Monday started REAL early. My Easyjet flight to Luton was departing at 9.50am and they were recommending arrival to the airport two hours before departure time. I set my alarm for 4.50am so I could get the 6.45am train to Queen Street. I was awake at 3.30am! Not only that, I had (excuse the graphic description here) a flood of biblical proportions going on down there – I mean, just when you think the menopause is bringing a looooooooooooong overdue cessation to things…talk about timing! F*CK! Grrrr!!
Anyway, my apologies … but I am a 52 year old woman and this stuff still happens AND I DON’T WANT IT!
I was ready just before 6am. Went downstairs, had a coffee and a banana. Checked the train times and oh…the 6.45am train was cancelled. Great start! Okay, nothing else for it. Wait for the next one at 7.11am. At least it was still scheduled to run. The one after was also cancelled. I watched the live times like a hawk! As soon as I saw that it actually left Anniesland station I could breathe a bit.
Train arrives. I get into Queen Street no worries. I make a beeline for the airport 500 stop on George Square. I get there and a guy then arrives a few seconds later going “there’s works down there on Cochrane Street, I’m not sure the 500 is gonna stop here” and then I look up on the bus stop sign and see a notice stuck to it saying that because of the Christmas lights switch on that happened the night before the stop wasn’t in operation. Well, it wasn’t in operation on Sunday night, but obviously this thing was still in effect. Grand! Okay, panic time. Where’s the next operational stop?! Corner of St Vincent St and Renfield St, yay! I SOMEHOW keep up with the two men that were at the George Square stop with me and we get to the stop just about 90 seconds before a 500 pulls in.
I’m just in doom-meister mode at this point. “The M8 will be heaving. There’ll be 3 mile tailbacks. The airport will be hoachin’. I’m gonna miss my flight!” Thankfully not so. Some luck at last. The M8 was grand and we got to the airport in 15 minutes. No one was more surprised than me to find that I got through the entrance doors of the airport bang on 7.50am! Exactly two hours before departure time. Go me! Flew through security! I was sitting down in the departure area of the airport by 8.10am – WTAF?! Someone pinch me! At least I had time for another coffee and time to just take a chill pill for a bit.
Glasgow was cold but dry when I left. Luton was not quite as cold but was grey and drizzling with rain. Ah, Luton, I missed ya. Not. I tried to see if the old “I (heart) Sausage” kiosk was there but I couldn’t tell and I didn’t really want to go searching for it. From there I was going to catch the 757 coach to London. When we moved from Luton, the coaches would run every 20 minutes on weekdays. NOT ANY MORE! Every half hour in the mornings until 11am when they then go only once an hour. I had a 30 minute wait until the next coach. Never mind. I’ll get to London in plenty of time.
Arrived in London about 1pm or shortly after. I got off at Baker Street and decided to walk down to the Selfridges Foodhall to get something from there. For several years now I have been following a company on Instagram called HoneyNDate – they make vegan, raw ingredient cakes and desserts and I have been wanting to try something of theirs for YEARS! They’re meant to sell a selection of their stuff in the Selfridges Foodhall. I looked several years back to no avail. I thought I’d give it a try again. I walked round and round and ROUND that foodhall. Could I find them? Could I f***! I even asked some members of staff, they had no clue. So…that was fruitless.
The rain just kept on drizzling down and so I decided to just head on to my hotel on Charing Cross Road. I stayed at The Assembly in Covent Garden. It’s fantastically placed! Equidistant from the Wyndham’s Theatre and the Garrick Theatre in opposite directions of Charing Cross Road, Ronnie Scott’s was only a short walk away. Old Compton Street, Shaftesbury Ave, Chinatown and Leicester Square are all within short walking distance.
On my way down to the hotel I stopped in a Caffe Nero and got myself a sandwich and a slice of cheesecake. At the hotel once I’m all booked in and in my room I realise I don’t have a drink. I had assumed there would be tea/coffee making facilities in my room but there wasn’t. Damn! The hotel has a rooftop bar. So I take the lift up to the bar and see a “closed” sign on the door. Bugger! I try the door. It opens. I gingerly walk through and poke my head around the corner to see if I can see any staff. Phew! There are staff! I ask if it is possible to purchase a soft drink and grab myself a couple of bottles of ginger ale…that cost me EIGHT QUID! Oh, I tell a lie. I got a discount for being a hotel patron – £7.65!!!! For two TINY 200ml bottles of Fever Tree ginger ale. London prices!
I ate my sandwich and slice of cheesecake and let myself have a rest for a while. I planned to leave for Ronnie Scott’s at 5.30pm. It was only 5 mins down the road. I wasn’t sure what the whole plan was. My email said that doors open at 5.30pm and with no experience of ever having been to Ronnie Scott’s I didn’t know if they just let patrons in and they dine and then there’s the gig or what the hay. I thought I’d find out once I was there. Best to arrive promptly even if it meant that I could leave again, or had to wait around for ages. Whatever needed to be.
When I arrived at 5.45 – after going around in circles, well around blocks, trying to find exactly where it is, I joined a not insubstantial queue. It was about 30 minutes waiting in the queue to get in. It took me a couple of minutes to get my bearings and work out where the stage was. To my left and on the table ahead of me I see Cherisse. I didn’t want to flail my arms around and wave like a loon and shout out and she never turned her head around enough for me to be in her line of sight so…you know. I didn’t really see any other familiar faces. If there were any other Simple Minds fans there in support of Sarah I didn’t recognise any of them.
There are certainly regular patrons that go to Ronnie Scott’s. I sat next to a couple, around my age, and they have been several times. I had confessed to being a Ronnie Scott’s virgin to them. They asked me what brought me to this particular show? I think my answer of “I’m a massive Simple Minds fan” was kind of lost on them. In hindsight it probably would have been from my not explaining Sarah’s role with SM.
Only a few minutes go by and Sarah arrives on the stage with her ensemble of musicians and backing singers. Dressed in a beautiful white dress with large blue polka dots, with a matching headwrap and tight white striped corset. If Sarah was nervous, she ain’t showing it! From the second the music starts you can hear how fabulous the acoustics are in the room. Like, just WOW! Just how rich and sumptuous the instruments sounded. The main musicians played drums, double bass, piano and organ. It didn’t take long at all for Sarah to command the stage. Her voice! What a voice!
The capacity crowd – some 220 patrons – were incredibly receptive. Encouraged by Sarah to clap and and get up and dance (sadly I was in the middle of a long bench table which came right up to my waist so there was no way I could stand up – I dearly wish I could have!). There was quite strong audience participation. Though I think Sarah was thinking she had a tough crowd on her hands – it really wasn’t the case though, it was just that a number of us were being hindered from getting up and standing due to the style of the bench seating.
She performed all the tracks from the album, I think in tracklist order – fairly much in tracklist order anyway. She introduced her band members through the evening, as well as her backing singers. There were also special guests. The guitar legend that is Mr Chris Spedding played guitar on some tracks and the fabulous Skye Edwards from Morcheeba dueted with Sarah for a beautifully stirring rendition of Amazing Grace.
Was it worth a 400 mile trip by train, coach and plane to get to see Sarah’s debut solo gig? By heck it was!
At the end of the show she told us she’d be at the front signing copies of her album. Before that though, I finally got to say a brief hello to Cherisse, then I made my way out the front hoping to say hello to Sarah and maybe get a snap of us together. I took no photos or video of Sarah’s performance as we were told that it was not the done thing at Ronnie Scott’s and I’m a good girl so my phone stayed in my bag! I could see Cherisse doing a bit of filming though, so you can see bits of Sarah’s performance on Cherisse’s social media.
As I made my way through the crowd to get out into the front of the venue, Sarah walked past me. I stopped her. She looked at me like “Don’t I know you?” Bless her! I said “Larelle”, pretending like she’d know me. She hugged me and I couldn’t help myself. All I said was “Please let me interview you! Please will you let me interview you? Please, please, please?!” I dunno. We’ll see… stay tuned. Who knows? (Yeah, I think we know…)
I then queued for a bit out in the front area because I thought I didn’t tell her she was fabulous and the show was wonderful. I just did the asking for an interview business and then felt like a complete idiot for not telling her how amazing the show was. I still didn’t do that the second time. I asked for a photo instead. Sarah looks incredible and I look like a monster.
We were being told to move on and leave the venue, that another show would be starting shortly and we needed to clear off so the next lot of patrons could come in. As I loitered around outside, Chris Spedding was leaving. He walked right by me and I nearly stopped him. It just crossed my mind to want to say hello. I don’t know why. I honestly don’t know what compels me to want to do this to people. I never really used to be like this. I guess I just keep on pushing myself with this skewed notion of being bold and brave. I quickly changed my mind. I just let him walk on by. A lady was standing near me. We looked at each other and then looked back at him and she said to me “He was amazing, wasn’t he?” I replied, “He sure was, yes. I thought about stopping him to say hello, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. I saw him performing with Bryan Ferry in early 2020. He was amazing then too.” We turned back and watched him get into a cab that was waiting for him. He’s a little unsteady on his feet these days, bless him.
The lady was waiting for her husband who was inside buying one of Sarah’s CDs and having it signed. He came out very happy saying “I got it signed.”
I waited a while longer. Cherisse came out and I said hello again and we had a hug and then she was off with her mates to a pub down the road. I waited longer still. I wanted to actually say one final “you were brilliant!” to Sarah but time ticked on and it was getting cold and I felt it was time to move on.
I grabbed a coffee and tiramisu from the Caffe Nero on the corner and walked back to the hotel – not before grabbing a bottle of water from the store on the corner in case I was thirsty overnight.
Check out wasn’t until 11am the next morning, and with no breakfast to wake up to, I set the alarm for 8.30am. Lucky I did as sleep eluded me for a fair while but once I did finally get to sleep, it was a cosy and deep sleep. If I am ever needing to be in central London again, then I’d definitely stay at the Assembly again.
I left the hotel at 10.30am. The weather was sunny. Hurray! Still quite cold though. I had a nice thick coat so I was fine. I needed coffee. A thing I noticed the night before was a place selling Portuguese pastel de nata. What I aimed for was the Caffe Nero I had got my coffee from when I left Ronnie Scott’s the night before. When I got there, it was heaving. The Cafe de Nata on the other hand was empty. I thought they can’t just sell natas and nothing else?! They must do coffee too, surely? I went in. Yes! There was coffee. And OMG…different flavours of natas!! Not just the standard plain custard, but blueberry ones, raspberry ones, cinnamon apple ones…and others (a quick look at their website seems to show strawberry, chocolate, passionfruit and coconut flavours too. Yum!) I got a latte and decided on a raspberry nata. Then I spotted the cinnamon apple ones and got one of those too. I know! But hey, I don’t know when I’ll be in London next and I had never seen natas in other flavours before.
After that I decided on going to Chinatown for lunch. I contemplated going back to the Selfridges foodhall but I just couldn’t face the idea, so Chinatown won! I went to Leong’s Legend on Gerrard Street and…erm…I had meat! I know!!! But the pork belly was calling me! I had a Taiwanese bao bun that had a slice of pork belly, peanut sauce and coriander and it was delicious! I then had the lunch dish of pork belly and rice. I KNOW!!! I know, I know, I know. I do feel incredibly guilty. The bun was really nice and although I wanted the pork belly, the guilt I felt for eating it overrode any pleasure I derived from breaking my pretty staunch vegetarian diet. Then again, I still eat seafood so…I dunno. Geez. Anyway. I’ve satisfied my pork belly craving for another…however many years it was since I last had pork belly (not that many to be honest).
Along with my pork belly dishes I also had a soya milk with pandan jelly pieces. I was given the thinnest paper straw and the pandan pieces kept getting stuck. Lol. I asked for another straw and the waitress said “the straws are too small and weak, I’ll give you a spoon so you can eat the pandan jelly.” Yay! I felt hideous enough that I wasn’t using chopsticks and was breaking up the pork belly pieces with the spoon that was meant for dishing up the rice on a plate. I am ssssooooo uncultured! Eating meat…with a spoon! Yep! I’m all class.
After lunch in Chinatown I decided to head to the coach stop to get the 757 back to Luton Airport. My flight was at 5.30pm and it was now 12.20pm. I checked the times and knew there’d be a coach just before 2pm that I better be on to get me back to Luton in time. I just get the corner of Baker St and Oxford Street and I see a 757 coach turn down Baker Street. This sends me into a panic. I was getting worried as to where the coach stop was. The old stop was on Gloucester Place but on the 757 timetable it wasn’t mentioning the Gloucester Place stop any more but listed a stop as “Lisson Grove, Dorset Square – Baker Street Station”. I look at Google Maps. It’s no help! Lisson Grove is a quarter of a mile away from Dorset Square and Baker Street. I started losing the plot. None of it was making sense. I was worried if I went to Gloucester Place it would be the wrong stop and I’d miss my coach. What do I do?! I can’t afford to miss this next coach! I try to call Greenline, the coach company that runs the 757 service. There’s no way I am going to get through. I call the OH in a panic, agitatedly telling her my situation. She tries to work it out for me and it’s not making any more sense to her, either. By this point I’m on Baker Street and I don’t see any bus stands listing the 757 on the stops. I decide to head to the stop it has always gone from on Gloucester Place. THAT STOP IS NOW LABELLED BAKER STREET STATION?!!!! WHAAAAA?! Had I not seen that earlier coach turn down Baker Street, none of this panic would have happened. I can’t tell you how panicked I was about this. I was having kittens! Thankfully this coach was actually running late because had it not been, I *would* have missed it!
I am on the coach and back on the road to Luton breathing a sigh of relief. No trouble with the coach. Smooth run to Luton. Through airport security in a flash. Arrived in plenty of time. Loo stop, coffee. Relax. Final little hiccup, a delay in the gate information appearing on the board for the flight. It eventually appears and all is fine. Smooth flight. Out of Glasgow airport and on a 500 coach in 10 minutes. At Queen Street station for a train home by 7pm. Home, fed and curled up in bed by 9.30pm.
London, done!