Day 1
I’d not booked, the flights, hotels, taxis nor event tickets.
My sole responsibility was to get Hattie and me to and from Stansted Airport.
Anything else simply wasn’t my responsibility or, more importantly, my fault.
The day started well with a trip to Tesco with Kieren. He was lucky enough to find £20 worth of football stickers and Joss was lucky enough to be the beneficiary of 3 bottles of wine, some itchy scalp shampoo AND a mini watermelon - I know, she’s a lucky lady….
It took no time at all to pack and then about 1ish we set off for the Radisson Blu hotel at Stansted
The journey was excellent with Hattie feeding me starburst until we hit the M25 when it became a nightmare
Everyone decided that if they were going to break down they’d do it in the middle lane
3 such breakdowns meant that my bladder was well past capacity by the time we reached the hotel and found a parking space
The woman on reception obviously sensed my discomfort and decided to make it worse by doing everything slowly and in a voice that could only be heard with the use of an ear trumpet so when we got to the room we were only moments from disaster
Once we’d (I’d) settled in, we went down for some drinks - pretty fancy
But, and I can’t stress this strongly enough, the undoubted star of our stay at the bar was this man:
We were sat near the lifts so we first heard the beep beep beep of someone reversing just as we arrived and he quickly sped past us
As he returned, he was carrying a goldfish bowl sized glass full of gin
15 minutes later, beep beep beep as he went past us, got off the buggy and ran to the bar for a bottle of wine
10 minutes later, beep beep beep he came again to get a charger
Another 15 minutes later, beep beep beep, poor Hattie was now crying with laughter like pavlov’s dogs just at the sound as he rushed past, dropped the buggy off again and ran to the bar for yet another bottle of wine - what a party he must have been having
We decided then to go for some food and as I’d grown impatient with the so called table service we paid at the bar and went to the Collage restaurant
“Have you a reservation?” - no
We can seat you at 8:30 ?
I could see at least half a dozen free tables but as Hattie had previously said the Madri was getting the better of me as I’d “commented” on the attire of the woman in front of me. I decided not to argue and go back to the bar
I know I know, first world problems
When we did finally get in, the wagu cheeseburger with onion chutney was bloody delicious
And the sauces were all fancy too…
With another drink with the meal we decided we’d had enough for the night and settled down for the early start in the morning, where the real adventure starts …
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