Harry Potter Part 2 & Visiting Family

On Friday we had part 2 of Harry Potter lined up for the evening so we took a trip to see my family, some of which live in London. We all met at my Great Aunt’s house and then my Mum, Uncle, their cousin Elaine and her daughter Alison, my Great Aunt, Kim and I went for a lovely lunch out. It was so good to catch up and I hadn’t seen my cousin Alison for years (although we couldn’t quite believe it had been that long!).

After dinner we took the underground to Covent Garden for a walk around.

And we got smoothies, Kim sporting the lovely ring my mum gave her for her birthday.

We got to part two of Harry Potter & The Cursed Child a little later the second day but we still had time to browse the gift shop. We got matching house necklaces because we’re that cool and met a very excitable Harry Potter fan who we chatted to in the queue. She was slightly mad and had already booked tickets to see the play a second time, she compared her own life several times to Harry Potter characters and knew strangely in depth information about the gift shop, the theatre and signings of books.

Anyways, backing away slowly from the mad girl, the play was enjoyable however if I had any criticism of it it would be that it didn’t feel like it was written by J K Rowling.

Also this time I didn’t choke coughing from my cold. This time I went to Boots and was armed with cough syrup which I swigged from frequently any time I felt like coughing and it worked a treat, it’s pretty much gone in fact.

 

We went back on the tube, they just opened the night tube too and it was pretty busy and I was so tired I think I fell asleep immediately!

Harry Potter & The Cursed Child

Last year I left Kimmy with express instructions to bid on tickets to Harry Potter and the Cursed Child and after she waited online for hours clutching my credit card she got them in exchange for a small fortune. We took a trip to London where we’d booked a Harry Potter manicure with Maddy at Wah Nails. Kim went for a deathly hallows theme.

 

And I went for slytherin nails. I annoyed Kim during all intervals in both parts by hissing and making my snake nail pretend to bite her

We queued up at 18:30 on the dot, we saw a lot of people dressed up and lots of Harry Potter themed clothes, hair and jewellery.

Inside the theatre it seemed small but someone told us it sat 1400 people at a time so I guess it wasn’t that small.

We were in row E so really close to the front, we made friends with our seat buddies, to our right were girls dressed in hufflepuff robes. Now these must have been expensive to buy… Where the hell would you wear official hufflepuff robes to? On our left were a gothic pinup styled couple with a Harry Potter tattoo, we liked them best and speculated during breaks as to the plot line.

I won’t give spoilers… But oh em gee.

The Savoy

  On Thursday we drove up to London and parked near my Great Aunt’s house in Barking. There was a good deal on at the Hilton in Wembley so we dropped our bags off there with an early check in and saw the stadium. We couldn’t find our padlock from last time we were here so they must have cut it off… Rude.

We’d booked to go to the Savoy for afternoon tea, we had to hurry because we were a little late (more on that later!). That shaped hedge below was fake by the way because I gave it a poke.

It was pretty fancy, Kimberly was on her best behaviour (no chewing with her mouth open allowed!) and we got some champagne. There was an American lady behind us who’d gone a little overboard on the fancy and had turned up in a long pink silk dress complete with matching fascinator, bless her.

I got my earl grey tea with lemon and Kimmy had chamomile tea.

Kim even mastered moving tiny sandwiches from the tiered plates to her own using a knife and fork, a vital skill in English life. There was a pianist that played classical versions of modern songs, she was very good. Kim said she thought this would be an easy job and I suggested she go up and give it a go which she declined.

Our scones were so tasty.

And the room was pretty to look round. It had large Art Deco portraits of famous people that visited the Savoy like Alfred Hitchcock and Audrey Hepburn.

After our sandwiches and scones we had some cakes which were beautifully decorated.

And some more… It got to the point where I was full to burst and Kim was speculating whether she could undo the tie on her dress to allow more room.

We were ready for the bill and asked our waiter for it when he said oh no madam, you have the cake course to come. Cake course… We just had the cake course I said, but he informed me that was the pastry course. Oh dear readers we almost died.

We eventually escaped the feeders Savoy to Trafalgar Square where I instructed Kim to keep walking lest I was sick on her. I still think it’s a shame they got rid of all the pigeons, when I was a child my family would visit just to feed the thousands of  pigeons.

The Broads & Fireworks

 We had a chilled out day Wednesday, there’s a walk along the Norfolk Broads by our house we explored and did some Pokemon catching along the way (gotta catch em all).

And then after some dinner we went to do some arcading. Kim forced some little kids off the dance machine so she could dance to Cotton Eye Joe (alone, I was a spectator only). We got a photo strip done and then we sucked at basketball. When I say sucked, I mean we were really terrible.

And we played skeeball for the first time which we hadn’t tried, we weren’t so bad actually. I beat Kim at air hockey by a very slim margin.

And then we had a little walk along the beach.

Before setting up camp in Goldie. We had strategically parked Goldie to watch the fireworks that are on in Great Yarmouth every Wednesday night. It was absolutely packed but we were all set up with the radio and comfy seats, coffee and a blanket. And when the fireworks were over we zoomed out back home missing the traffic. Ingenious.

Cromer, Heacham, Holt, Home

Tuesday we had a bit of a road trip, we went out to Cromer first and walked along the sea front and got ice creams.

 

 Did you know in America they don’t have flakes? True story. I explained crabbing to Kim and once again failed to find a t shirt that said “I got crabs in Cromer” for another year running (for the non-locals, Cromer is famous for its crabs being the tastiest and you can catch little crabs off the pier).

Then we went to Heacham to the Lavender Farm and walked through their nice gardens.

And inspected the Lavender; Kimberly’s verdict – BEES. Kim is mortally afraid of bees owing to a childhood incident where a nest of bees had made a home in playground equipment and she climbed on them with disastrous results. As I write this she informs me that they were not bees, they were wasps, or hornets.. She hasn’t told me if they were Africanised or not yet. She also wants to know why I’m dragging up traumatic memories.

We got a Lavender scone and after that we took a trip to Holt to visit Byfords, a big favourite of mine.

And then the long drive home. Every time we go in a car and I drive Kim instantly falls asleep. Every time we go in a car and Kim drives I snap to being super alert and the air is punctuated with my screams of “my god woman pick a lane” and “hands on the wheel!!! Ten and two, ten and two!” Or Kim’s favourite “I choose life!!”. Memories.

Return Of The Kimmy

So after 6 months Kim has returned to England for a visit. I got back home the day before from my latest agency stint and as Kimberly would get into Norwich for about 4pm it meant I spent the morning feverishly vacuuming the house in a half assed attempt to prove to my wife that I’m not a slob (although I am). All this cleaning was carried out whilst the kitties loped about watching me which I thought unfair as they cause most of the mess by shedding. My boy cat Barclay seemed a little distressed, he doesn’t like it when I behave unusually. I even took my car Goldie to the car wash, and they cleaned the inside of her too (I don’t have a hose so washing her myself is a bit of a problem). I did not know the footwell mats were black, I thought they were just old and worn not caked it dirt!

 

So Kim got held up in customs as per usual for about half an hour because that’s what our country does best instead of catching actual criminals, obviously. Luckily we foresaw this and she was armed with all sorts of paperwork and there was no issue. Kim was thrilled to be back, the cats were less thrilled when Kim ran after them trilling “babies!!” with her hands outstretched. Poor things.

The next day we decided to take a small trip to Pleasure Beach because my Mum had left us tokens and there was a Groupon offer. We went on the big wheel.

You could see pretty far over Yarmouth actually.

Of all the rides the pirate ship was particularly unpleasant as Kim gripped my arm and screamed the entire way through it until the end where I gingerly pried her claws out from my skin… This is still a kids ride right? There were mostly kids on it.

She did redeem herself with very good dodgem skills though.

All the spinny rides I sat on the outside because Kim is tiny but then the gravity throws you out and I was thoroughly squashed. But all in all the rides were fun.

Then we went for fish and chips which was tasty. And then…

We walked up tat street to the bank because somebody (cough, Kim) divulged to me that she had brought all of the money she exchanged for her dollars out with her. Yes. She had a small handbag full of one thousand pounds which she had even left on the floor during one ride. My face looked like Edvard Munch’s The Scream. We changed all her 50 pound notes for 20s (because no where likes accepting 50s) and then clutched the bag tightly for the rest of the day.

Before we went home we played mini golf where for a change I didn’t have to double the par, I think the key is not to keep score, I do a lot better when we don’t keep score. I was interested to see that the family ahead of us were some lesbians and their kids and they were terrible at golf too, I thought lesbians were meant to be good at golf? Why aren’t my special skills shining through?

In other news I’ve become very disgusting and have a small cold where I sniffle pretty much continually, I even bought a sniffy stick (my Mum’s terminology) which Kim thinks is really gross.

For dinner we finally got to drink our prosecco Tasha got us back in February when we got married.

And Kim’s dinner choice was a make your own pizza from ASDA… Simple things…

Jewellery Repairs

This post probably won’t interest many people other than my family so I’ll apologise for boring the rest of you.

Recently for graduation my Mum gave me my grandmother’s bangle as a gift, I also have my grandmothers diamond ring, both were in need of a bit of a clean and the bangle needed reshaping slightly and had become a little tarnished.

And my other grandmother had left me her ruby rings, one was completely broken and the other was in need of a good clean. I had thought about converting them into something a bit more modern but they’ve grown on me and I decided not to. Either way they needed a good repair.

And they were a little dull too as they hadn’t been worn in years since my lovely Nanny died.

Anyway I took them all into a jewellers at Great Yarmouth and got the lot done for £26 so that was a bargain and they turned out lovely. You can see the broken ring is all repaired and the bangles been reshaped.

All the stones polished up nicely.

And the bracelet looks a lot less tarnished although because it was damaged in places and it’s rolled gold they couldn’t shine it up perfectly without either losing the pattern or getting it plated which they said wouldn’t last. Still I think it looks rather good, and you can tell it’s vintage.

Gay Pride Norwich 2016

 My friend Tasha and I decided we’d go to Norwich Gay Pride this year and so we were all set to drive together when there was a huge accident on the main road to Norwich which closed it completely. Luckily Tasha knew an alternate route and we doubled back on ourselves, finally got to Norwich through the traffic, parked and made it to the Pride parade with about 4 minutes to spare.

A lot of people had dressed up or wore rainbow themed clothes, Tasha and I had rainbow temporary tattoos we wore on our faces (we’re cool).

The police made a real effort for Pride, including one of their cars that they got decorated. I liked seeing the gay officers march but I think it’d be good if nurses marched in the parade too.

There were a few companies who had employees marching which I thought was nice and they handed out free things. Lots of whistles and singing.

My favourite is always the rainbow dogs, I only saw a few with dyed fur this year though.

There was a samba band led by a man in a jungle tarzan-esque outfit dancing at the front and a clown float thing but Tasha and I thought there should be more music.

We followed at the end of the march to go and get something to eat and met two police officers who let us wear their hats for a photo so that was funny. I think the parade was longer than last year but there still needs to be more music and it’d be better to have nurses in the march as well as police officers.