As is a Christmas tradition in this household and in part to stop one of us from going postal with boredom, we tend to head out on Boxing Day, not to the shops and alike: hell getting stuff is what the internet is for, but for entertainment given that most (if not all) Christmas TV viewing is crap.
So, mid afternoon yesterday we followed the tradition which in previous years has taken us to see an pantomime (oh yes it did….), to the Royal Opera House for ballet, to the Alex for Spamalot and last year, to the dull fest which was Stafford Rangers V Stourbridge….zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz. This year’s destination was the Alex theatre Birmingham….
And talking about Birmingham, after an easy drive down the M6….no traffic queues to get off at J9 which confused us, we arrived at the end of the Aston Expressway turning off at the roundabout with the A34 to find that someone has built several hundred (okay perhaps not but it seemed that way) tower blocks around the university. It looks a right mess around there. Oh…and why block off the turn in Digbeth which takes you to the Bull Ring? It was a complete nightmare finding another way to our car park which didn’t involve long queues of traffic!
Anyway, arriving at the theatre to collect our tickets from the Box Office: we had only had the decision to attend three days earlier, the bloke in front of us was buying a ticket. CBH looked at me and I at her with the: “I bet he sits next to us” look. Well, she was half right as he sat in front of us. The reason for our look…. This gent smelt of urine so much so that people noticed as he walked by them. Then, when we got to our seats, CBH was sat next to “Billy Big Balls.” Why is it that some men are unable to sit with their legs closed? I am a man and I can. Its really irritating that some people take up other people legs space just because they don’t give a damn. We moved to a couple of empty seats as soon as the lights went down to get some fresh air and leg room.
Onto the play… “Benidorm” with five or six of the cast having starred in the long running TV series.
As we had arrived just before the start of the show we did not get to read the shows posters but I imaging the following: “A 107% hit” The Express, “Brave Brits getting one over on foreigners in the sun. I laughed so much I brought back up my sangria ” The Mail, “Tits, tits and more tits” The Star, “Not a laugh a minute, a laugh a second” The Sun and “A gritty in-depth exploration of working conditions in an overseas hotel” The Guardian….are things the posters would not have said. Instead, if I had been writing a review….er….then I would have used words like: “Mostly filler with little killer,” “some poor acting not helped by a poor script,” “They forgot to write a book to base this play on as what plot it had a two year old could see coming,” “two hours long...too long by two hours,” “the ice cream during the break was nice,” “Trainspotting in the rain at Sugarloaf is more fun” and “don’t bother unless you really, really, really, really don’t have anything else to do.”
Yes, we enjoyed it……not. Not one of our best decisions but hey, what did we expect?