Day 15 - Death by liquor shots (and concert WIN)

So thankfully, the Seasick Steve show on Saturday was in a completely different part of town from Friday and Saturday, so I had no worries of striking out on live shows for the week.

The day started nicely, and with a lot of promise for cool things. It started innocently enough. I printed out a ton of self-guided Jack the Ripper tour notes, so I planned on doing that (lots of good material for the Devil's Demons). I was excited, not only would I see a concert and have a fun night, maybe I could do something productive and creative before my capacity for thinking was greatly muffled by booze. So I made my way from home and started walking towards Soho, where I would need to catch the tube over to Whitechapel.

I cut through the touristy part of town, so I went past Buckingham Palace, through Green Park, and down Piccadilly Circus. I found an uppity shopping district with lots of cool hat and gentlemens' stores. I didn't buy anything. But there are lots of cool hats there to potentially buy.

Next I headed up Charing Cross Rd, and made a couple of cool discoveries:

1) Pizza Hut sells wine. That's just incredible.
2) There is a store called Fopp that sells cds and books etc. They were cheap. I bought all 3 Seasick Steve albums and a book of heavy metal cd covers.
3) There was a pub named the Marquis of Granby, and they had good beer. The bartender also had a Simpsons' ringtone. The British absolutely LOVE the Simpsons.
4) This part of town is also music store central, there were at least a dozen instrument shops scattered about the area. Now I know. And knowing is half the battle.

After wetting my whistle and purchasing a couple things, I started back towards the Tottenham Court tube station. Again, not thinking ahead, it wasn't until I was close to Whitechapel that I realized that entire portion of the tube was shut down for the weekend. So I hopped off at Liverpool Street and decided to try and walk.

Jordan called then. Basically, I decided to head to their neck of the woods, Greenwich, instead of the walk. Next weekend.

So I journey there, and meet Jordan near the O2 arena, which is this mammoth of an arena that hosts all kinds of events, is filled with clubs, restaurants, shops, it's ridiculous. We walk to Jordan's flat, which is awesome. It reminded me of IKEA but in a good way. Jordan says the cab drivers refer to it as the Lego apartments:

So we head into Greenwich proper, which is a really cool area. This is where the observatory is, where time is measured (GMT) etc. We wandered quickly through a really amazing market where several artists peddled their wares (return trip absolutely necessary) and made our way to the Gipsy Moth, one of the coolest pubs I've been to. It's right on the waterfront, and they certainly serve a good pint.

After a few here, we made our way to another pub, after which I headed back home and to Seasick Steve.

Seasick Steve was absolutely brilliant. The venue was packed to the brim, the energy was contagious, and the music fantastic. His stage set up was awesome, looked like a camp where a homeless guy by the river (which he was) would hang out:

I was so impressed by how many people knew his songs and could follow along. Even for someone who didn't know a song, it was easy to groove to. He was a real showman too, very refreshing. I thoroughly enjoyed myself. I have way too much fun by myself as well.

After the show, I made my way towards Waterloo to meet up at the Wellington, a massive pub-hotel which was. I dunno. Good?

Neat murals in there of battles. I was pleased by the fancy artwork. Especially as I started to down vodka sodas like they were going out of style:

After this place, we wandered down the street to some ridiculous Cuban place, packed to the brim. We were there for a bit, then ended the night at another place around the corner, where we danced our faces off. There are lots of fuzzy pictures here that end with Jordan and I in some sort of embrace. Bro-love.

That's basically it. We fell in the street at some point too. I think I might have had a shot or eight that night.

I thought I had lost my camera as well, but thankfully I had put it in Rosie's purse (for some reason). Whatever works I guess. We had a good night. I didn't feel particularly well Sunday, but that's what Sundays are for. Recovery.