Paul’s Big C

“Mum, what would you like to do for your birthday?”

“Well, I’ve never been to St Paul’s Cathedral…”

Also wanting to see what all the fuss is about; my sister Beth and I booked tickets for us all (2x adults and now 1x discounted senior ticket to be precise, yay, to discounted travel now Mother!), hopped on the tube, walked 5 minutes following signs to Paul’s Big C (whoops, maybe I won’t abbreviate it to that) whilst shouting ‘f**k off’ to a few pigeons along the way, trotted our way up the big grand entrance, begged the sweet 75 year old doddery volunteer if we can hop on her 1pm tour of the cathedral and this is roundabout the time I learnt how little I’ve actually learnt in my short 28 years of life so far…

5 things that I learnt whilst observing St Paul’s Big C, that I should have perhaps learnt long before now, but f**k it, better late than never to have learnt:

1. “Who the f**k is Paul?” I first whispered in Beth’s ear. There’s only 3 Paul’s in life I’d ever heard of; one of them I holler to his Christmas songs whilst p*ss drunk dancing around the table every December 25th, Mr McCartney. The other one I munch on his mince pies consequence to said p*ss drunk dancing around the table every December 25th, The Hollywood baker man, and the other one…he just fixes my car from time to time, Paul the mechanic man who lives down the road. St Paul however? Mate, who are you? Well, apparently one of Jesus’ 12 best mates, probably hopped to the pub with him on a Friday after work.
   

2. Whilst walking around the Cathedral floor, our little ol’ tour guide lady kept referring to ‘a beautiful font’. Confused as ever as to why I couldn’t see any of the 1700’s objects scribed with Comic Sans font, not even with the mediocre Times New Roman styled writing…I later learnt that the huge plant pot like object stood before us was actually said ‘beautiful font’, originally used for dunking babies beads into during baptism, but later what Mum now wants to use to plant her shocking pink geraniums in.
   

3. Walking on down to the crypt, there was a lot of references to a dude named Nelson. “No way!!! Is Nelson Mandela buried here?” I asked my sister, “I guess so, she said Nelson is just buried down there, how cool, let’s go see!!”. Stumbling upon a burial scribed, ‘Horatio Nelson (1758-1805)’. A famous dude whose leadership helped the British Naval Success. It wasn't Mandela. Nor was it scribed in a Comic Sans Font incase you’re wondering.
   

4. There was something called ‘The Whispering Gallery’ on the second floor up a few/800 steps. Turns out if you whisper something into the wall from one end, it’s possible for those listening against the wall standing at the opposite end can hear what you’ve said. You can whisper anything, our little ol’ tour guide laughed and said be careful what you tell the wall, you may expose your deepest darkest secrets. Not believing this theory entirely, I can now confidently say that all 38 tourists standing before me today later learnt that I regularly eat 3/4 a packet of chocolate hobnobs dunked in tea for breakfast, I hadn’t washed my hair since last Tuesday, nearly committed a hit and run at the zebra crossing this morning whilst running late for the train and I knicked a 1st class stamp from my mothers purse yesterday morning. She’s not kidding, the walls will expose all of your secrets. Whisper better things next time in the Whispering Gallery.
   

5. Our 75 year old tour guide; wearing a very smart black trouser suit with a brown corduroy blazer, bit of mascara and a bit of lippy, was definitely dressed to impress the fellow 80 year old tour guide Ken…if you ask me what I thought all the fuss was about St Paul’s Cathedral? It’s all kicking off, what with ‘the font’ acting as the new fire pit, it’s like the new series of Love Island in there.

10/10 and Fiona the not so doddery and very much with it tour guide was a legend. She won’t be voted out anytime soon.