Luckily, I quite like queueing. When in a queue you can, in a very British way, find out a lot about people. You can listen to their conversations, make assumptions about them and even make notes without having to engage more than with a polite smile if they catch you staring.
We started our day by deciding not to join the 2 hour queue for the Bank of England. We had been in the museum before. We also decided that the Cheese Grater building queue was too long but we did wait behind a very excited Italian, who was going to get an i-phone 6 next week because, "Why shouldn't I? I have to spend my money on something," and his mates for the Lloyds of London building. He seemed inappropriately excited to explain how his mother had died on the only weekend she had ever been alone. The building appealed to the Long Suffering Husband because it looks like it's made from exhaust pipes.
It's a building I'm pretty sure I've been in before, when it was new and I did a week of temping, while a student, for a ship insurer. I think I remember the bell and the funny escalators but I'm sure there were less desks and filing cabinets.
Then we spent a little time in the queue for the Gherkin building, until a man told us that the queue was so long that we were not going to get in before it closed and suggested we came back at 8am on Sunday. It's a building that I'd like to look in but maybe not that much. It's quite nice from the outside, though and looks very different to the Baltic Exchange that I used to walk past before the IRA blew it up.
We were getting a bit bored of the queueing so we went to see the poppys at the Tower. Stupidly, from other people's photos I thought they were real poppies but they are even better for being sculptures.
Next, it was City Hall, egg, honeypot, woodlouse or glass gonad (as Boris calls it: I am a bit concerned about Boris' testicles and think he should probably see a doctor!). This was a fantastic queue to stand in. The Southbank is a great place, where you can see people hanging out. Couples propose on Tower Bridge, street performers sit for hours pretending to be the invisible man, dads climb on top of large black ball sculptures to impress their children. This weekend also coincides with when many parents are dropping their children at University. Behind us in the queue were a family, with a daughter wearing a freshers wristband. The daughter was explaining to her mum's friend how embarrassing her mum had been, as she was the only one crying, which set the mum off all over again. The Dad was trying to keep things pleasant by telling what he thought were funny stories about his sister's roots that everyone ignored and clearly thought were less than funny.
In front of us was a couple with a very smiley baby, who were fretting about their daughter's food getting radiated in the x-ray machine. She scolded him for being stupid about something by saying, "And you're a teacher." If she hadn't said that I would have known because we saw him later asking about visiting at other times and I could tell he was planning a school trip. They asked the two young volunteers at the door if they worked there. They did. They were apprentices. Their job was cool because they got to work on events and exciting things like that. They only met Boris in the lift, where he said random things that they didn't know how to respond to.
I liked this building but it was a bit strange. There was a selection of piped music playing including the Archer's and Blue Peter theme tune and lots of people felt compelled to lay on the floor, maybe it's the extra large steps.
On the lower ground floor there is a map on the floor. I found Essex on the map, it appears to be the escape hatch!
We ended our day with a visit to St Paul's and some food nearby. I did a lot of temp work in an office next to St Paul's in the eighties and never noticed the nail before.
Open House is a great idea. Next year I will go early and apply for the ballot for some of the appointment only buildings like 10 Downing Street.
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