such a civilised evening...

In January when I booked tickets for Fox, Cosgrove and I to see Will Young at the open air concert at Kenwood I had assumed the weather would be good in August. Fortunately I had booked luxury deckchairs and so although there was a torrential downpour at 6pm we were not subjected to a Glastonbury style mud bath. Kenwood is the house where Julia Roberts is filming her period drama and Hugh Grant comes to visit her on set in the movie Notting Hill. It's posh. The people that go to the concerts there take picnics and hampers and wine and champagne. It should be really civilised. Will Young seems to have a lot of women fans in their mid to late forties. These women like to stand up and wave their arms when he sings. This tends to block the view of the people behind. The people with restricted views adopt various tactics, the people behind us threw food, the people to the right of us shouted and swore, "If you don't sit down I'll f**king put you down". I tried to ask the 46 year old with a vest top, bingo wings and combat trousers to sit down politely. I explained we could not see. She grumbled but eventually sat down. Will played "Light My Fire" and up she got. Fine, "Light My Fire" is fairly up tempo and she can jiggle around all she likes. I looked at her back, the droopy flesh wobbling at the back of her arms and waited for the song to finish. It did, but she stayed put, right in the aisle, blocking the view. everyone else that had been standing sat down, she did not. Cosgrove and Fox could sense my rage building. I got up walked down the aisle and placed my 6'1 frame squarely in front of her 5'4 one.
Bingo Wings: Oi, don't be mean. I can't see.
Me: Precisely, and neither can I if you stand there.
BW: Well why don't you stand up.
Me: I am, and I will make sure I stand in front of you until you do the same as everyone else and sit down.
BW: You are horrible.
Me: Yes, I am.
The crowd has now started telling us to "Shhh" and yelling Sit down.
BW's daughter tells her mum to come and sit down. BW goes back to her chair, I turn and go back to mine the audience applaud and the man sat behind me tells his wife that, " That young man was very clever in getting her to sit without being physical." The woman in front of me turns around and says thank you. I blush. Fox and Cosgrove are doubled over trying to contain their laughter.

The actual gig was a bit dull. Will is not the most scintillating live performer, but he can hold a tune and he was on the other side of a small lake so it is tricky to develop a rapport with the crowd.

As we were leaving BW kicked off again. I was a little in front of the boys, but she was next to them and started saying she was going to f**king have me. The boys tried to placate her but she just ranted some more using a ripe selection of expletives. Fox reprimanded her for her vocabulary and then she started going on about she wasn't going to be told to sit down by, "some 20 year old, who should be showing me some respect." I over heard this last comment and was delighted, she thought I was 20!!!! OK it had got quite dark, but still. The boys had caught up with me and BW was just behind us. She would not let it lie. "I'm 46, you should be giving me respect. Where is your mother? I bet she 's not a Will Young concert. Yeah, I'm 46 and I've still got it." Unfortunately this just made us laugh even more. I was itching to turn round and explain that respect is something that needs to be earned and a 46 year old dressing and behaving like a 14 year old just doesn't qualify in my book, but I decided that it was best just to let her witter on as her failure to get a rise from me seemed to be annoying her more!