David and Freema at HMV
Nov. 5th, 2007 08:46 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
fairyd123So totally worth the 5 and a half hours of queuing:
So woke up at the ungodly hour of 4:00 a.m. and after some remonstrations with the taxi company (with the driver continually saying that he was parked outside my flat, which, not unless he was borrowing Bond's invisible car he wasn't) I finally made it to Oxford Circus at about 5:20 a.m.
Passed the people camping outside Virgin for the McFly signing (and how irritated must they be that the security people were still desperately trying to get rid of wristbands for their signing at 10:30 when my friend and I went in there!) before ending up in front of HMV ...and finding there was noone else there.
I knew I couldn't possibly be the first and before long I was accosted by a shout of "Doctor Who? " nods "Down here!".
I then went down a side alley to discover everyone queuing there behind barricades. A very nice Welsh lass (who poor thing had been there since 4 pm the previous day) took my name and wrote a number on my hand with sharpie (No 40.) Thankfully a friend of mine who I know from conventions arrived at the exact same time as me which at least meant I had some company in the queue. Found out that the people at the front of the queue had been there since 6:00 p.m. the previous day and had camped out.
And then we queued...and queued...and queued! Very long wait but the Welsh lass was hilarious, the security guard looking after us was entertaining (even if every time he wanted our attention he addressed us with "Listen up geeks!" )and we met some really nice people in the queue which frankly I think is what these sort of signing events are really all about. There were only 250 wristbands although they went a little slower than I had expected. I think a lot of people very new to this sort of event waited until fairly late to show so the majority of the wristbands went between 7 and 8. The last wristbands went at 8:30 with a few lucky souls sneaking in (there were 4 bands left and 10 people waiting - so they all got in). After that the guard started turning people away and I did notice a few tearful people complaining loudly to the manager at the front of the store.
We got our wristbands, went on a wander down Oxford Street, queued again (and met some more really nice people) before it was time to go into the store for the signing. The place was completely packed with loads of people behind barricades. As I had suspected when I found out that they were only handing out 250 wristbands Freema and David were only scheduled to be there for one measly hour! Which meant they rushed us through like you wouldn't believe. One item each (meant to be the box set but a few people cheated) and no photos which was a crying shame as I would really have liked a photo with David.
Anyway they were both lovely and David looked nicely dishevelled all unshaven in his Fratellis T-shirt and jeans. I went up there, he asked me my name and I congratulated him on winning the NTA award last week. He beamed and thanked me and I mentioned that I had booked for Hamlet and Loves Labours Lost and was really excited about seeing both. The rest of the conversation went like this:
Freema : You've booked already!
David: Oh see this just makes me nervous everyone telling me that.
Me: Oh people are really looking forward to seeing the plays - people are travelling from all over the world to see them.
David: Oh god don't tell me that!
Freema: cackles hysterically
Tragically that was about all I had time for before the burly security guard went to hurl me off the stage. So David thanked me for coming and I left. I felt very bad because David was first which meant that I spoke to David and by the time I'd finished talking to him Freema had already signed my set and I was being moved along. Which I think was happening to a lot of people. Hopefully she'll do a signing somewhere else and I can speak to her more then.
My photos were not great - too far back when they came out and being rushed along too much to get all that decent shots but what photos I took are below (I kinda like the ones of him against the big screen- they're unusual).
So woke up at the ungodly hour of 4:00 a.m. and after some remonstrations with the taxi company (with the driver continually saying that he was parked outside my flat, which, not unless he was borrowing Bond's invisible car he wasn't) I finally made it to Oxford Circus at about 5:20 a.m.
Passed the people camping outside Virgin for the McFly signing (and how irritated must they be that the security people were still desperately trying to get rid of wristbands for their signing at 10:30 when my friend and I went in there!) before ending up in front of HMV ...and finding there was noone else there.
I knew I couldn't possibly be the first and before long I was accosted by a shout of "Doctor Who? " nods "Down here!".
I then went down a side alley to discover everyone queuing there behind barricades. A very nice Welsh lass (who poor thing had been there since 4 pm the previous day) took my name and wrote a number on my hand with sharpie (No 40.) Thankfully a friend of mine who I know from conventions arrived at the exact same time as me which at least meant I had some company in the queue. Found out that the people at the front of the queue had been there since 6:00 p.m. the previous day and had camped out.
And then we queued...and queued...and queued! Very long wait but the Welsh lass was hilarious, the security guard looking after us was entertaining (even if every time he wanted our attention he addressed us with "Listen up geeks!" )and we met some really nice people in the queue which frankly I think is what these sort of signing events are really all about. There were only 250 wristbands although they went a little slower than I had expected. I think a lot of people very new to this sort of event waited until fairly late to show so the majority of the wristbands went between 7 and 8. The last wristbands went at 8:30 with a few lucky souls sneaking in (there were 4 bands left and 10 people waiting - so they all got in). After that the guard started turning people away and I did notice a few tearful people complaining loudly to the manager at the front of the store.
We got our wristbands, went on a wander down Oxford Street, queued again (and met some more really nice people) before it was time to go into the store for the signing. The place was completely packed with loads of people behind barricades. As I had suspected when I found out that they were only handing out 250 wristbands Freema and David were only scheduled to be there for one measly hour! Which meant they rushed us through like you wouldn't believe. One item each (meant to be the box set but a few people cheated) and no photos which was a crying shame as I would really have liked a photo with David.
Anyway they were both lovely and David looked nicely dishevelled all unshaven in his Fratellis T-shirt and jeans. I went up there, he asked me my name and I congratulated him on winning the NTA award last week. He beamed and thanked me and I mentioned that I had booked for Hamlet and Loves Labours Lost and was really excited about seeing both. The rest of the conversation went like this:
Freema : You've booked already!
David: Oh see this just makes me nervous everyone telling me that.
Me: Oh people are really looking forward to seeing the plays - people are travelling from all over the world to see them.
David: Oh god don't tell me that!
Freema: cackles hysterically
Tragically that was about all I had time for before the burly security guard went to hurl me off the stage. So David thanked me for coming and I left. I felt very bad because David was first which meant that I spoke to David and by the time I'd finished talking to him Freema had already signed my set and I was being moved along. Which I think was happening to a lot of people. Hopefully she'll do a signing somewhere else and I can speak to her more then.
My photos were not great - too far back when they came out and being rushed along too much to get all that decent shots but what photos I took are below (I kinda like the ones of him against the big screen- they're unusual).
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no subject
Date: 2007-11-06 08:13 am (UTC)