33

On Thursday Beth & I celebrated 33 years of me, firstly with a day out in London posing as tourists, then a lie in the following morning, a trip to see Bond and then a somewhat lacklustre Saturday night out in Brighton.
As usual Beth pulled out all the stops and made me feel so amazingly special and happy (she's damn good at this surprise thing) and she got me some pretty fine pressies too. On Wednesday I awoke in a minor panick when I realised her alarm hadn't gone off and I rushed about like an idiot for a bit until this wee little voice squeaked "Surprise" from somewhere under the duvet. Sleepily she explained that we were off to London to be tourists for the day and to take a trip on the London Eye (something I'd wanted to do for a long time now). Originally she'd told me that she had the Thursday & Friday off work so we could 'do stuff' and it was a lovely treat to get her for an extra day.
So, we wobbled off to London on the train to go see the wheel in all it's glory. It's a very impressive sight, especially when you come at it from the south and see it looming over the tops of the buildings. Anyhow, we grabbed our tickets and found out that, now we had them, we could take our 'flight' whenever we liked so we decided to take in another sight first. As it was my birthday Beth let me choose and, being a boy, I choose the Imperial War Museum. Which, in retrospect, wasn't a very 'birthday-ish' idea.
The Imperial War Museum is amazing, there's a tonne of tanks, planes and cannons in the foyer and then more intellectual stuff on the rest of the floors. Beth & I were blown away by the 'Trench Experience' (it even smells the way you'd imagaine) and we had a few tears in our eyes looking at all the evacuee memorabilia in the 'Children's War' exhibition. It's incredible to think this actually happened, can you imagine having to send your kids away from you for a long, unknown period? It must've been awful for all involved. There were some heartwarming stories, some funny ones (for quite a lot of London kids it was their first taste of the country) and some truly upsetting tales. There's a letter in there from the Admiralty informing a family that the transport ship their kids had been on had been torpedoed and lost with all hands. Imagine that, you think you're sending them away for their protection and then that happens. Those children went through so much. One equally disquieting aspect is the standard of spelling and grammar in their letters home. It's excellent. A five year old back then could write far better than a five year old can now I tell you. There's also a highly moving picture of a home-coming that brought us to the edge of tears again and a recreation of an old house in West Wickham, which is where I grew up (which was after rationing despite how I sometimes look).
To cheer ourselves up we went to go see Beth's mate's Laura's grandfather in the Victoria & George Cross exhibit. He received a GC for his daring rescue of his mate when their mine collapsed and flooded. His medal was there along with a smiley picture of him.

Anyhow, the London Eye is brilliant and well worth taking a trip on. You seldom (almost never) get to see London from on-high and it's fascinating to see what buildings look like from above. I had no idea Charring Cross station was so funky. London is such an eclectic mix and it spreads out away from you like spilt fluid creeping across a table. It's amazing. There were only six other people in our pod so we got to wander around inside taking in the view from all angles. The pace is leisurely (it takes a full thirty minutes to complete one rotation) so you're only aware you're moving when you look at the foreground, whilst the view just idly drifts by.

Chris meet us off the wheel and took us to a lovely local pub where we experimented with a couple of new, unpronouncable but lovely Czech beers and had a brilliant Macaroni Cheese before heading off back to the station and home. On the way Beth suggested we pop into the Market Porter for one for the road. When we got there however it turned out a load of my mates were there. It was brilliant. I was momentarily phased and spent ten minutes fiddling with my zip and going "Duhhhh... Ummmm." before regaining my legendary cool and drinking Black Sambucca until my head spun. All in all a very lovely day.

Because of the drinking we didn't haul ourselves out of bed on Thursday (my actual birthday) until around 2 and Beth cooked me kedgeree for brunch. Lovely. After that it was Bond time which was fantastic. What a great birthday. What a great lady.