Pointless

Today was a weird day. My sister got us tickets to be part of the audience of a game show called Pointless at the bbc studio in London. I've been dying to go to the city for ages so I thought, excellent! I can spend the day roaming around my favourite places and meet up with my sisters and bro-in-law in the evening for the show.

Wrong.
I had to stay at home and wait for a delivery guy to collect something I needed to return and also for my sister's new laptop to be delivered. We missed one delivery already so she would kill me if we missed it again. So I wasn't able to shower and get ready until it arrived which was pretty annoying. More annoying was that I had planned to sleep in but for some reason I woke up early and couldn't get back to sleep.
 Finally, at 2'O clock the laptop came and I rushed and got ready in time to go at least one place before the show and pick some dinner up too. I ended up in trocadero first because I wanted to check out the anime shop. I was also dying to pee :-p but when I got there I saw they charge £1 to use the toilet! WTH! So I decided to go after at Mcdonalds.
The anime shop was lovely! I wish I had more money to waste. There was almost an entire wall dedicated to Totoro and his little friends (from the studio ghibli movie My Neighbour Totoro). Not only plush toys but bags, keyrings, wall hangings and even slippers and gloves! In the end I bought a little Ponyo model and a little chibi L (from the excellent anime Death Note) and a floral watch. I actually wanted the Nightmare Before Christmas watch but it had an ugly strap.
Even after loitering in the shop for ages I still had about 20 minutes to grab some dinner on the way so I decided to go to Queensway and get a takeaway from Noodle Oodle!
 It was very strange to go back to that area on my own when before I was always with friends. Plus, it had gotten dark. It made the whole place seem to take on a strange unfriendly hostile feel rather than the magical feeling I'd usually get when I went there. It's odd how the same place can seem so opposite in different circumstances. It's like the memories are flitting passed you like ghosts and the town is all dead.
 The weird feel seemed to be chock full of bad luck as well. It took me at least 10 minutes just to walk to the restaurant from the station which was worrying as I was counting every minute so as not to be late. When I got there I couldn't decide what to eat! I was flicking through the menu trying to find something quick to eat and something with chicken veg and rice.
After ages I finally found a dish and asked if I could have chicken instead of prawns. They agreed. Then told me the minimum spend to use a debit card was £8 and my dish came to £6.30. I didn't want to order more things because it would just take more time. So I rushed outside looking about for a cash machine but it's down by the station and I'd wasted enough time already. I wouldn't have time to get money out then rush back and then rush to the station again so I decided to go to Subway instead. I also needed to pee and Subway didn't have toilets.
So I went into the Mcdonalds and the toilets were disgusting. And one of them wouldn't even flush. I had to clean the other one before I used it and then when I washed my hands, the hand dryer wouldn't stay on more than 5 seconds and it was so slow that blowing on my hands would have dried them quicker. I was in such a rush and so worried about being late that in the end I quickly took money out, grabbed a steak and veg wrap from subway then legged it to the station.
Managed to get to the bbc at the exact time I meant to in the first place and munched my wrap in the queue.
The show itself was fun to watch. I'd watched a few clips on youtube but they didn't seem all that. But seeing it live was a lot better. Maybe the contestants were more entertaining than the ones I saw or maybe it was because the guy who explained stuff to us about what we had to do was so funny. He was funnier than the host actually. There were times when the hosts were trying to make jokes and not quite getting there.
What was really fun though was being involved and seeing the contestants right in front of you so you can completely sympathise with them. It makes you want to root for them more.
It wasn't my first time as an audience member. Once in Whiteleys, a lady asked me and my sister if we wanted to join the audience of the Deadly Knowledge Show. That one had a much smaller studio and seemed more staged. It also had a rehearsal before filming of the whole thing to help the contestants get the hang of it. For Pointless, we did a few practices of things we had to do but then we went straight into filming which made me a little nervous even though we weren't really on camera. I had butterflies in my stomach just sitting in the audience, I can't imagine how the contestants must feel. I really admire how well they kept their cool and joked about.
Next time we are hoping to try and see a dance competition show. I'll remember to bring a drink though, was so thirsty during Pointless, the filming went on for hours. I also must remember to find the show on the Sky planner and put it on record. We didn't have sky plus in the old days so I never did see the episode of Deadly Knowledge Show on television.
Oh, I also got a chance to finally wear a choker I bought from etsy.com. I was so worried I hadn't tied it properly and it would fall off somewhere and be lost. But it stayed on all night. Would love to buy more.
Here's the shop I bought it from:
Hide and Stitch by MsMRDate All the pieces are one of a kind so it's not on sale any more. But it's the one the shop owner's wearing in the profile pic. I also bought the batman earrings which are awesome!