London - Day 6

Wednesday, 11 September, 2013.

Back in Houston, we have become used to sleeping with a fan blowing.  It's more for the "noise" than for the breeze.  Sometimes we need it to drown out the F Bar not far from the house.

I thought about it, but I decided against bringing a small portable fan along on our trip to England.  Instead, I downloaded a couple of apps from the internet onto my phone.  Both of them have provided us with some good "white noise" during our trip.

While both are free, the "Relax and Sleep" app provides quite a number of sound effects, and you can combine them to hear more than one at a time.  The other, "Rain Sounds" provides nine sounds all associated with rain, but only one at a time.  Either will help you get a good nights sleep.

We woke to the sound of crickets and a fountain (Relax and Sleep) to another day of dreary overcast skies and rain.  Frankly, this rain every day is getting a little old.

The wife fixed another nice lazy breakfast of scrambled eggs and coffee.  With rain like this, we don't really want to get outside much.  The only things on the agenda for today are to see "The Book of Mormon" matinee at the Prince of Wales Theatre, and to have dinner with friends.

So we had a bite of lunch around noon and left the flat about 1:30pm just to be sure we had plenty of time to get to the theater by 2:30pm.   Getting there was a simple Tube trip to Picadilly Circus and a short walk on Coventry Street.   If nothing else, this flat in Marylebone provides stellar access to the Tube.

Sure enough, the tickets were waiting for me at the Box Office, and our seats are just outstanding: Row F in the "stalls" (6 rows from the stage) and smack dab in the middle of the row.  Perhaps the only better seats could be the elevated boxes on either wall.

The Book of Mormon is fucking hilarious.  What strikes me as curious is that, I  remember when the play premiered in New York City in 2011 and I heard that some elders of the Mormon Church saw the play and liked it.  They actually "approved" of it?!  Either they are really stupid (they ARE church elders, after all) or ... they have a really great sense of humor, which is kinda doubtful.  Maybe they were just lying.

I can't see how anyone who attends the Book of Mormon would not get the multiple slams on religion, especially the Mormon religion.

Hasa Diga Eebowai, indeed, which, according to Trey Parker and Matt Stone (the writers of The Book of Mormon), means "Fuck you, God" in a Ugandan language.  Both of us just loved it.  Being atheists, we really appreciated the humor.

After the play, we had plenty of time before meeting friends for dinner, so we zipped back to the flat for a few.

The rain had ceased (a miracle!) so we decided to walk to dinner.  We found The Golden Hind with no problem, were early, so grabbed a table for a restaurant just across the street, a perfect vantage point to see when our friends showed up for dinner.

Sure enough, right on time, our dinnermates appeared.  One of them is a co-worker from Houston who is on a four-year assignment in London.  The other has "retired" and so does some volunteer work while exploring London.  How cool that would be.  

I did something rather similar back in 1994 when my wife got a great job offer in Baltimore, so we moved from Houston to that old, old city and I took the first six months off just to explore the area before taking a job or two for some more income.  I was not truly "retired" like this guy.  JEALOUS!!

I have to say, the fish and chips we had at The Golden Hind was really awesome.  The fish part I mean.  It was a large piece of cod in a really delicate, flaky, mild crust.  It really was perfect.  Light and crispy. The chips (French Fries to you Americans) were OK.  My wife thought they were perfect: crispy on the outside, mushy on the inside, and all different sizes, which means they were hand-cut.  No frozen potatoes here, baby. 

My co-worker doused his fish in a malt vinegar, which the restaurant had on each table.  My wife loved that too.  I preferred the tartar sauce.  Our friends were such regulars here that the owner came out to say "hi."  

The Golden Hind is BYOB, oddly enough.  Our friends brought a nice regular-sized bottle of Chardonnay (750ml), and we produced three personal size bottles (200ml) of Chardonnay and Beaujolais.   We had quite a nice buzz by the end of the meal.  It was great to catch up.

Sure enough, by the end of the meal, it began raining again, but we all had our own umbrellas and so took our time walking back to the flat.

All in all, a really great day.