Bo Concepta

On the way to lunch Sandra and I stopped in at Selfridges as she wanted to check out some furniture. Weirdly Bo Concepta had a spread put out – free cookies, cake and drink!

Had to pass on the cookies and cake but I had to grab one of water bottles which were pretty cool.

Cox Cookies and Cake

To say that cupcakes are huge in London at the moment would be the mega understatement of the century. The latest to enter the scene is Cox Cookies and Cake located in Soho. The one thing that Cox Cookies and Cake does is that it adds something a little different to the cupcake scene – in terms of the looks of the cupcakes at least if not the flavours.

Staying true to its Soho location, the shop is themed out to be almost a night club – ridiculously loud music, at least when Sandra and I turned up just before lunch, included. The interior is painted black and window displays are all kitted out with neon lights. The shop is actually rather bare except for a bar along one wall and then, of course, the cupcakes at a counter on the other wall.

The cupcakes themselves looked pretty schmick – there are regular ones (or classics) priced at £2.50 or you can indulge in a specialty (£4.00) which can be covered in skulls, an Andy Warhol Marilyn, or sparkling sugar ‘diamonds’, and a giant pair of lips and then you could go for the Coxxx (get it?) Cakes (also £4.00) such as the Titty Cake, Man Cake, the Beef Cake and the Bum Cake. The flavouring of the Beef Cake sounded the most delicious and unique flavouring – hazelnut praline cupcake with praline icing and nothing to do with the bulging bicep attached on top I promise … the guys said the menu was kind of still being played around with but I do like the fact that the cupcakes themselves aren’t just vanilla or just chocolate (e.g. bases included choc and cherry, carrot, banana and raspberry.)

Sandra and I were going to be having lunch at Phoenix Palace not too long after so I didn’t go for one of the richer specialties or Coxxx cakes – instead I tried the Lemon cupcake with lemon frosting and shaved white chocolate curls. It was very good but very very sweet!

Oh the other thing to be said about the store is that the guys in the store are very cute!!!!

Spots Versus Stripes

Cadbury were running this Spots Versus Stripes competition thing in Leicester Square – basically it involves mini-competitions between those on the Spots team and those on the Stripes team. It was quite an atmosphere in the Square today and all sorts of people were out – including this one guy walking his giant lizard!

I was surprised that the guy with his white minks wasn’t around too. He normally hangs around Leicester Square or Trafalgar Square at the latest.

So, I managed to convince Sandra to play one of the games called Slide and Dunk. Basically you slide down this rather massive slide in a potato sack and then shoot the ball into a hoop when you got to the bottom. The slide looked pretty big from the ground but when we got to the top it was pretty scary – even for someone like me who likes that kind of thing!

We did it though … and for friendship’s sake we will call it a draw 😉

London Transport Museum

My play date with Sandra today started off with a visit to the London Transport Museum. Yes we are just big kids at heart! The Museum is located in the heart of Covent Garden and underwent a re-furb not too long ago. At over £12 to get in, it’s a little expensive for adults (or kid-ults like us) to get in but free for those under 16. Luckily we were able to use a 2-4-1 offer for the day to reduce the cost a bit.

The Museum has effectively three floors and there is definitely plenty to occupy for the little ones … and a little bit less so for the bigger ones! Still, if you have a interest in the history of London Transport, its quite a good museum and there is heaps of memorabilia, such as copper tokens (as opposed to tickets), old maps, adverts etc. to get through.

The lift amusingly goes up (or more technically down) by years rather than floor numbers.

The top floor is dedicated to 19th century London.

My couch was talking to me!

Level 1 starts to see the Growth of the Surburbs – and it is on this level that a kind of interactive bit for the kids exists e.g. they get to dress up and drive a bus, play interactive quizzes, and there is even a Guess Who of London Transport workers to play.

Its Me!

Finally the bottom floor has all the demonstrate buses etc.. and also exhibitions on London during the war (quite sobering) and a closer look at the workings of the Underground.

It took us just over an hour to work our way through the museum but that was probably because we didn’t read every single little thing … on the other hand we did waste some time climbing every demonstration bus and playing in the kids interactive area (the clothes were very tiny – we could only fit the caps on – heh heh!)

I can see this would be a great place to bring the little ones to play – next time I’ll have to borrow one! 😉

A Guide To Sexual Misery

Laney dragged me along to see the most random show tonight “A Guide To Sexual Misery”. Wolfgang Weinberger, professional sexologist, was aiming to answer any and all questions about sexual relations and why, quite often, it goes wrong!

I wasn’t really sure what I was in for – was it going to be like Your Days are Numbered: Maths and Death, a presentation using statistics to demonstrate why a large percentage of our population was due for sexual misery?, was there going to be embarrassing crowd-participation moments? was it sex therapy? was I going to be laughing? was I going to be laughed at?

Turns out that it was a bit of a combination of everything. Wolfgang is at heart an academic with a degree in economic and MA in Filmmaking. Very random then that he should turn to this particular topic without much academia to support him. The show contained mostly clichéd presumptions, generalisations and reactions about sex. He tried to get the crowd involved by asking us questions like “does size matter”, “do you masturbate more than once a day/daily/weekly/monthly” … this was after separating the men from the women to give a kind of wall of silence between partners with humming being our way of secret voting. Hmmm … not that anonymous really! This part was rather awkward to say the least!

Having said all that I couldn’t help but laugh for most of the show, albeit nervously at times! I don’t think the show would have been half as funny if it hadn’t been presented by someone like Wolfgang, who was endearing in his bumbling way and his Austrian accent. I wouldn’t recommend this show for anyone actually seeking answers to resolve their sexual misery but you will, at least for 90 minutes, be entertained.