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The Luxury Gap

October 14, 2011 in General by Stephen | No comments

To London and Camden Town. We’re off to this … IMG-20111014-00307

It all starts well. Holiday Inn Camden Town provide a room upgrade.

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Here’s the view:

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It’s not far to the Roundhouse, where the gig is on. We stop off at a vegetarian restaurant en route, then to the bar at the venue.

Mark Jones is the warm-up DJ. Kicking off with Brilliant Mind, it couldn’t really go wrong. We can order wine by the bottle, but with plastic cups. So it’s two plastic cups with 37.5cl of wine in each for Therese and I.

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An hour later, Heaven 17 are on and do an almost sound-perfect rendition of the Luxury Gap.

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Squeezing in “The Black Hit of Space” and “…and that’s no lie” as an encore was a bonus. Absolutely fantastic gig.

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Holiday Inn Harassment

June 20, 2011 in General by Stephen | No comments

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Not what I need when I check in.

It’s the vegetarian’s equivalent of hate mail.

Remember kids. Meat is Murder.

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Through the snow … to London

November 29, 2010 in General by Stephen | 1 comment

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Therese and I are are on our way to London. The weekend snow was pretty heavy, so we’ve asked the Taxi to stop at the top of the road, rather than attempt to come down the lane.

By taxi, I mean the one I ordered last night which turned out not to be “booked” this morning when I call. No real crisis, they send another one and we’re  – amazingly – on the right train, on time – with no delays.

London itself is much milder (though the BBC would suggest otherwise). After week of staying in a Holiday Inn, I need a change.

The Hilton Metropole beckons.

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Nice room, and free caramel shortbread. There’s also free running water, across the ceiling. I change room just in time to collect Therese from her project’s final night out.

Caramel shortbread below

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803 is the new 101

November 23, 2010 in General by Stephen | No comments

Checked into the Holiday Inn, Kings Cross. I’m offered an upgrade but warned it is a “smoking room”. I’ve been here before and decided to check out the room before turning it down.  Room 803 certainly doesn’t smell bad. There is an additional  door however in the event the adjacent rooms is let at the same time.

No big deal I think. That changes around 10pm when three “ladies” return to aforementioned adjacent room. Loud and giggly, they leave all but one behind after a few minutes. The remaining one then has a two hour inane phone call, punctuated by her quite significant smokers cough. She sounds like she’s in the same room.

0015 the TV goes on … and sounds like some sort of “Britain’s got talent” sub-genre. Enough. Therese can’t sleep. I can’t sleep. Clothes are donned and reception change our room with minimal fuss.

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IHG Promotes Sustainable Eating

November 16, 2010 in General by Stephen | No comments

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Adjacent to the hotel elevator, the “Mediterranean diet” proposes one portion of fish or white meat a week and red meat monthly. Next week I push them over the line to full blown vegetarianism.

I suspect the US branches don’t display solidary on this one.

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Toast Thief

November 2, 2010 in General by Stephen | No comments

So I have a little routine in this hotel, being that I’m staying here on a regular basis.

The hotel toaster is of the conveyor belt variety, taking around 90 seconds. I get to the machine, pop in some brown bread, get fruit and juice, drop it on a table and go back to collect my toast.

Except today there’s a couple in front of the toaster. The wife takes one of my two slice and walks away. I know it’s mine as the rest of the bread in the toaster is white.

I say to the husband “I think you’ve just taken my toast”.

He stares intently at the toaster. Is he attempting to attain a zen-like calm? Control a deep “Dr David Banner” creature within? Or just avoid some confrontation?  I haven’t even put on my best Glaswegian accent. Or used the bad word like Malcolm Tucker would.

There’s little I can do. It’s only 0730: a little early for a monologue. Or a diatribe. I pop another couple of slices of toast in. Unfortunately I can’t go completely  Dalai Lama on him and have to utter “… well I’ll put some more toast in then”.

All credit. He doesn’t allow his gaze to be averted. Well, not until he collects his six slices of white toasted bread (and I’m not exaggerating).

On the plus side, it turns out I’m at the table one down from them. They say nothing for their entire breakfast.

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