up watching Shooting Fish (the DVD edit of which is different to the theatrical release, sadly. I am slightly annoyed by that).
Aaaanyhow, so, we got up this morning and headed in to London (for those of you wondering how this fits in with my economising; today was my last fling before stopping. The last prescheduled events day) (random aside – can you tell I’m tired? – the nipod is working well, and interesting to have because I put not only music I really like on it, but stuff I thought I should listen to more, which means I’ve just really enjoyed Maria Mena, Mogwai and Metric – all of which I was aware I liked, but I’ve never really listened to enough. Anyhow.). We went to meet Kathryn’s mom at Heathrow. Normally I drive there, but a quick costing of tickets indicated it was cheaper for us to get the train there and then go from Heathrow (after Kathryn patiently pointed out to me that Heathrow has both a train and an Underground station. I’m convinced I was being terribly irritating, unintentionally, because my brain wasn’t working and I kept trying to help but getting things wrong ;-) ).
Despite British Network Rail’s new time telling system which appears to be based on Hexadecimal we got there on time.
Or more accurately, we knew her plane was late and we got there before it arrived, which was our aim.
Meeting Kathryn’s mom turned out to be not nearly as scary as my fears about it – mostly because Kathryn’s mom is really lovely, and very friendly, and also she failed to have any pointy sticks (nor the opinion of my friend Sophie, who’s always said she’d interrogate any lesbian suitors for her daughter far more thoroughly than any heterosexual suitors… because ‘she knows what lesbians are like’). And we went on to have a really nice day in London, munching on incredibly fine food at a cafe near Paddington before Kathryn and I headed off and obtained tickets for Evita… snapping this photo on the way:
…I’ve not been to a musical for years – and the last one was so long ago and I was so young that I can’t actually remember it – although I have a feeling it might have been a production of Kiss Me, Kate. Anyhow, Evita was just plain enjoyment for me, and it was nice to get dressed up in a posh frock (well, moderately) and go out. :-)
Afterwards we headed to another cafe where we had, uh, largely the same food – and chatted s’more; before we wandered back to their hotel and eventually I headed home.
The journey home turned out to be a trifle eventful; first the train I was going to catch was cancelled – not a huge problem, there was another 20 minutes later (which meant 20 more minutes with Kathryn :-) ), everyone seemed to be running to get on to the train which seemed odd, but the reason became apparent once I was there. I got one of the last few seats, and watched as people just kept arriving.
Eventually, sardine like, the train driver having tried to convince people going to the first three stations to take a different train (leaving 10 minutes later) we pulled out. Not that I cared, I had a nice seat and there was no one who might conceivably be considered a ‘give up your seat for’ person on the train; at least not within my range of vision which granted was limited by asses and rucksacks. However, within my hearing range was an argument which turned into a full-on brawl with some drunk bloke pulling another drunk bloke out of the train, where they proceeded to kick merry hell out of each other until one collapsed onto the station platform.
I’d just decided that I really ought to check on the bloke who’d lost the fight, given his lying prostrate on the ground and not getting-back-up-ness (given my code of conduct I’m required, actually, to stop and help people who need the aid of a nurse) when the train doors shut and we pulled away. Fortunately his friends appeared to have phones and so on and so forth, but really. Some people should not be allowed alcohol.
Also disturbing – the bloke I sat down opposite, whilst he was polite to me, he had two tattoos, one of crossed confederate flags with ‘THE [SOUTH?] WILL RISE AGAIN’ and the second tattoo which said ‘[covered by shirt sleeve]… to the blacks’. Which as an ending to a tattoo when combined with a pair of confederate flags, well, somehow left me feeling faintly unnerved.
Ah well. At any rate, I had a fantastic day; and am now phenomenally tired.
