Tigers on Vaseline...

I traveled to London after work yesterday evening to meet my friend Howard from Manchester. After some food, a bit of gay bar hopping around Old Compton St and Brewer St and a not too late night, we were up and mooching about the capital by late morning today.

Our first stop was The Queen's Gallery at Buckingham Palace for the Leonardo da Vinci Anatomist exhibition. It's the largest exhibition ever put together of his anatomical drawings and notes; a simple but well laid out exhibition. My lasting impression was the inquisitiveness of this man and his capacity for attention to detail. Incredible and very beautiful.

A quick flit around the Buckingham Palace gift shop, negotiating the Union Flag tea towels, Diamond Jubilee embroidered cushions, royal themed crockery, Betty Windsor calendars and some tempting t shirts with "Princess" written in diamanté across them left us both feeling satiated with royalty to the brink of nausea; enough to turn anyone republican.

This was followed by a saunter through Soho and a beer and veggie burger lunch at Byron. Whilst eating lunch, I managed to track down the whereabouts of Heddon St on my phone. This is the location of The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars album cover shot and is not the easiest street to find in London. Search for it on Maps on the iPhone and you are simply directed to Regent St. However, a bit of detective work revealed its exact location.

A quick mince down Brewer St and then across Regent St saw me standing in Heddon St, exactly where Mr Stardust himself stood some 40 years ago and a bewildered Howard forced to take photos of me doing so. It's certainly changed in that time, dotted with its cafes, bars and quick eateries. Judging by the photo, I don't think I'd cut it as a messianic, alien rock star.

We retraced our steps back along Brewer St to a bar that Howard knew called The Yard; on two floors with a little courtyard, we sat outside enjoying a couple of beers and watching the gay boys come and go. The perfect end to a lovely day out together.

As I write this, I'm sat on the train back to Cardiff. Opposite me are two Christians. I know this because they both have their New Testaments close at hand. They eye me with suspicion, as if I had 666 tattooed across my forehead. Perhaps they can smell that I'm a non believer? Well, I am wearing L'Atheist, eau de toilette pour homme by Lenthéric.

He is fat and much younger than her. He wears a red hoodie with "Playboy Mansion" emblazoned across the front with a photo of some scantily clad female to accompany it. He stares blankly; his mouth hangs open, the cavity filled by his swollen tongue. I catch him looking at me and his eyes flick to staring out the window again.

She is tiny, delicate and is pale to the point of translucence. I can see the veins in her marshmallow skin. She fingers a copy of "The Lady" as she slowly tries to eat an M&S salad, leaf by leaf, with a plastic spoon. Watching this is frustrating beyond belief. Were she a child and I her parent, I'd have to slap her and tell her to stop playing with her food.