Damn long! The last 24 hours have felt like the longest of my life. Well, okay technically 24 hours is 24 hours however it feels like I’ve lived at least three days in the last 24. Still I seem to have survived it for now, except for picking up a feeling that I’ll soon be coming down with a cold, so its all good.

So, where has the last 24 hours brought me?

It all started with waking up at 4am yesterday morning to get to Shaftesbury Ave for 5am for the broadcast of the AFL Grand Final. This idea, when suggested by Pauline, seemed all fine in theory leading up the day but I did find myself wondering why it was that I was getting up at stupid o’clock to go watch a final which didn’t even feature my team (the Brisbane Lions) in a venue (Walkabout) that I have sworn I would try my bestest never to step into! Still, at 5am Pauline, James (who had even less reason than me to turn up!), Brendan, and Cameron found ourselves in a line outside Walkabout. More on this here.

After watching the Grand Final, by which time it was about 8.30-9am, of course I was hungry so we ended up grabbing some breakfast at Giraffe over the river from Embankment. By the time we got across to Giraffe, as Grace, yes that’s me, thought it would be a good idea to walk, we had all been up for nearly six hours so it was basically lunch time. The breakfast was very welcome but boy was it a mistake to have something so heavy because it immediately sent me into a feeling of needing a nap immediately!

Thankfully the walk back to Leicester Square and then from there up to Oxford Street woke me up some as I had to meet Caro for another wedding dress fitting at Vera Wang, Selfridges. Unfortunately signals got a bit crossed and there was some confusion about her fitting time but I did see the dress she was planning on wearing (an interesting red number) and had the chance to catch up with her and Maud over my second lunch of the day! However, I was still stuffed from breakfast so limited myself to a butterscotch milkshake. Mmmmm ….

After all this it was mid-afternoon by the time I got back home and although I was hoping to grab a quick nap before heading out again in a couple of hours for Christy and Scott’s “Cuban Night” an engineer was coming to try and fix my internet and there was no guarantee when he would turn up. And as much as it was tempting to nap before he got there I thought it would have scared him off when sleep-rumpled-grace-who-just-woke-up-from-a-nap-and-is-therefore-still-in-her-pjs-with-shocking-hair-and-most-likely-crazy-eyes answered the door.

After the engineer came there was time for a quick shower before heading off to meet Scott and Christy, and their former housemate Jenny, for a quick drink before making our way to the Museum of Garden History for a night of Cuban Jazz, where we met up with Craig and Mark (or Bartie). Quite a strange venue and in fact I hadn’t even realised there was a museum dedicated to Garden History! More on this here.

After the jazz Craig wasn’t quite ready to finish off the night so we all headed over to Bar Thompson for a bit of Sing Star Superstar. It was very entertaining though has just further proved to me that I should never never never sing in public again – ha ha! Admittedly I was having quite a bit of fun, and perhaps the laughing didn’t help with the keeping in tune aspect of the game, but nevertheless I had to move on to the final engagement of the night – an appearance at Club 49 in Soho.

James’ friend, Tara, was having a birthday do at Club 49 and she’d arranged to have a VIP area in the club. It actually didn’t seem all that big a venue but the line to get in was definitely large. Just as well I was on the guest list though I still had to pay a cover charge to get in. In addition to the guest list the benefit of the VIP area is having your own bar! Definitely makes getting in your drinks a lot easier. 🙂

The dance floor on the bottom floor of the club was absolutely ram-packed and hot as anything but for the most part the music played was pretty awesome – though it did hit a few blank spots now and then. And towards the end of then night it got totally rubbish – maybe their way of getting people off the dance floor and out of the club! Some of the photos below:

And so, after making our way through the crowded streets and to the crowded bus stops, which at 3.30am in the morning were heaving, I finally got home at 4am Sunday morning. The End.