well, i must confess to being exhausted and wishing to go to bed, especially as i have verk to go to tomorrow. however, look you see, i am aware of the fact, and indeed appreciate, that many of the more regular readers here will be keen to see me, at long last, being reunited with Spiros. so i will push on.
for some reason, and i choose the words very carefully here, Spiros has become like a sort of cult figure amongst some of you. here, then, are some of our adventures in and around london town.
that is indeed me with Spiros, meeting not long after i arrived in jolly old london. we met at a pub that he specifically selected because, in his opinion, the stairs from the tube up to it would be the most difficult and steep for me to climb with my backpack. cheers for that.
what did we do in the pub? well, he had some smart cider, and i had a pint of london pride. i also, having not by then had lunch, ordered a hamburger and chips. the lady in the pub - Lithuanian originally, i believe - took this as to mean that i wanted some eggs on some ham with chips. they were nice, if unexpected.
towards fighting, then. firstly, hackney carriage drivers, or if you like black cab drivers. the hackney carriage is one of those iconic vehicles closely associated with london town. that's all well and good, but it in itself has not been a reason for Spiros to take a shine to the drivers. as we have seen in the past, he is prone to having rather strong disagreements with them.
here he is approaching two of them. he approached with nothing but goodwill and attempted, i suppose, to break bread with them. they were having none of it.
Spiros merely asked them if they wouldn't mind giving him the password for the wi-fi in their cab and asked if this was a good spot to book an Uber ride from. they, sadly, told him to "f*** off out of it".
it saddens me to see people not getting along, dear reader. Spiros had extended a hand of friendship to them and they rejected it. as far as i am concerned, Spiros can walk with his head held high, for he tried to make amends for any previous misunderstandings between him and the cabbie fraternity.
yes, since you ask, yes i did indeed stay with Spiros. here is the magnificent bed set up he had in place for me. well, except for the Marlboro - Shaun brought me them, nice one man.
yeah, that is a copy of Behind The Candelabra you can see, and yes they are tissues that he has discreetly placed in the book for me. the White Ace cider and copy of the Sunday Sport were very welcome things to leave too, as was the Chelsea bedding he selected.
onwards to more fighting, then, although i am not sure this one was really fighting.
a substantial number of people that Spiros knows seem to spend most of their day sat somewhere drinking. this is no bad thing at all; as point of fact it is a lifestyle that i may one day quite like to try for a bit.
here is the most recent such friend that Sprios has made. now that it is somewhat warmer - and let me tell you it is damned humid down in london - this chap has taken to sitting in this spot at the same time every day to drink four cans of, frankly, anything that has alcohol in it.
not really fighting, i suppose, but Spiros does encourage him to try having six or eight cans instead.
the only real problem that some of you might have is that the chap in question appears to wear a uniform which strongly suggests he is employed, in some capacity, in the public transport sector; possibly as a driver.
i'd like to think that he engages in his hobby of sitting in a flowerbed getting sh!tfaced after his driving, if he does indeed drive, shift is over. if not, well, the fact that he is back at pretty much the same time each day would to me indicate that his hobby is not affecting his work.
it's really smart, it is, and if i had one, i would wear it all day, wherever i went. Spiros isn't allowed to wear his outside of the house, for fear that he would go up to black people and ask them if they wanted to pretend to be Clubber Lang or Apollo Creed, or indeed ask people with Russian accents (of which there are a lot in london) if they fancied being Ivan Drago.
it was a short and sweet trip that i went on, dear reader, but very much well worth it. this is the first time that Spiros and i have been able to meet up on the northern side of the equator, and my only regret about that is that it's taken so long.
will i be going down towards london again to meet up with him once more? almost certainly, dear reader, almost certainly. i have no idea when, but i would imagine that when i do, i will report on it here, and further i would suggest it will feature further adventures in trying to make peace with london cab drivers and a good deal more of sitting around in flower beds drinking cans of stuff that has alcohol in it.
right, i should really be heading off to get some sleep, so to end, here's Spiros and i riding the tube.
many thanks for the hospitality and the adventures, Spiros, with particular emphasis on the smart bedding you sorted for me and the most useful tissues.
be excellent to each other!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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