I went to see the fantastic Q the Music’s farewell show at Her Majesty’s Theatre in London at the weekend.
I stayed at a hotel not far from Westminster Abbey, and getting from there to the theatre involved walking along Whitehall.
For the occasion, I wore my best suit, and I had arranged to meet some friends in a bar across the road from the theatre. Unfortunately I was slightly late, so ended up having to walk rather briskly when leaving the hotel.
As I walked/ran along Whitehall, dressed in my best suit and on my way to a James Bond event, I did feel ever so slightly like Daniel Craig in Skyfall as he followed the same route when trying to prevent Silva from killing M at the government enquiry (although he ran a LOT faster than me).
Despite being in a walker boot and on crutches, I had a pre booked engagement in London on Saturday. Four of us had booked up back in August to go to see a musical at the theatre. Luckily we had chartered a people carrier taxi door to door,which worked out £100 each and saved the hassle of going by buses ,tubes and trains, so this helped me a lot ,with my restricted mobility.
Nasty Alex,who used to look like Jaws in his younger years, is quite big, around 200 kilos and about 196cms tall. He couldn’t actually fit into the seat in the theatre,so the staff very kindly sat him elsewhere, in a seat that could accommodate him!
Somehow,at the end of the evening,we ended up in the bar of a posh restaurant on Pall mall! I was the only one in our gang dressed in a suit and tie, even though it was a leopard skin pattern. There I was , sitting next to “jaws” opposite my other two companions,one dressed in a black roll neck sweater, looking a bit like a gangster ,and the other In a sweatshirt looking very dodgy,even though he paid for the £68 bottle of wine. It kind of looked like a meeting of James bond, a baddie and two henchmen!
Music
We played a medley of Bond themes as the holding music. OHMSS made for an awesome entrance but when the bride was running late Live and Let Die turned out to be quite anxiety inducing!
We also had All Time High for the first dance. I know it’s nobody’s favorite theme but it made for a nice slow dance and the lyrics were on point: Funny how it always goes with love, when you don’t look, you find But then we’re two of a kind, we move as one
We went with Lego, kindly put together by a friend of the family. Instead of the traditional bride and groom our chosen avatars were James Bond and Harley Quinn.
Thank you. All Time High went down really well, had a few people ask what the song was after. Despite our shared love of the 80’s Madness never entered the conversation, and I do like a bit of ska.
My wife’s request for the music was Time Of My Life from Dirty Dancing, which was the last dance.
We also used “All Time High” for our wedding last year. During this song my girlfriend and I walked together towards the guests and the civil servant who was going to marry us.
Congratulations Vanya. And good choice on the song. I’ve always liked All Time High and thought it was a really good song. I don’t know why people don’t rate it very highly.
Thank you so much.
Songs are just funny like that, it’s all subjective and our tastes can change over time. For the longest time All Time High sat neat the bottom of my rankings of Bond themes, so much so that I don’t actually have it in my playlist. Then during lockdown, while my fiance and I were living apart, it came on the radio and I listened to it for the first time in years. In that moment I heard anew and it moved me in a way that it never had before. After that it was an easy choice for the first dance.
There is actually a listing on eBay,by a seller in India,who is trying to sell this watch ( with the Paulareis logo blurred in the pictures) with the nylon strap for nearly £400!!
I’ve just noticed on the sellers feedback page,that some poor sod in America fell for the scam and paid full whack for the homage watch, thinking it was the real thing!
Funny thing was, on Friday i ran into my mate,who got me into reading the original Flemming novels back in 1997, and told me to read Moonraker as it featured Maidstone, we walked passed the mural and he never even noticed it!
Bloke I know just came over to see me as he was passing. He noticed my fake 007 watch and said " that’s a nice watch! Bet that set you back a fair amount! "
Back in about 2004, I bought a pen with an FM radio in it,that you listened to through headphones. It caused quite a stir when it went through the scanner at Charles de gaul airport, in my hand luggage!
