So A Cyclist Outed Me As Gay

I know you're all looking forward to your monthly dose of satiric journalism surrounding life in London, and don't worry that will come, (I locked my keys and my phone inside the flat today. What a story!) But right now something that happened on my way home is playing on my mind, and I honestly can't get my head around it.

Let's start at the bus stop. I, after closing the pub and having a now customary drink and general life chat with the manager, was waiting for the night bus (late) when a couple of young girls walked up and sat down next to me, shivering violently. They dispaired at the display stating that the next bus would be almost half an hour's wait, so I assured them that the display lies, and pointed out that the bus was parked in the terminal across the road. They explained that they had gotten on the bus not knowing where to get off and had ridden it to the end of the line, and were now essentially retracing their journey in the hope of eventually getting home.

Long story short, they needed to get off at my stop and walk in a slightly different direction. After a nice bus-chat and after they thanked me for my kindness and help (I was branded the nicest person in London, I pointed out that this was due to my not being from London) I pointed them in the right direction and headed off on my own path. No sooner had I taken two steps then a cyclist who had been approaching us from behind yelled out,

"What kind of man lets two girls walk home by themselves at this time of night?" A fair point, I suppose, but he immediately followed with, "He must be gay."

Now I stayed silent here, as any immediate response my brain may have formulated would probably have been either juvenile or offensive. Or both. But after the fee seconds of no, you're gay ran through my head, the next thought I had was, was that an insult? To me? Seems more insulting to the gay community. Did this cyclist just attempt to argue that gay men are less chivalrous than their straight counterparts? How does that work? If I preferred cock, would I feel less obliged to be a gentleman? Certainly in my experience homosexuals are far more likely to walk a woman home. After all, what's less creepy: random stranger you met on a bus walks you to your front door and now knows were you live, or man who has no interest in your genitalia walks you home?

Which leads to an even more disturbing thought, was the cyclist trying to pin me as some sort of sexual deviant? Obviously if a man walks a girl home he must be straight, and also must be interested in engaging in sexual congress with one or both of his unsuspecting female companions. As such, being the raging homosexual that he has judged me to be, I would have no reason to walk the young ladies home.

Surely I am not in the wrong here? I got the girls onto the correct bus, got them off at the stop closest to their house, and by my estimations they will have had to walk for a maximum of 9 minutes through the notably assault-prone area of Honor Oak Park. Honestly they would have been more at risk walking through Balamory..

Perks Of Being A Tourist

I don't get much opportunity to do 'touristy' stuff; the stereotypical sights and spots which attract thousands of foreigners every day, none more so than those in the Capital itself. And so, ten months into my life in London, an opportunity arose which I could not pass up: show an old friend from America (high school) around London during her first two days in the fair isles. My thoughts during the whole experience were, "Why have I never done this before?"

We started at Paddington station. Some time later we managed to arrive within the same part of Paddington station, and headed to a convenient coffee shop which rhymes with Bartucks to prepare for the day ahead. After a stroll through Hyde Park (Why had I never done that before?) we took a train to King's Cross to gaze at the lack of platform 9 3/4, visit the Harry Potter shop and see a man who may have had the best job ever - he was a rail-based pest controller. And he was carrying a large falcon. No word of a lie, this man was casually strolling around one of England's most famous stations with an impressive bird of prey perched on his gloved arm. This day was going to be great.

After King's X, it was a bus to Southbank, to take in the river and the bank's world-class entertainment and attractions! Except lets face it, the Thames isn't hard to take in and the entertainment was disappointingly sparse on Monday afternoon. Still, got some bloody good ice-cream (the first of many) and had a nice stroll.

From there we visited Trafalgar Square (again, I'd not had chance to go since my move, and we chose a beautiful day to visit) to sunbathe with the lions under the watchful gaze of Admiral Nelson.

The final stop of the day took us to London Bridge for a pint on the riverfront at a great riverside pub in the Hays Galleria. Which was a Nicholson's pub, which granted me my new employee discount, but more about that later. The drinks were perfect and food we ended up having was delicious.

And then we had an indor BBQ (George Forman's Lean Mean Grilling Machine) at Richard's along with drinks for dinner.

Day two started with another meeting at Tarmucks - this time we were actually able to find one another far more easily - and then we were off to visit the Queen! The Changing of the Guard at Buckingham Palace is a wonderful tourist and British attraction. Featuring such exciting sights as: Police Officers on horseback, footsoldiers in red coats (The Red Coats are coming! The Red Coats are coming!) and bearskin caps, some of whom were also ahorse. And the marching band, easily stealing the show playing such classics as The Theme from Indiana Jones, The Imperial March and My Heart Will Go On. Brilliant stuff.

Day duo continued to improve as The American was introduced to the wonderful concept of a Cheesemonger. The concept that a shop could specialize in selling little other than numerous varieties of cheese caused a minor excitement aneurysm, but she quickly recovered and was nibbling happily on the samples available for tasting. I bought a very expensive pork pie, another new experience (and another very good one, though she wasn't too keen on the sweet chili scotch egg) which we shared for lunch on a little city centre greenspace we stumbled across en route to Leicester Square. On final arrival to the cinema-swamped stomping ground of the world's biggest film releases, we decided to have a drink (well, I had a drink), wonder Chinatown, buy tickets to a comedy show, and make our way to a far more obscure attraction: Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese.

The full run of events that took place in our short time in this particular pub (enough for us to finish one drink) would occupy an entire blog post to themselves, and by this point I imagine you're tired, so I'll condence the entire experience into the funniest moments: Thames Water pub crawl, 'you're rather attractive', and dogging. I'll let your imaginations run riot there.

We met Richard again for dinner before all heading to the highly anticipated Mostly Comedy at the Leicester Square Theatre. The show featured two warm-up Fringe acts and we were three of an audience of 12. It was absolutely wonderful. The first act, comic duo Doggett & Ephgrave, based their entire show on a slide show. A risky maneuver for a comedy show as there can be no room for error or improvisation, and at times the room was quiet but they got plenty of laughs. The second act was the acclaimmed stand-up and Metro columnist Richard Herring, who's writing I have long admired and who had a cameo role in Rock Band VS Vampires (sadly I wasn't on set that particular day, so missed the opportunity to strike up a conversational friendship with this semi-famous personal favourite of mine, setting up a flaky pretence to saying hello after the show, portraying a vague air of fame and fortune to my friends. Friends who know me well enough to realise that said air is, in fact, complete rubbish). By this point I had consumed a lot of alcohol (5 pints) so going for another drink afterwards seemed like the most sensible idea. And then, Soho! Which turned out to be perfectly barren on a Tuesday night in early June.

However, through the haze of smog and beer goggles, I spied a neon sign down a little alley. It said simply "The Bar". This had to be good. And as we drew closer the blackboard outside declared 'DJs dedicated to 60s and 70s soul.' It was tiny, it was underground, it serverd alcohol and the DJ was genuinely playing vynals on two decks. I let the soul train take me all the way home.

Actually it was the N343 but that doesn't sound nearly as fun.