Bank Holiday weekend 03/05/24 - 06/05/24
May. 25th, 2024 10:12 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
satyricaWaking up in Southampton on the Friday, I wandered down Hill Lane to the station to be picked up by Mum & Dad: we drove out to the Royal Victoria Country Park near Netley. The site used to be a huge military hospital, although the Chapel was all that really remained that was accessible and it had been fitted out as a little museum about the hospital and its history, which we enjoyed ambling around before heading in to the picturesque Hamble for a leisurely lunch at The Bugle and wander along the marina. On the way back into Southampton Dad enjoyed trying to hunt down a few of his old University haunts before dropping me in town. I mooched around town a bit, then walked over to Bitterne where J was serendipitously hosting the Listening Party meet-up again, so I hung out with the guys, chatting about music while people's chosen albums played (they had moved on to a Concept Album theme) which was enjoyable and life-affirming in its expression of non-toxic masculinity.
I stayed over at J's then wandered out early on Saturday, hopping on the train into town to meet L&L for a quick coffee (catching up about all the non-roleplaying stuff we never discuss, despite talking every week) and then caught the train back up to London. When I got to Waterloo I headed straight to Stoke Newington and Bar Dona which T&A had hired out for the afternoon for their daughter S's 1st birthday: the only one they'll be able to appropriate for themselves, so were using it to see all their friends and celebrate having survived what has been a tough year for them. Most of N's usual gang were there, so we all hung out and chatted, then headed iver ti the White Hart for some dinner before going down to T&A's for the after-party and mire drinks and hanging out. By the time N & I got in at 9pm, afternoon-drinking had left me ready to crash out, which was handy is it meant I got a good few hours sleep before getting up again at 2.30am to head out for a gig.
Frank Turner was launching his latest album with a world record attempt to play 15 gigs in 15 cities within 24 hours and his London stop was at the Underworld at 4am. I actually messed up setting my alarm but luckily one if my super powers is being able to tell my brain what time I need to wake up and I sprang awake less than 10 minutes after it should have gone off. This escapade had not been my idea for once and I got myself to Camden in good time to meet up with E&J, who had come from a trip to Slimelight. We were let in from 3.30 and he already looked pretty nackered by the time he came on stage, despite having plenty more stops to make, but blasted through a bunch of mostly new songs, with a crowd-pleasing classic and Jinny Bingham's Ghost, which he couldn't not play at an Underworld show, thrown in. I got home for about 5am and went back to bed for a couple more hours, but wasn't really sleeping, so got up at my normal time and got on with Sunday.
After a morning at home, N & I travelled out to Twickenham for afternoon tea with R&H and kids, who it was lovely to catch up with: R had had a (benign) brain tumour removed a few weeks ago and was still recovering from the operation but seemed in good spirits. We headed home early enough for me to join Family Zoomtime, then Monday was the first May Bank Holiday. I did a shop in the morning, then N & I went down to the British Museum for their Michelangelo: The Last Decades exhibition, which was really well laid out and informative (and, for once, not overwhelmingly busy), even if the subject matter if almost exclusively religious art and architecture was the side of the Renaissance I'm not so interested in. we wandered down into Soho for ramen, then came back up to the Dalston Curve Garden, where we sheltered from the rain on their sofas. N headed home while I walked from Dalston as far as Stoke Newington, delving into every world-food supermarket and health food store on the way (and there were a lot!) in fruitless but enjoyable quest for barberries, which I needed for a recipe and no-one seemed to have even heard of. Back home I did a few hours of scrapbooking whilst listening to the Bad Gays podcast, then after dinner did a crossword with N before rounding off a really restorative long weekend by watching the Barbie movie.
I stayed over at J's then wandered out early on Saturday, hopping on the train into town to meet L&L for a quick coffee (catching up about all the non-roleplaying stuff we never discuss, despite talking every week) and then caught the train back up to London. When I got to Waterloo I headed straight to Stoke Newington and Bar Dona which T&A had hired out for the afternoon for their daughter S's 1st birthday: the only one they'll be able to appropriate for themselves, so were using it to see all their friends and celebrate having survived what has been a tough year for them. Most of N's usual gang were there, so we all hung out and chatted, then headed iver ti the White Hart for some dinner before going down to T&A's for the after-party and mire drinks and hanging out. By the time N & I got in at 9pm, afternoon-drinking had left me ready to crash out, which was handy is it meant I got a good few hours sleep before getting up again at 2.30am to head out for a gig.
Frank Turner was launching his latest album with a world record attempt to play 15 gigs in 15 cities within 24 hours and his London stop was at the Underworld at 4am. I actually messed up setting my alarm but luckily one if my super powers is being able to tell my brain what time I need to wake up and I sprang awake less than 10 minutes after it should have gone off. This escapade had not been my idea for once and I got myself to Camden in good time to meet up with E&J, who had come from a trip to Slimelight. We were let in from 3.30 and he already looked pretty nackered by the time he came on stage, despite having plenty more stops to make, but blasted through a bunch of mostly new songs, with a crowd-pleasing classic and Jinny Bingham's Ghost, which he couldn't not play at an Underworld show, thrown in. I got home for about 5am and went back to bed for a couple more hours, but wasn't really sleeping, so got up at my normal time and got on with Sunday.
After a morning at home, N & I travelled out to Twickenham for afternoon tea with R&H and kids, who it was lovely to catch up with: R had had a (benign) brain tumour removed a few weeks ago and was still recovering from the operation but seemed in good spirits. We headed home early enough for me to join Family Zoomtime, then Monday was the first May Bank Holiday. I did a shop in the morning, then N & I went down to the British Museum for their Michelangelo: The Last Decades exhibition, which was really well laid out and informative (and, for once, not overwhelmingly busy), even if the subject matter if almost exclusively religious art and architecture was the side of the Renaissance I'm not so interested in. we wandered down into Soho for ramen, then came back up to the Dalston Curve Garden, where we sheltered from the rain on their sofas. N headed home while I walked from Dalston as far as Stoke Newington, delving into every world-food supermarket and health food store on the way (and there were a lot!) in fruitless but enjoyable quest for barberries, which I needed for a recipe and no-one seemed to have even heard of. Back home I did a few hours of scrapbooking whilst listening to the Bad Gays podcast, then after dinner did a crossword with N before rounding off a really restorative long weekend by watching the Barbie movie.
