The Solsburian Who Annexed a Hill and Came Down a Mountain

Part Five: The Aftermath and Meeting With Tony

The previous installment...

Note: The formatting is all messed up on this page. No, I'm not going to fix it.

As Angel and I were walking down Penthouse Hill Drive, we realized we needed
to make sure we had the right bus number headed back to the Abbot House. So
we decided to use Angel's cell phone to call Sandra. We got through, and
Sandra gave us the bus number to take, and she added, "Oh, and your friend
is here." I looked at my watch. We agreed to meet with Tony around 5, and it
was only 3:45pm. I was hoping that since he went through the trouble of
getting to Bath from Aldershot, he'd find ways to amuse himself while
waiting for us, but it seemed that he spent most of his time hanging out at
the Abbot house.

After hanging up, we tried to get to the bus stop, concluded that we were at
the wrong stop. So we went to another stop, just in time to catch the bus.
We had to go back to Bath to take another bus that led to a stop a few
blocks from the Abbot House. That took forever...while there were two buses
leading to Newbridge road sitting at the main station, all the drivers
seemed to be on an hour break. So we sat and waited before a driver finally
decided to, like, drive.

And even then it was a long drive with all of the stops in and around Bath.
I do remember seeing a Apple dealer, where I was warmed with the thought
that it's very likely that Gabriel had stopped in there from time to time.

Finally, we got to the Abbot House stop, a half-hour late for our meeting
time with Tony. We got off with several people, who quickly dispersed, and
we started to walk the street. A man in a black leather jacket crossed the
street with us, and I wondered, did he get off the bus with us? I didn't
remember seeing him on the bus. I couldn't see his face as he walked ahead
of me. The way he looked a bit like a punk with the weird styled red hair
and leather jacket, as well as he insisted on walking between Angel and I
(Angel was walking a few paces ahead of me as usual.)

As we all walked along, my thoughts shifted focus to meeting Tony for the
first time. I hoped meeting little ol' me would be worth the two hour trip
for Bath. I wondered what I was going to say. I wondered what he was going
to say. We finally stopped in front of Abbot House, and I realized Punk Guy
was still with us. I don't remember, but I may have thought that it would be
funny coincidence if Punk Guy had a room at the same place. Both Angel and I
stopped to see if Punk Guy would keep walking or not. For a second, I looked
down at the sidewalk...I realized I needed an opening line to greet Tony.
That's when Punk Guy spun around and faced us, and spoke, startling the heck
out me. "Aren't you going to say hello to your old friend?!"

I strained to recognize the face. The shape of his face and his beard looked
just like it did in the picture of Tony that is on the Gallery, but it still didn't seem right. I
had no idea his hair was so red...I thought it looked grey-ish brown color
in the picture, and he seemed younger than what the picture made him
out to be.

I looked down and saw the yellow stitching on his Doc Martens. "Tony!" I
said trying to give a firm handshake, and chided him for essentially
stalking us. He had a pretty good laugh at that. Apparently, he knew we were
on our way so he waited at the bus stop for us, mingled with the crowd, and
walked with us from there. I knew he had no problem spotting me...I was
still wearing my "Lovetown redux" outfit.

Ladies and gentlement, the Blues Brothers without the sunglasses! No, I'm not standing in a hole.

We went inside and up to our room to rest and figure out what we wanted to
do for dinner. It turns out Tony had planned on visiting a bookstore in Bath
that a friend had done some bookbinding for, but the place was closed. So,
Tony spent the bulk of the day hanging out with Robert and Sandra Ashley at
the Abbot House, watching television. She said that Sandra had no idea who
Peter Gabriel or Genesis was, and we confirmed that she thought Solsbury
Hill was in the U.S., but she tried to help in finding Solsbury Hill for us.

We talked of our adventures of going to Real World Studios and Solsbury
Hill. Tony told us as he was taking a taxi from the train station to the
B&B, he asked the driver about Solsbury Hill, and it turned out the cabbie
was a big Peter Gabriel fan. At one point, Tony said to the driver, "What
would you say if I told you that I know someone who came all the way from
America just to see Solsbury Hill?" The cabbie said, "Why, I'd say they're
crazy!" "But what would you say if I told you she was big Peter Gabriel fan,
like you?" "Oh. In that case..." the cabbie said, seeing the light.

Tony gave me a printout of a long e-mail that Kari had sent for Tony to
deliver to me. I read it...it contained well-wishes for a great trip, and a
set of instructions. According to Kari, I needed to make sure I had a good
time with Tony (Darn. I was planning on having a *bad* time with Tony.) And
that I needed to annex Solsbury Hill (Mission Accomplished) and toast to her
when we went out for drinks.

It must've been raining at one point (although I don't remember it) because
we looked out the window to see a perfect rainbow. We took a couple of
pictures, which you can see below. Side note: When I showed this picture to
Kari, she said it was funny that she saw a rainbow the same day we did, and
she remembered that when I met Kari for the first time, we saw a rainbow
then, too. Cool!

So, where did you say Peter's house was again?

We decided to head on over to The Boathouse again as we knew it had a bar,
was reasonably priced, and was within walking distance. Being extremely
hungry, we all headed out.

We made our way to the pub and got some drinks. Angel had some orange juice, Tony had some Guinness, and I had a glass of red wine. We chatted for a bit before deciding to get a table for dinner. We got our table, and noticed it was extremely hot and stuffy in the room. Tony realized that we were seated right next to a heating panel. Tony also realized that there was a heating control behind the panel, which was under the table, next to the floor. So Tony crawled under the table, took apart the panel and fiddled with the controls, and we all got strange looks from the other diners in the room. Repairs made, Tony took his place at the table.

We fianally got our meals. Tony and I had seafood, and Angel had some curry pasta-thing. After we ate, I had a brilliant idea...let's sit outside at the picnic tables by the river where we could talk and drink. There wasn't anyone else outside...probably because it was cold out. I felt fine in my long coat and hat, but Tony seemed less enthusiastic about my brilliant idea. I forced him to go outside anyway, and Angel just followed along. So we sat outside, with Tony and his beer, and I kept ordering bottles of Smirnoff Ice. Angel had ice cream in a container shaped in a penguin's head (don't ask.) And we talked about...everything, really. Movies, books, games and other cool stuff. We talked, and then talked some more. I remembered at one point, Tony talked about this article.

Me advertising for Smirnoff Ice and looking way too damn happy. We did take a few pictures of Angel and Tony outside the pub, but none of them came out at all...only the pictures of me. Thus proving there is no justice in this world.

After talking and drinking for a long while, we decided to go inside for a few minutes. I was secretly hoping that I could talk Angel and Tony into going up that footpath that was behind the pub, wanting to see the city lights at night.

However, once we got inside, Tony looked at his watch, and his eyes fell out of his head. Well, not really, but he looked really shocked. He then informed us that he had exactly fifteen minutes to catch the last train out of Bath. Oops.

We ran out of the pub and dashed back to the bed and breakfast. Angel and Tony were a good twenty feet ahead of me. I didn't see how Tony could possibly get to the train station on time. Just then, a taxi pulled out of a side street, right in front of Tony. He jumped in the back seat (even though there was a passenger already in the cab!) and begged to be taken to the train station. To this day, I couldn't believe Tony's luck with the cab appearing in front of him like that. We still needed to get Tony's bag which was in our room at the inn. Angel and I ran ahead to get to the inn, and Tony had the cab follow us. We ran in, grabbed Tony's bag, threw it to Tony, gave him a farewell hug, and he was off.

I wondered what would happen if he didn't make the train. He'd have to come back to us, and probably spend the night at the inn. Maybe he'd have to sleep on the floor on our room. I wasn't opposed to that idea, but his wife might not care for it. A few minutes later, Angel got a call on her cell phone. Tony was calling from the train...he had made it just in time!

Somewhat relieved, I went to chat with the innkeepers for a few minutes. It appears that while the wife didn't know much about Peter Gabriel, the husband and his brother, and the wife's mother knew quite a bit about PG. After talking a bit, I decided to head for bed, feeling bittersweet that my excellent Bath experience had come to a close.

Heh...I'm not as thunk as you drink I am.

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