It's health and safety gone mad!

Because we travelled down to London on Remembrance Sunday, we were unable to pay a proper tribute as we didn't stop for the minute silence. I have packed my Granddad Eddie's pins for the 11th and I do feel a bit guilty about the fact that I was probably asleep when 11am came around because as soon as I get into a moving vehicle I am ready to nod off, it's a pity really that I can't get properly comfortable. I like to sleep naked and the other passengers make such a fuss that I can't sleep. After our trip to Camden we went to Paddington Station for a drink in a nice bar we found on a previous visit, of course as it was our anniversary yesterday we had to go to the statue of the bear because I always say how he helped us to get together. Neither of us can remember why we say this but we thank him anyway. 

In need of something to eat we wandered past a few restaurants and had a look at some cabinet mounted menus to try and find inspiration as we didn't know what we fancied. Eventually we found an Indian restaurant that was half full and stopped to have a look at what they had on offer as Mandi is quite delicate when it comes to curry. Before we had time to think about it a waiter had appeared next to us and was giving us the big sell asking what we liked in a curry. As soon as Mandi told him that I like a hot curry he obviously didn't see the sophisticated man about town that everyone else sees when I appear, he saw an ignorant yobbo who used to blight Indian restaurants years ago asking for the hottest thing they had with a big plate of poppadoms and ten pints of lager while making references to 'Gandi's revenge' and making comments about putting the toilet roll in the fridge to make life easier later. Of course I don't want to be that idiot but on the other hand I do like a hot curry, I do like poppadoms, and I drink lager when I'm there. The waiter ushered us in offering to make me a vindaloo, which confused me as vindaloo isn't a particularly hot dish down south but I am sure that he and his colleagues saw me as a challenge. The service and the food was lovely, which was good news seeing as they continued being master salesmen and bringing all manner of yummy to our table. Of course they handed me a drinks menu and before I had chance to look he said 'pint of Cobra?'. That's racist.

As far as the challenge was concerned it was one nil to me as I cleared my plate without breaking into a sweat. I used to have a very small window between putting my cutlery down and needing the toilet, but now I seem to have developed a tolerance. Again Mandi is a lot more delicate than I am and I am able to eat anything with little effect (I don't even put on much weight) so she had a mild vegetarian dish and we were both in a fit state to, without going into too much detail, celebrate seven years together back at the hotel. This morning was a different matter.

Because I don't like the restrictions of a hotel breakfast times, I usually prefer to walk out and find a nice cafe to have a good fry-up. There was a nice cafe a short walk away so I indulged in a full English breakfast. Realising that there wasn't a toilet at the tube station I knew that a journey to Brighton was a bad idea without a visit. The only public toilet in the area was one of those coin operated cupboards which I didn't fancy so I simply went back to the hotel. We were staying in a very grand Victorian hotel with a concierge and a lot of ornate staircases leading somewhere (I popped out for a cigarette last night and got lost on the way back to the room) so I felt a bit guilty going back in after having checked out just to go and use the toilet, but needs must and I was in there for nearly half an hour.

It turns out I wasn't the winner last night after all.

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