Seeing Things With People

                So this was a busy week for me. In addition to it being my second week of full-time work, I actually had stuff to do. First up was Antony and Cleopatra on Tuesday night. After enjoying seeing Julius Caesar last month with Britbound, I figured this was a safe (and relatively inexpensive) bet. We were set to meet at 6:45pm and I worked until 5:00pm, so there was no point or time going home. But I also had very limited money. I took the bus to London Bridge and grabbed a bite to eat at Nando’s, where I had accumulated enough points to get a free half chicken. I read my book and ate chicken like a loner and still had forty-five minutes to kill.

                We were set to meet at The Anchor, so I popped in and grabbed a glass of wine and kept reading until it was time. Here’s the problem with meeting places: you don’t know anybody so when the one person you do know shows up (the Britbound host) you realize that all of you have been sitting a few people away from one another, completely oblivious. Once Marie-Clare gathered the group together we made random smalltalk before heading to The Globe. There were no huge Shakespeare buffs there besides me but it was an impressive group. It takes a certain kind of person to not really like Shakespeare but want to see one of his plays, and Antony and Cleopatra is hardly one of the better-known ones.

                In some ways this group was better than the last one, while in other ways they weren’t. Really, it was just because at the last one I met a girl from Canada, Mina, and she and I spent the whole night together talking and whatnot. So there was nobody this time that I got along with that well, but at least they all stuck together. Part of the reason I got to know Mina so well last time was because everyone basically split up and she was the only person still around. This time, everyone did a good job of keeping together. They were also a pretty friendly group, unlike last time. So it’s hard to say which I preferred. It definitely didn’t turn me off going to more events like this.

                I was a little nervous about seeing Antony and Cleopatra, especially since Julius Caesar was just phenomenal. In a way, it would have been better to see this one first, because there would not have been so high a bar set. But I knew this and I was pleasantly surprised. It didn’t match Caesar but it did a very good job trying. The combination of humor and drama was excellent and the cast were all quite good. I always love their dances which come out of nowhere (like when the men are drunk on a boat). They add such a unique feeling to the play. The actress who played Cleopatra was quite good. She looked so much like Gemma Teller from Sons of Anarchy and reminded me of her, too, which was actually really appropriate in a way. I don’t think it was a deliberate choice, but that would have been cool.

                After the show was over I high-tailed out of there because I had to work in the morning, and I’m still not used to consistently getting up at 7am every day. Wednesday was a normal day and then Thursday I did yet another thing! This is unusual for me. I usually do stuff once every two weeks, not twice in one week! I’m trying to get out more, so this is a good start. Up Thursday night was movie night with Sarah. There’s a summer cinema set up in Regent’s Place Plaza that shows two or three movies a week for free. I’d heard of it because people were talking about a screening of Cool Runnings they were doing on Saturday. That’s what Sarah and I were going to see initially, but her work schedule changed so we couldn’t. However, I noticed on Thursday they were showing one of the greatest movies of all time: Clueluess. I know, I know, Sarah and I have both seen Clueless at least a million times. Whatever, that movie is great. And it got us out of the house.

                Thursday happened to be Sarah’s day off which is why it worked out so well. And the night thing was the screening began at 6:30, so it wasn’t going to be a late night for me. And it was FREE! I met Sarah after work and we walked to the plaza, which was really nice. I’m a sucker for attractive concrete parks with no actual green space. It was a really nice setup. The entire area had lots of concrete steps that I assume businesspeople eat lunch on. Sarah and I sat on one of those really close to the screen. Had we been earlier we may have been able to snag one of the fifty or so beach chairs they had set up or the dozen bean bags. Oh well, at least we weren’t sitting on the concrete floor, like we thought we would be. Clueless was excellent, as per usual. We were both really glad we had gone. It put us in an excellent mood for the rest of the day. Summer isn’t over yet, hopefully I can make it to another one of these.