THE SEARCH FOR MR. ADEQUATE
Part XXIV
By SUSAN SILVER

“A Foggy Day in London Town”

Actually I brought the sun to London when I joined Deb for our little adventure starting with four days there. She had been there a week longer and it rained every day. So she was glad to see me, but it could have just been the sunshine. Deb, as you may recall is my friend of thirty years who has not had sex in twenty-five of those years. Deb now, even prettier with her new face, and menopausal raging hormones (go figure) was determined to meet someone, Adequate or not and do the deed. Or at least want to.

Well, one of us did meet someone I will tell you about in a later column. That is known in TV as the teaser.

All in all, we had a great trip. Though we’ve been friends a long time, we’d never traveled together and that is always the test isn’t it? We shared rooms in London and Scotland and had our own but adjoining rooms on the Queen. (Ship, not Reigning Monarch, lest there be reader confusion for those of you who skim.)

Bottom line, we are still friends ... even better friends, which is no mean accomplishment. I actually thought we were very well matched. She is easygoing, flexible, quite neat and I am really fun. That balances out, doesn’t it? Actually I thought I was being fairly neat but she didn’t agree. That did nothing to change my side of the room behavior but it was duly noted.

Horror of horrors, we both discovered that we snore a tad ... snort actually, but only once or twice, a fact neither of us knew because there had been no one sharing either of our beds for a while. No no ... we had our own beds on the trip ... .I meant lovers to report on our prior nocturnal sounds. Though I have had lots of sex, thank you, in the first twenty-four of those twenty-five years, no one mentioned any random snorts. Thank god men sleep like logs. And I use earplugs, something Deb now is devoted to.

Back to the trip. I flew Virgin ... no wisecracks! It was the best. And I love that they call it “Upper Class.” The sleeping pods are cute and comfy and they give you soft black jammies which I changed into and it’s like one big slumber party. With neck massages if you wish. Food was really tasty and the goody bag, I mean travel amenities pouch, was excellent.

Deb flew First Class British Airlines because she pisses money away but liked my jammies better and will switch to Virgin from now on. In London we stayed at the Athenaeum which we both have stayed at before and love. It is quaint, well located, and small enough to be homelike and intimate.

The best thing about it is The Donald. Not that Donald. The English
Donald is the fun concierge at the Hotel, known far and wide for his attitude. When I’d stayed there in the past, I made it my end of the day stop to dish with him about what I’d done, where I’d gone and show him my purchases. He is very fey and clever and always says thing ... like “Oh is that your color?” or ‘Oh don’t worry that’ll come back in soon.”

We ate at some “In” places: The Ivy ... like Elaine’s here, show biz and lively, Langan’s, still nice even though I don’t think Michael Caine is involved anymore, and Cipriani ... not like the one here. We got there at 8:00 and were rather disappointed at the crowd, tatoos and shirtsleeves. I asked the amused maitre d what was the deal and he said ” Oh you have to come in again at 12...that’s when all the beautiful people come.” I told him I can’t stay up till 12 and these were definitely the ugly people but Stan was there a few days after we were and said it was a great crowd at 11:30. Oh well.

We ate pre theater dinner at a lovely place Le Palais du Jardin because the very "“in" place called Screechy’s that we had finagled a reservation to wanted to sit us as at the end of the bar ... on stools, near the door to the kitchen. I don’t do bars. I don’t do them for drinking and certainly not for eating. And there was not one and I mean not one person sitting in either of the two dining rooms. I wanted to just storm out, but Deb was being apologetic to the woman at the desk so she eventually called the other place for us. We liked the food a lot there. Take that Screech!

We did a loovely proper tea ‘dears,’ at a place that made us feel like two little old ladies ... but what the heck.

We loved Le Caprice where we ate several times as they treated us like the little Princesses we sometimes like to think we are. However, Deb went too far. Let me explain ... as you might have guessed by now, Deb is friendly. Deb is very very very friendly. I am only (1) friendly. She loves to talk to people ... I mean she lovvvvvves to talk to people. Example: Years ago we went to the baseball game in LA and were grabbing a bite in the cafeteria. I had checked out my tray, proceeded to the table and was half way through the meal when I realized she was no where in sight. She was, at the checkout having a lovely talk with the cashier! That’s my Deb.

So when I arrived at the hotel, she’d already bonded with the bus boy, was hugging the sales manager and had invited the waitress in the lobby tea room to come visit her in LA.

At Le Caprice, I had left and was running to grab a cab in the only rain we had, when I realized there was no Deb. She had stayed behind to exchange email numbers or birth signs or something with Jesus ... pronounced Jesus ... who is the head maitre d who’s been there forever. When I ran back and was drenched dragging her out, I asked her if she had invited him to come visit her in LA too.

And, thus started a little game in which every time she over-chatted, I said “and” as a code word for “hurry up” ... or shorthand for “are you inviting them to come to visit you? And while you are at it, why don’t you tell them you have not had sex in twenty-five years?” Remember this ... it will come in handy for the column about Scotland.

This provided us huge laughs at Deb’s expense. She loves to laugh, even at her own expense. I told you she was easy going.

We did some shopping and I acted as “stylist” as Deb is trying to change
from her very conservative tailored look to a little softer and more feminine, sexy. I can help her in that regard. And I did. Boy it’s fun spending other people’s money. However, I stayed on my budget and got only two pretty tops and a great and cheap dress as I was saving my money for gambling on the ship. (More about that in the Queen Mary column.)

We saw terrific theater. Deb had seen something called “Festen” which she recommends. We both loved “The History Boys,” a very English schoolboy play which was brilliant though we missed a reference or two, and “Don Carlos” with Derek Jacoby which was excellent as well, except for one supporting player whom we agreed had to be someone’s girlfriend as she was acting in a totally different play. A soap opera. Sad to report, the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical “Woman in White” was a bit of a disappointment. Some glorious voices and a great comic portrayal, but does anyone else but us think that Sir Andrew keeps writing the same song over and over? Come to think of it, everyone we spoke to said it.

Oh wait a minute ... I don’t write restaurant reviews or play reviews! Sorry. And having been to London many times, neither one of us wanted to redo sites or cultural stuff in our short time, though we regretted skipping the Churchill Exhibit which got raves. So ... back to the men thing. We had one interesting occurrence.

There we were, all decked out in our finest, walking home from theater one night thinking we looked pretty damn fine, when a group of rowdy young men from somewhere like Liverpool, were coming towards us. Not feeling afraid as we would here, sorry but true, we smiled and they smiled but as they walked past they said in a singsongy way, “You may be blonde and you may be pretty, but we’re not going to have ya’ cause you’re in the over forty club!” (Or cloob as they said it.)

We stopped and laughed and said “thank you!” We’ll take “over forty.”
When we got back to the hotel and told our Donald, he said well first of all, you should have said, “ I don’t do ‘old’ and I don’t do ‘serious’ ... and the next time someone says something you don’t like you just say “Well kiss me tits and call me Phyliss!” That became our motto for the rest of the trip. And you are all welcome to use it as well. It fits a myriad of occasions.

So as to the men ... in London, there were ... none! I mean none for us.
Although in general I love the way English men dress and saw quite a few attractive men on the street, I met none. In the good old days, I’d had many a great date with an Englishman but I was usually introduced by my friends there whom I’d lost track of now.

Actually, one morning I did meet someone who wanted my number. (By the way, my number is 8.) Deb was doing the $45 omelet in the hotel dining room so I went around to Shepherd’s market and got the $10 omelet at a little restaurant and a well dressed, attractive blonde guy with bad teeth picked me up. He was an Australian businessman living in London, but I was only there one more night and wouldn’t abandon Deb and besides, I don’t like blondes. But it is nice to be asked.

The only other possibility was a rather hot looking older guy with a grey pony tale in Caprice who gave me the eye as he walked to the table with his wife. I know, I know, but the actual pony tale looked better than it sounds. And since there was a wife, what the hell does it matter anyway, she said bitterly.

If truth be known, we didn’t really concentrate on meeting guys. We just did the things we wanted to and had lots of fun.

So it’s on to Scotland next week and the continuing true adventures of the two blond chicks over forty. Till then ...

Respond to susan@newyorksocialdiary.com