Advertisement
Published: March 24th 2008
Edit Blog Post
Nicola decided that for my birthday she would surprise me. Not once or twice but yes greater than or equal to three times. On Friday after work I had to rush home and be ready to go out. I did just this, for you should always be early for a surprise, it helps build the anticipation. Anyway we caught the train into Tottenham court road, I still had no idea what was going on, well until we walked into a building that had huge signs for the Queen musical ‘We will rock you’, that’s when I had a slight inkling of what it might be.
Jaimee met up with us too, and we had a drink before going in. I knew of the Queen show but didn’t really know much about it. I don’t want to give it away to people who haven’t seen it but I thoroughly recommend it. It is written by Ben Elton so is really funny as well as having great singing and dancing.
So surprise one was a success, what did Saturday have in store? I woke up to calls from my parents, brother, granddad, and mates Fitch and Brendon, it was great to
catch up with them all. Two hours later I had to hang up and get on the tube for surprise number 2. There was quite a gathering of us, a few were a bit hungover from the night before, not the best when you’re going ice skating! That’s right ice skating, I had never been before so was a tad apprehensive. I would love to say that I took to it like a duck to water, but really it was more like an anchor to water i.e. I was awful. Thankfully we had an hour, for in half an hour I wouldn’t have enough time to knock positively everybody over. Thanks to Nic, Nadine and Andre who all took turns babysitting me around the ring. By about the 45 minute mark I was skating without holding onto a wall, another person or my breath. It wasn’t the most graceful thing but I reckon with another hour I would have been at Olympic standard.
I think the only person comparable to my awfulness was Joel but he had an excuse - being hungover from his work xmas function. Some of his falls looked horrendous. I was amazed at how good
some of the rest of the group were, Lisa and Andre were pulling off all sorts of maneuvers but it was Amanda doing spins and tricks that had me in awe.
Saturday afternoon was beers and Chinese at a restaurant in Putney near the bridge, then off to the Walkabout next door to watch the Barbarians play South Africa in the rugby. It was an awesome game, way better than any of that rugby world cup nonsense. While there, Andre and I witnessed something strange. We were sitting watching the game when Andre’s empty pint glass just shattered. We both were silent. No one was near the table, neither of us knocked the table or the pint. It just shattered! I don’t think I’ll ever know what happened. Perhaps it was down to anger from the South Africans in the room due to them getting smashed in the rugby?
The final surprise of the night was Nicola baked me a carrot cake, yum my favourite. Surprise though because that wasn’t the last surprise, there was another surprise - the fourth surprise! Once again I was ushered onto public transport, this time arriving in Clapham Junction. Quite a good
turn out had gathered and we entered a local bar, I was happy to catch up with everyone and was chuffed when I found out that we were there for a comedy night. Three comics and the host had us all in stitches, they all had varying sketches which were received well. Someone must have let the host know that it was my birthday because I got a bit of stick, mostly about being a sheep shagger. How did he know? - I thought that paddock was secluded.
The night finished at the Clapham grand with some drinking, talking bollocks and general tomfoolery. Thanks to Nicola and Jaimee for organising things and to everyone who came along and gave me presents.
The following day I stupidly agreed to play football. We won 4-1 though so it wasn’t all bad, I only managed to score two goals.
Match report
Advertisement
Tot: 0.081s; Tpl: 0.031s; cc: 8; qc: 23; dbt: 0.0232s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb