Anyway, I thought the occasion worth reporting on as I had such a lovely birthday! Birthweek, in fact, as the celebrations seemed to last!
My birthday was on Tuesday 10th, and I had no plans for the day before 6.30pm. I therefore decided to treat myself to a nice day to myself. I had a lazy morning, then headed over to West London for a wander round Notting Hill. I bought myself a rather fetching cupcake themed bag, a jacket for my Edina costume (more to follow) and then had a lovely birthday lunch in Le Pain Quotidien:
Nom nom
From there I realised I could do my old favourite walk towards work along Bayswater Road/Hyde Park and then through Mayfair. I'd missed this, and it was lovely to do it again. The weather was fine and bright; not too cold for January. It reminded me that two years previously I'd also been in Hyde Park on my birthday, but there had been snow on the ground then and the Serpentine was frozen over!
Had a lovely shift at work. Everyone made me feel so special and loved. One of my friends bought me not one but TWO cupcakes(!), everyone signed a card for me and sang a round of Happy Birthday in the meeting at the end. Clive Rowe (actor) wished me a happy birthday and said he'd loved to have come salsa dancing with us on Thursday (as was the plan) but was busy. Had a conversation with him about salsa dancing with me standing in Grand Circle and him on the stage...funny.
After work, Phil the stage door keeper had booked a large table for us in a pub on Drury Lane, so we all headed up there. It felt so great that so many people were there! There were probably about 20 in total, including ushers, bar staff and even a cast member in the form of Will, an extra and understudy (who'd "been" Ben Miller when he was off helping his wife give birth). As is usual at such occasions, everyone plied me with drinks and I was really very merry by the time Will suggested we go onto another bar (called 'Alley Cats', beneath a music shop on Denmark Street). There we were onto the cocktails and left when they closed at 2am.... this had not been the plan and it made for an interesting shift the following matinee. Myles and I were both hungover, were put ushering together in the Dress Circle and we were both a) extraordinaily hot; b) annoyed with every person who asked a question; c) craviing bacon and d) barely able to stand up.
Anyway, we survived the day somehow and were recovered enough by the Thursday to make it out again to salsa! It's a club on Charing Cross Road that plays latino music... most people there were pretty good and obviously take classes but we did our best and wiggling in an almost convincing way and had fun! Clive spoke to me earlier in the evening to again express his regrets at not being able to join us (apparently he's a big salsa dancing nut!) and promised to invite the rest of the cast... that didn't happen, but the very image of Peter Capaldi out mamboing with us was enough to sustain me!
At the weekend I had the luxury of a Saturday off, so went home to Kent to be spoiled some more. Saw the family, ate extortionate amounts of food and generally had a lovely time.
On that Sunday was the Christening of baby Joseph and so I officially became a godmother! :) It was lovely returning to the church where Katy and Andrew had been married; and even the weather was equally as gloriously sunny as it had been that October day. The baby was as good as gold, and it was lovely to see Katy's family again. I am very proud to be Auntie Godmother Rachel!
And so, responsibility! And good example setting... I will achieve this, but two days later I happened to have the third and final birthday type party type thing in the shape of the much anticipated Ab Fab night in Shoreditch!
It was so fun to dress up (and it is so surprisingly easy to get in character once one dons a wig a a ridiculous outfit), see my wonderful crazy friends and take Shoreditch by storm! Those people in the kebab shop didn't know what'd hit 'em!
Highlights:
Our group being clearly the best dressed there
Commandeering squishy cushions and watching Absolutely Fabulous with a room full of people
Winning a bottle of
Pretending to fall out of the taxi at the end of the night, in true Eddy style
Looking like this:
And so there we are. Play is still running well, and I still love it. Can't wait for everyone I know to see it! Found some great love for it on the internet:
http://www.winkball.com/walls/hGdEgr9VpzlJ/the-ladykillers-at-the-gielgud-theatre
In other news, I have networked and modelled for the education department of Delfont Mackintosh (and when I say modelled I mean pretended to do various ushering tasks for their access website), dealt with some weird and, er.. 'wonderful' customers and said a sad goodbye to Cleo, someone who joined at the same time as I did. Already our numbers are dwindling quite a lot. But we have had some great newbies too, which makes it alright :) Have been here 4 months now and would happily stay at LEAST another 4 more.
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