Our sports reporter Mark has been collecting a great deal of dust so we’ve finally given him an assignment. He wholly recommends the very fun, charity raising, and inclusive Royal Vauxhall Tavern Sports Day at the back of Spring Gardens on Monday 31 August from 1pm. Because we’re all about charity.

For the uninitiated, Sports Day is our own little Notting Hill carnival, with soca and steel drums substituted with handbag throwing, tug of war and drag queens.  The event is composed  of approximately 10 teams, usually dressed up and with great names. As you can imagine, there is a definite comedy element to the proceedings but is MC’ed by some professional sports reporters who corral events into a semblance of actual competition. The various tasks (egg and spoon, the 50 metre mince, drag race relay, etc) are constructed in a knockout format with the winning team being crowned at about 5pm. All proceeds go to charity LGBT Hero, which promotes health in the lesbian. trans and gay communities.

This event is free but bring some cash or a tappable phone as there will be charity buckets and volunteers about, and there is also a raffle.  The day is certainly not limited to a specific demographic and there are a number of families there with kids, older folks, and an overall sense of mirth abounds. There are bars, music and mirth being consumed. We would never presume to tell you how to live your life, but for maximum enjoyment we might suggest a picnic consisting of ultraprocessed food scored from the corner shop. The website indicates a kickoff at 1, but is usually about 1:30.

Why there aren’t more events like this is a mystery to us, like the continued existence of phone boxes or announcements on the tube banning E-unicycles. And whats an E-unicycle?