I sat on a bench overlooking the Thames wondering why there are no after hours clubs in San Francisco and then coming to the conclusion that it may be for the best. (Still ordering vodka Redbull at 5 in the morning is a good thing, don't get me wrong, but I am afraid I may look like a chewed up wire by the time I'm 35.) It's 11am and we are not scheduled to keep drinking till about 12. I sat for about ten minutes taking in the view. That was the end of conventional sightseeing of London. Back on the tube! Feeling productive having at least seen something aesthetically pleasing in London during the day, I head back to Clapham to meet Paige and a few friends. It was Sunday. We had been waiting for this for a good year and it didn’t matter that I still had not slept. The Church was our tourist attraction. We didn’t need to see Westminster Abbey we needed to go to an old theater with the seats removed in Clapham Grand. Now if you have lived with me in the last two years you already know this. I love to dance early in the morning. It's when I am still a little drunk or hung-over, I usually always have a bit of extra energy the morning after a good session. The happy jumping around kind of dancing that usually works best with bands that use abbreviations or acronyms for some reason, Like MGMT or LMFAO. MIA works brilliantly as well. Another thing I love to do after a good session is dress up. I find it helps with my hangover depression. However unless it’s Halloween I can’t really go "all out" because I would look like a fucking nut job. So I usually have to be very subtle. I may wear funny dark rimmed glasses for example. One morning I decided to dress punk rock and wore chucks, black skinny jeans, and my Mars Volta tee shirt. Or I will go super girly with lots of flower print and pink sandals. So my point is, The Church sounded like my hangover's wet dream. Basically it’s a club that's only on Sundays and you can dress up, dance, see a magician and a stripper. Read my Review on Yelp of The Church to get idea of the place. I met up with the team and we headed over. I don’t remember what the cover charge was and it does not matter. I don’t remember how much drinks were only that you have to get three tall cans at a time. It was pretty brilliant and I would suggest it to people in London. Well I would suggest it if you like places like Coppers in Dublin, Reirdans in Cork, Kells in San Francisco, and pretty much most of the bars on the upper east side.
Sadly The Church closes at four so we moved on. Paige would have to get her fix of Aussie men making out for her ammusement elsewhere. Until next time, maybe we will bring costumes. Afterwards we went to a few bars. The thing to do apparently was go to a bar, The Walkabout, after the Church. The lad we were with was absolutely adamant about showing us yanks the walkabout. If I had a drink for every time he said the name of this bar I would almost have as many drinks as I had consumed over the past two days. And that was too much to make any kind of effort to go to the Walkabout. Although now that I think back.... aye forget it... the way we are living there should be no reason to regret anything. After the bars was it now time to go home? Nope. It was back to one of the lad’s house in Clapham. We got back to the house more exhausted than drunk. We had now been out for over 24 hours and we had surpassed that point of being totally pissed. We had officially drunk ourselves sober. We showered (not together) when we got there. There is always a method to our madness. We may be able to drink for long periods of time, but we're not taking massive amounts of shots. We may be able to stay out for 36 hours but we are still showering and helping ourselves to mouthwash in the bathroom whether we know the owners or not. After freshening up, Paige and I along with four other Irish lads kept drinking there into the night all the while being entertained by the banter.
Paige and I woke up on the couch in the morning and thought it was a good time to start home. We walked to the tube station through the neighborhood remembering how two days ago we went out for that one drink. Remembering how when we got to the club I bought a round of 3 Vodka Redbulls and drank them in the time it took me to find everyone. When I repeated this story one of the boys responded with, "I left you ten minutes ago". An hour and a half later we made it clear across town on the underground. Epic. The weekend was epic. The rest of the trip would have to be devoted to lying on the couch and having a nice Italian dinner with outdoor seating. I was telling the person we were staying with in London how we really have not and probably will not do anything touristy during the day. He figures he can do stuff like that when he is older. I fully agree. When I’m older I will probably really get off on seeing Parliament getting some free walking tour of 18th century London. What else am I going to do when I’m in my 50s? I will probably take my family to London and I will need a way to entertain myself and torture my kids. We will walk along the Thames on the way to the Tate right by where I had sat to give myself a break from the weekend long bender and they will have no idea how awesome I was. Maybe I will give some hint when we walk by; Implying something that would only slightly let wind that I once sat there sometime between drinking enough vodka to kill a small child and watching a man eat a gold fish followed by a nice young woman who took her clothes off for a room full of dancing drunks.
