Good Morrow!

One year ago today I was headed for London...to celebrate my brother's birthday and to kidnap my TBNH (Then Boyfriend Now Husband) and bring him back to America.

It almost didn’t happen.  I had been off my bipolar bear meds for 2 years and was falling apart, barely hanging by a thread.  I hadn't been sleeping, couldn't function and therefore hadn't packed.  I called my brother, sobbing hysterically and told him I needed to cancel the trip.  I wasn’t well and NEEDED to stay home and get back on my medication.  Unfortunately, he somehow managed to convince me to get it together, get in the car and get up to Seattle in record time.  A yellow jacket had decided to hitch a ride with me.  I almost crashed the car trying to get it out.

Made it to my parents house, tearfully kissed Yoda goodbye, jumped in my mom’s car and made it to SeaTac with 3 minutes to spare.  I rushed up to the British Airways check-in desk.  The lady looked me up and down, stopped smiling and raised her eyebrows.  "Did I make it on time?"  She looked at her clock and gave an inaudible response.  She genuinely wanted to tell me I hadn't.  I threw my bags on the scale.  Her smile returned as she informed me both were overweight.   I took laptops out of each and said I'd be giving them to my mom who was outside waiting to see if I had made it.  Luggage weighed in perfectly.  She silently put luggage claim tags on my bags, then handed me my boarding pass.  "Which gate do I go to?"  "S15"  "Thank you."  Gate S15 is in the International Terminal, which you have to take a train to.  Nice of her to mention that.

As I went through security the male TSA agent checking passports looked at mine and said, "Wow.  What a beautiful photo!"  "Is that your way of telling me I look like ass right now?"  I tend to travel without hair done or makeup on.  He laughed.  "No! Not at all....Where are you going gorgeous?"  "London."   "Mmmm...have fun."  I couldn't help but laugh.  Those last 5 minutes pretty much sum up my life experience.

I found Starbucks, then went to duty free.  I braved walking through the toxic cosmetics and perfumes (almost gagged) and headed straight for the hard liquor (which is also toxic...but let's pretend we don't know that).

And there it was...my first booze love...


                              


I picked it up, looked at the beautiful blue bottle and the memories came flooding back, not only of strip clubs and silicone, but of the exquisite combination of flavors that make up Bombay Sapphire.  I’ve never tasted its equal.  The list of infused botanicals is displayed on both sides of the bottle...juniper berries, lemon peel, coriander, angelica, orris (wtf is orris?), grains of paradise, cassia bark, almonds and liquorice. This baby was coming with me.

The flight was easy.  Friendly service (male flight attendant), delicious meals and FREE WINE!  Going through customs, however, never easy.  They only had one person working.  I said in a loud voice, "You're kidding me. One person working? Welcome to London y'all."  Someone in a uniform glared at me as four other people slowly crawled out of nowhere and took their... huts? cubicles? people aquariums?  Whatever you call those things they sit in.  Then I saw signs everywhere saying ABUSE WILL NOT BE TOLERATED.  Guess I'm not the first loud, rude, hungover American to come through there.

Somehow I managed to make it through without getting arrested or deported.  My man was waiting by the luggage carousal with dread (I'm female...of course I had a lot).  He looked good.  Hadn't seen him in 4 months (hallelujah Skype sex).  We then embarked on the longest fucking cab ride ever.  LONDON TRAFFIC.  Ugh.  When we finally made it to the hotel (The Radisson Blu in Leicester Square) it was surrounded by construction, so we had to be dropped off 2 blocks away and drag our luggage to the hotel.  My husband is a saint.

The hotel lobby was packed with beautiful people pouring in and out of their restaurant and bar.  Prince Charles was hosting a party (Yes, really).  My little brother had just arrived and was in the room waiting for us.  He was so happy my guy had brought the weed and I had brought the gin...the exact brand he wanted!  The mini bar had tonic water.  The usual yellow label crap.

And now for the point of the blog.  I HATE THE YELLOW LABEL CRAP!  And you should too...oh wait...I'm not supposed to say "you should" anymore.  So I won't say you should never be mixing your expensive beautiful potions (liquor) with cheap high fructose corn syrup laden CRAP.  But I HIGHLY recommend you try...

These 2 amazing wonderful much better for you tonic waters:

www.fever-tree.com

Sweetened with cane sugar, except for the Naturally Light...that's made with pure fructose (from fruit).

OR...

qtonic.com

Sweetened with agave, not sugar (same plant family they make tequila from - blue agave).

I've had both, I love them both.  PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE...(I'm sobbing again)...DON'T LET HIGH FRUCTOSE CORN SYRUP NEAR YOUR COCKTAILS!!!  Sorry.  Cocktails are sacred...unless you're using them as warfare.

So back to London.  I needed a toke of weed, a gin and tonic, a shower and a shag.  In that order.  My little bro was gracious enough to go buy Book of Mormon tickets after we smoked and drank.  My husband had a coke...not some coke...a coke (he doesn't do drugs).  A quick side note...sodas in Europe and everywhere else BUT the US are made with real cane sugar, not high fructose corn syrup, which I believe is the more evil of the 2 evils.  At least the tonic water in the mini bar was made with sugar, as was the coke.  It tastes so much better.  I'm starting to see a lot of cane sugar versions of popular brands on US store shelves.  Yay!

So after he gave me a good rodgering (I'm learning English), we met my bro downstairs and headed to the restaurant row next to the hotel.  I wanted fish and chips and a pint of Guinness (hadn't discovered IPAs yet).  The waitress brought me the pint.  I took a sip and was not happy.  It was warm...and FLAT.  I flagged the server.  "Hey there.  May I send this back please?  It's warm and flat."  She walked away shaking her head.   My brother and husband started laughing.  "It's SUPPOSED to be that way."   "No."  "Yes."  She brought me another one.  It too was warm and flat.  Dammit.  Now I had to drink it.  My bro went off to buy cigarettes and my guy went off to buy a Sherlock Holmes hat.  We were planning to do a photo shoot that could get us arrested.  Sitting by myself al fresco, people watching, suddenly a very slow motorcade went by.  In the last town car I saw a familiar, dweeby silhouette.  PRINCE FUCKING CHARLES.  "Was that Prince Charles?"  I asked the cute uniformed guard walking behind the car.  He nodded.  My husband came back.   "Did you see that car?"  "What car?"  "It was Prince Charles."  "Really?"  "I know!  Cool, right?"  "I've lived here my whole life and have never seen a royal.  You're here an hour and you see Prince Charles."

It was a great weekend.  Saw Book of Mormon, Wicked, the Tower of London.  Had a lot of sex in bathrooms.  Clean ones.  Like the single handicap loo down one flight from the hotel lobby.  I wonder if Prince Charles peed in there earlier that day…Bro had just gone up to the room.  I was feeling very randy (English).  We spread my coat on the floor and went at it.  Missionary.  My foot was in the air enough to grab onto something.  I didn't realize it was the alarm pull for actual handicapped people to use if they're in distress and need assistance.  We got a knock on the door.  "Everything OK in there?"  "Yes," said my husband.  "Yes!" I chimed in.  Dammit.  Now they KNEW two people were in there fucking.  I lost my hard on.  We gathered ourselves and dove for the nearby elevator, which thankfully was on the same floor so we didn't have to do the walk of shame past the lobby desk.

The other bathroom was our hotel room bathroom.  Bro was passed out on his bed snoring loudly.  We were safe...and silent.  Fun fact: men can't cum and laugh at the same time.  I was on my knees, about to take a load in the face for the big finale, so I took a deep breath of air and made squirrel cheeks while closing my eyes.  He started laughing.  He came, but there was no shooting to say the least.  Hey...I'm used to older guys.  They cum samples.  These young guys shoot Costco gallons.  Best to take a deep breath AND KEEP YOUR EYES CLOSED.

After that event, I filled up a clean, empty Starbucks cup...half Bombay Sapphire, half tonic.  Bro was still snoring.  Because of my skin and other reasons that would make you roll your eyes, it's better for me to sight see at night.  I put on sneakers because I wanted to be comfortable.  We were going to be doing some walking.  And once the gin kicked in, we got to do our naughty photo shoots (though we didn't have time for Sherlock).  If you want to see the pics check out my twitter.  Needless to say, I wish I'd brought along heeled boots.

We almost got hit by one of those red double-decker buses, we did get kicked out of Westminster Abbey.  Turns out Big Ben is a boob man.  And so yeah, that was last time I had Bombay Sapphire.

Until right now. Only question is...which tonic water???

And the lime better be organic.

Cheerio!