for those of you who for some reason read here regularly but all the same objected to the heavy quota of family and holiday pictures i can only, look you see, hope that you've enjoyed the slight break from that. yes, indeed, by that i do in fact mean i am going to carry on.
there are, however, not so many pictures grouped together that i have left to post. at some stage i remain optimistic that my (considerably) better half shall throw together a (considerably) better post on the joys of Making Harry Potter than i did, but not as such as yet.
on i go, then, to Hamleys, or if you like Hamley's, for the internet, in a somewhat partial out of character move, disagrees with the best spelling of the shop.
we arrived at Hamleys (and let's drop the apostrophe, for you and i do not care for such things) in the afternoon and were, as you can see, greeted by a rather large teddy bear of the big variety. he, or indeed she, was most friendly, and appeared quite happy to pose with all who wished for photographs. no, i did not do a pose myself and no, i probably wouldn't do that job unless there was some very serious coins of money involved in it.
a word to the wise. if you are from outside London, or are visiting from within on the instance of a special or memorable date, get to Hamleys for opening time. children with one or all of these special reasons or purposes are invited to join in with the ceremonial ringing of the bell which marks the commencement of the premises being open to the public.
was there, you ask, by any chance a puppet show on the go whilst we visited? why indeed yes there was, and as i have an apparently lack of variety of pictures from within Hamleys, here you go, here is a picture of it underway. towards the conclusion, i think.
this is a rather good reflection on what one gets from the Hamleys experience. it is huge - six or seven floors, i think - but it doesn't use them to be the "biggest" toy shop in the American sense of it. i mean, they don't stock absolutely every type of toy you could wish for. the range is formidable, but mostly they use their space to create the sense of wonder, entertainment, imagination and fantasy you would really want to be part of the toy buying experience. nice one.
was there a somewhat close to lifesize model of Her Majesty The Queen built out of Lego within Hamleys? those of you who have read my previous posts will know that the answer is yes, but here's another look, only this time with the boys posing beside.
yes, i have covered Hamleys in previous blog posts. this was my third trip to Hamleys in about 15 months, or maybe just 14. which would mean, to my knowledge, that it is thus far the only time i have visited the same location used for a Stanley Kubick film three times in just slightly north of one year.
quite a special location too, for the last scene of his final film, Eyes Wide Shut, was filmed right inside Hamleys. whereabouts? i am not certain. some reports suggest it was the ground floor, but i don't know. perhaps i should watch the film again to see if i can't work out the exact spot, should i make a fourth trip at some point in the future. as opposed to the past.
indeed yes, James would seem to be committing an act of treason right there. i would like to think he is merely tickling the nose of our reigning monarch, but in all likelihood he is as point of fact picking it, as precisely as it looks. nice one William, though, attempting to distract Her Majesty.
did the boys bankrupt me or my (considerably) better half within Hamleys? surprisingly not. they knew they needed to save money for Harry Potter World and were mindful of our limited ability to carry things home with us, so they were appropriately modest in their ambitions. the main thing that the both of them were taken with was some sort of ring off of Lord Of The Hobbits, or whatever it was. i think it was a replica of that ring what Merlin won off of a dragon in a game of chance or something; the one that a lot of people make a lot of fuss of just to toss it in a volcano.
the answer to the second most obvious question in that last bit is no, i am not taking the boys to a volcano in order that they may throw their replica rings in. the more obvious question does indeed have the rather straightforward answer of me indeed not knowing much about whatever it was.
erm, yes, that is me just about out of information and out of pictures to show off, so there's the boys with the massive teddy of the big variety again, along with a chap replenished in top hat and tails. i would suspect or even be so bold as to suggest that he is intended to be some sort of ringmaster; the sort one would associate with a circus. and, to be honest and fair, i recall him looking and acting a lot happier than this image would suggest.
righty-ho, there's a few more London pictures i will get around to posting here. as they are, by and large, of our (much less troublesome) journey home, i think it's safe to say that you do at this stage have the highlights of our time away. i can but hope you've enjoyed having a gander and reading as much as we had doing it all!
be excellent to each other!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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