Always Look On The Bright Side Of Life!

This week is half term from school, and surprisingly, I haven't gone away anywhere. This is not for want of trying, mind, but I wasn't really able to get my 'a' into gear, and so my various plans fell thorough. Originally I wanted to go to the Yorkshire Dales and hike the Dales Way - a 6 or 9 day 100 mile hike (depending on how hard you wanted to go each day) - but I didn't manage to sort out my accommodation or transport properly, and so that trip didn't happen. This puts me in the unusual position of being on holiday but still in London. What am I to do?

Well, rather than be depressed about it, I decided I would 'always look on the bright side of life' and make the most of it, so yesterday I started my Christmas shopping. Took myself off to Knightsbridge and had a wander around the shops. I have discovered the 137 bus takes me direct there, from the end of my road - pretty good eh, when you consider Mayor Ken has just recently put down the cost of a bus ride if you use your Oyster card - from £1.00 to £0.90 - if you don't have an Oyster it costs you an exhorbitant £2.00!

Anyway, wandered around the shops, had a lovely afternoon tea (yummy New York cheesecake and Cafe Latte) at Harrods, then moseyed on back to Chateau La Streatham.

Today I messed around doing some housey type stuff in the morning, then got my favourite 159 bus up to town to meet friends for coffee and to go to the National Portrait Gallery. The National Portrait Gallery really was quite interesting, they have portraits of so many different famous people, but my favourites were:

• The Tudor gallery - really liked the pics of Walsingham, Sir Frances Drake and of course Elizabeth I.
• The pics of Joseph Banks and Captain Cook (hey what Aussie wouldn't be interested in those) - oh and of Governor Philips too
• The pics of Diana, Princess of Wales
• The Warhols - especially Elizabeth II.

Anyway, after this we went for dinner at Satsumas before heading off to see a show. We'd been to the half price booths and managed to get tickets to "Spamalot" for £18 - much reduced from the £30 so-called 'half price' tickets that were being offered by the 'official' half price booth!

The show was amazing! The special effects were really quite spectacular considering they were being done live on a stage, the singing was very good (the Woman in the Lake though was the best, just amazing - such a tonal range she had!), the story captivating - but for me the best part was that the actor playing "King Arthur" was none other than Peter Davidson. Ok, now I'm sure you're sitting there going - who? But if I tell you that he was one of the old Doctor Who's - you might get it - but if you're from my family and I tell you that he was Tristan in "All Creatures Great and Small" - ah, there you go! His singing, to be fair, was pretty pov, but his comic timing and general performance was excellent.

I had a bit of a look on you tube for some clips, but all I could find was one from the Tony Awards, and one about the World Record attempt they did recently for the largest coconut orchestra, where they packed out Trafalgar Square on St George's day with people playing coconuts to "Always Look On The Bright Side Of Life". Here they are:





Shame the dudes around the camera person are rubbish singers!

Anyway, I really enjoyed the evening, it was awesome, such an enjoyable show, such clever music, such a funny script. Quality...