Rites of Patches

This July, I spent two weeks abroad in the United Kingdom. Two friends and I spent five days in London, followed by seven days in Scotland. The stories that follow are totally true and not in any way exaggerated or embellished.

Day 4

If there was one thing I wasn’t expecting about London, it was the birds. There were pigeons everywhere. I should have remembered this from that horrible song in Mary Poppins, but I didn’t. Was Mary Poppins set in London? Who knows…

If you have ever had the pleasure of walking amongst pigeons, you know something we found out the hard way. When pigeons take off from the ground, they always look like they are going to fly through your skull. Pigeons are instinctually incapable of taking off without making a person freak out and duck for absolutely no reason.

And they shout “Fuck you, asshole!” while doing it too

After checking out the Imperial War Museum and the HMS Belfast, we stopped at a riverside restaurant to eat. There I met my match.

I like bacon cheeseburgers. There’s a burger. And then there’s bacon on top of it. It’s glorious. It used to be my default order at any restaurant. I don’t waste time eating and no burger has survived my onslaught.

Then I ordered the Tower 42 burger, a double-patty monstrosity concocted by Satan himself.

It was the first burger that stymied me. I couldn’t eat it. I couldn’t even fit it into my mouth. I’ll give you a moment to insert your own joke here.

It was this big!

I gnawed the burger more than I ate it, whittling down each side. Despite some last second encouragement from my compatriots, I was defeated. There was a square 1.5 inch chunk of one patty remaining.

I plowed through a bunch of fries afterwards, but just the thought of taking one more bite of hamburger nearly made me retch.

Khaaaaaaaaaaan!
…
Defeat

Evening was falling when we left the restaurant. We were about to cross the Millennium Bridge when we noticed that it was packed full of people. We joined the crowds starting in the same direction, eventually learning that there was going to be a laser light show to celebrate the grand opening of The Shard, the new tallest building in Europe.

We waited for what seemed like an hour while the crowd grew larger around us.

And then this happened.

It did this repeatedly

Worst. Light Show. Ever.

I’d tell you how long those lights kept flashing, but we left and I never looked back.