Casual Days, Homecooked Meals, and a Sunday Stroll

Jason waits in John & David's backyard for the wash to finish...
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Saturday arrived, a day previously contemplated for a trip to Hampton Court Palace, out of a shared interest with one of our hosts in Tudor history. As it turned out, though, the prospect of arriving there amid the floral festival which happened to be underway raised our eyebrows a bit. More tired than we really realized, we agreed to consider it instead for Sunday. We still had plans for dinner and catching up with our old DC friend and his boyfriend in the evening, so we decided to save up some energy for that.

... before we hang it to dry.
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Saturday instead became a spontaneous day of relaxation, conversation and reflection. While steadily marshalling our laundry through the washer and onto the clothesline (randomly, it was one of the sunniest days of our entire rainy month) we took in British TV and films 'till early evening. Favorites we shared laughs over: "Let Them Eat Cake" (French & Saunders); 2D-TV; Hot Fuzz; and bits of Wimbledon. David shared photos of their recent anniversary trip to Paris, and we finally saw the video of their civil registry ceremony from last year.

Our most Victorian of after-dinner entertainment choices so carried us away that we overstayed a midnight train whistle

Princess Bonnie of Brockley, Duchess of Deptford and her consort, Lord Slugford, 3rd Earl of Honor Oak.
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At dinnertime we made our way closer to the city center, to Kennington, across the river from Parliament and one of the gayest (and more upscale) parts of London. We met our long-missed friend outside the Elephant and Castle station, stopping for a couple bottles of wine and an Italian beer (Peroni) on sale, six for a fiver. At his apartment we found his boyfriend waiting for us with a roast chicken dinner, a very interesting nonprofit service career to talk about, a wry sense of humor and the table nicely set. We were certainly wowed.

Us at the Observatory.
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After dinner, Guy and Dermot, who both play piano, entertained their dates with music, excitedly comparing interests, each playing alternating spells of showtunes, popular, and classical music and prompting occasional singalongs. Our most Victorian of after-dinner entertainment choices, underscoring just what quaintly odd fellows we are, so carried us away that we overstayed a midnight train whistle, tipped off luckily to a good discount cab service which flew us home in time for a bit more time with our hosts.

The view from the Royal Observatory at Greenwich.
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When Sunday finally arrived, we reluctantly decided to skip Hampton Court in favor of a much cheaper and low-key excursion to Greenwich. We lunched on value curry at the food court (at the next picnic table over, in the strong midday sun, a young man was passed out dead to the world, face on the tabletop) and perused books, antiques and cultural ephemera at the Village Market booths, wandering ever closer to the Greenwich Observatory atop the hill.

A surprisingly punishing walk up the steep trail to the observatory, past a little boy screaming to his parents to turn back, brought us a sweeping view stretching from beyond central London on the west to Canary Wharf and sprawling development on the east, a view spanning two hemispheres.

The town fete, outside the Powder Monkey.
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Down the hill, past sunbathers and young dads playing with toddlers, past the Naval College and the statue of Wiliam IV, the Sailor King, past the pub where we'd enjoyably whiled away Friday night, we found the small gay bar The Powder Monkey and stopped in for a pint or two to split up the walking and enliven our Sunday afternoon. This is the neighborhood gay bar for Greenwich now that the famous one up the street (seen in teen-angst classic "Beautiful Thing") changed into something else. The perhaps overly cold and modern decor did nothing in particular to warm or soften one's heart, and the other clientele seemed a bit distant too, considering what a lovely day it was to be alive in Greater London. For our part we were happily occupied in conversation. Until the costumed freaks in the street within a quickly-gathered crowd began setting off fire extinguishers and firecrackers.

We dress for dinner.
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It was the Village Fete, apparently, including random entertainments and cultural events, which in this case meant a Chinese soprano in provocative red gown doing her best to project (with amplifiers) an abstract operatic perfromance of uncertain provenance from atop a pilliarized conveyence surrounded by metallo-fabric giraffe concepts puppetized by dancers inside. And then they shot off a loud confetti cannon.

On the final leg of the stroll we circled the Cutty Sark - somewhere inside of that all-encompassing scaffolding within which they are trying to undo a serious recent fire.

At home, our last night now before us, our friends prepared a classic Sunday dinner of delicious roast (chosen at the moth-watering butcher shop around the corner) with potatoes and peas, and crisp fantastic little Yorkshire pudding, perfectly baking-cup shaped. And smothered all over in savory brown gravy. Fantastic.

A final tour of shared enjoyable feel-good TV and film followed before we faced the terrible truth that we were leaving in the morning. Good nights were said, preliminary sorting and packing accomplished. In no time, we were ready for the morning's good-byes.