Birthdays Come But Once a Year

And Sock Monkey's birthday was yesterday!

In honour of the momentous occasion Sock Monkey and P took the day off work (so it wouldn't be ruined) and went out for the afternoon.

After the present presentation we went into town and had Tapas for lunch (where I managed to throw my glass of not-even-sipped-at beer all over the floor in an incident involving bread - don't ask) then we visited Sacred Made Real at the National Gallery. This is is an exhibition of Spanish painting and Sculpture from 1600-1700. Sock Monkey is very fond of religious art. And the creepier the better, that's what I say.

My favourites were the statues rather then the paintings although I did like this (points right) mainly because she reminded me of the lady at the start of a Columbia Pictures film.

I was interested to discover that the statues are actually several planks of wood which are joined together rather than one piece of solid wood. The head and hands tend to be solid and the rest is hollowed-out to make them easier to carry when they are being paraded through the town during religious festivals. The correct term for them is 'Polychrome Sculpture'. And another intriguing fact is that whilst the scultpor carved them he was absolutely forbidden to colour them in and so a painter was then brought in to finish them off so to speak. This was called 'Encarnation' which literally means 'bringing to life'.

Here are more of my favourites:

Ecce Homo by Gregorio Fernandez before 1621

(this is about as tall as me)

Dead Christ also by Gregorio Fernandez about 1625-30

(world famous and on some of those lists of Things You Must See)

Christ as the Man of Sorrows by Pedro de Mena 1673

After this we had a little bimble around the National which, I discovered, is stuffed with Religious Icon Art. This Pleased Sock Monkey as I love Icons (I have two at home) and I've only ever seen dismal old Dutch Masters in the National. A return trip is planned.

After our Religious experience we went for a steam, sauna and swim. We were therefore cleansed inside and out. Not for long though because as soon as we left the gym we had a cigarette and decided to avoid rush hour by having ONE drink then going home.

P decided that we should go to a very ornately decorated cocktail bar in Piccadilly Circus (as we happened to be walking past). Here she presented me with champagne cocktail to celebrate me being even older than I was the day before.

After we finished our champagne we decided that it was still a bit busy outside so would stay out longer but go elsewhere. So we trundelled along to Freedom Bar for more cocktails. This is where we started off that night we ended up singing karaoke in the O Bar...

So about 16 gallons of margarita later (P stuck to various champagne cocktails) we moved on to G-A-Y Bar. God knows why - we are about 25 years older than everyone else. Aren't young people ('yooths') skinny?

At approximately 10pm P announced that she absolutely had to have something to eat so we went to Balans. Sock Monkey ordered an all day breakfast but had a lot of difficulty eating it because it was making me feel a bit ikky (it wasn't the tequila or the Smirnoff Ice you understand) and so after nibbling at a bit of bacon and sampling the sausage I basically turned it into just beans on toast. I did however become most fascinated by a mushroom which looked like a piece of steak. As I was dissecting it I managed to propel my toast across the room. So that was two bread incidents in one day.

We then sat outside to enjoy the charm of Old Compton Street where we got talking to a young boy at the next table who P insisted was a Rent Boy.

Then we got a taxi home. Arrived back at Sock Monkey Mansions at midnight. When I got up this morning I didn't look like I had had a steam/sauna/swim. I appeared to have rabbit's eyes.

Tonight I'd quite like to go to bed early but I'm meeting a load of friends for dinner. Told P I was going to have a starter, a sip of water and be in bed by 8. She said "lol ok that's what you think."

A most satisfactory birthday indeed!