Day 9 - Much Ado About Everything

Today, hubby stood in line for "day of" tickets for "A Midsummer Night's Dream."  He managed to get two tickets, so we're seeing the play tonight.  One of the stars is Sheridan Smith, who we saw in Legally Blonde back in 2010.

The Shard

In the afternoon, we decided to take a London transport bus that basically followed the path that the tour buses take.  Since it was daylight, we tried to take more pictures of the London Eye and the Shard.  We were supposed to be able to take the bus all the way to the Tower of London, but as occasionally happens, the bus had to terminate its route early, this time on Tooley Street.  We waited for the next RV1 bus to take us to Tower Hill, then we had to get off, and get on again with another swipe of our Oyster card in order to return to Covent Garden.  However, this bus also terminated early, this time dropping us off at Warterloo station on the south side of London.  So we waited for the next RV1 bus and finally made it back to Covent Garden.

We stopped briefly in the London Transport Museum so hubby could pick up a new mouse pad with a map of the Underground on it.  After that we walked through the Farmer's Market food fare and bought dinner.  I had what was essentially a steak salad and hubby had a sausage on a baguette.  We returned to the flat to eat and watch a little telly while I downloaded my video camera files and went through them.  Then we walked to the Noel Coward theatre for a little culture.

Noel Coward Theatre

Really good show.  The woman who played Helena (Katherine Kingsley) was excellent as was the actor who played Bottom (David Williams). He really hammed up his death scene as Pyramus by stroking the head of the guy who played his beloved Thisbe after Pyramus had killed himself.  The story is a play within a play with the non-fairy actors dressed in what appeared to be World War II clothing and the fairies were dressed like hippies.  They even played a few songs from Hair and "The Sound of Silence" by Simon and Garfunkle.  After you get used to the language, it almost seems like they're talking modern day English.

Sheridan Smith and David Williams as Titania and Bottom

We sat in the very first row, which meant if an actor dropped to lie down on the stage I couldn't see them unless I stood up, which I didn't want to do because of the people behind me.  After the play, we returned to the flat and relaxed for a bit before going to bed.