How many days does one get to celebrate one’s birthday? Apparently, in London it’s a week.

Last Monday was Steve’s birthday. As I’d mentioned in a previous post, I find it a rather odd custom here in London that folks tend to organise their own birthday gatherings, but meh...whatever. The morning of his birthday, Steve sent out a reminder e-mail to all, advising that he’d be at the Tup at 7 for those who wanted to wish him a happy birthday.

After meeting with yet another recruiter that morning, I hoofed it up to Camden Market to a really fun store, Oddballs, to try to find a gift for Steve. Oddballs sells all sorts of wacky-fun things like juggling balls, unicycles, and diabolos. If you’ve never seen someone working a diabolo, take a peek. It’s pretty cool. When we’d gone there a few weeks ago, there was a guy playing with one in the store. It’s kind of like the yo-yo's awesome cousin. Anywho, Steve had noted that he could use some new juggling balls, which I picked up (along with a kazoo...that no one seemed to recall how to play). Good times.

We met at the Tup that evening, and Landlord Dan was up there in addition to the ol’ gang. Dan bought Steve a yard of ale (which, I was told equates to about three-plus pints) and we all followed Steve outside to cheer him on and watch him pound down this ridiculous amount of beer. Now, I’m not sure if it was the pressure of it all or the fact that people don’t exactly chug-a-lug in England, but I think Steve wound up wearing more ale than drinking it. His shirt was positively soaked, so as we went inside to have some birthday cake, he put on Greg’s sweater, which Greg had so generously offered.

Thursday night was Guy Fawkes Night, celebrated with fireworks and fun. It must be noted here that the people had been setting off fireworks all week long. Every time I heard one go off, I’d cringe a little, convinced it was gunshots...then I realised I'm in London, not Charlotte. (hehe) I think Star was with me on that one, as she kept tweaking with each loud bang. It was kinda cool, however, to see fireworks each night from my windows. You can sort of make out the fireworks in the distance in this pic, taken from my bedroom window. There were several shows to see, and Steve came over that night for a birthday dinner of steak au poivre, and we dined whilst watching the Dave channel and listening to the skyrockets outside – very cool.

On Friday night, I joined Steve’s family to celebrate his birthday. We started at The Alexandra pub in Wimbledon, then moved to dinner at Suk Saran, with its fabulous Thai food, then back to The Alexandra for a quick post-dinner drink together. (You may recall that The Alexandra was included in the Wimbledon ghost walk blog post a few weeks ago...Hooray for haunted pubs!) After returning back to our Colliers Wood ‘hood, Steve and I popped into the Tup for one last celebratory birthday drink with the other locals. (winks)

Was Steve’s birthday over then? Oh, of course not! We still had another day to go (at minimum!).

The gang met on Saturday afternoon at The Alexandra in Clapham to watch England vs. Australia in rugby. Now this is one sport with our lil’ reserved English folks don’t hold back. Whether it was shouts from across the room (“C’mon, England!!”) , exchanged stats across tables (“Did you know Jonny Wilkinson Wilkinson overtook Neil Jenkins' world test record of 1090 points last March?”), or chants of “Swing low, sweet chariot...”, they were all out in force. Best game quote goes to Chris, re: Jonny Wilkinson, rugby superstar, who was all over the field (I believe Steve even used “omnipotent”), as he said, “Those other 14 players are just superfluous!” Love it...hehe...

Following the 9-18 England loss (sigh), we wound up with great real estate in a downstairs area of the pub, watching the Wales vs. The All Blacks (South Africa). Hungry, yet not wanting to give up our area, we grabbed bites in shifts from the hole in the wall next door. As the place began to crowd in anticipation of the much-publicised David and Goliath fight, we decided to leave and return back to the Wood 'hood, where we watched the fight at South African Anton’s before calling it a night.

Good times: I returned home to find that Star had as much of a party as Steve, tearing into the garbage and making a well-distributed mess through my flat - yet again. Sigh...My kingdom for a proper trash container. Perhaps that's what I'll add to my next birthday wish list..? (winks)