One of the most impressive parts of Samuel Pepys' life would be his extravagant social life. Pepys has an unusually large amount of friends and enjoys going out with them to eat. It is surprising to look at all of the activities Pepys takes part in, and to realize how wealthy he was due to his expenses from there. Even more impressive is how he balances his business life and his social life.
A recurring event Pepys takes part in every day would be the act of dining. Almost every day Pepys is either out on the town eating or having his acquaintenances over to eat. Pepys is able to do this easily with the help of his cook. One activity that often takes place would be story telling. While dining with Lord Carteret and Sir Brisband, they tell him of fascinating stories about cows bigger than three humans. Also while out to eat arguments often occur. After finding out that 4000 people died due to the plague Pepys' friends scoffed at those numbers and refused to believe them (www.pepysdiary.com/archive/1665/08/).
There also is a more active part to Pepys' life. This would include all games and events he participates in. After waking up he usually enjoyed to play a game of billiards with Brisband(www.pepysdiary.com/archive/1665/08). Another interest of Pepys would be horse back riding. He would often ride his horse on business ventures and he truly felt alive during this. Pepys also was interested in riding other people's horses. Pepys also was interested in riding other horses as well(www.pepysdiary.com/archive/1665/08/). Pepys also thouroughly enjoyed the opera and would attend almost twice a day, even if he had already seen the play. It is hard to imagine such a lavish lifestyle as the one Pepys had. He often dined out instead of using his cooks, he owned a horse, and he also had a billiards table. Just these alone could put a man in this time in debt.
The most fascinating trait of Samuel Pepys was his ability to seperate his business and social life when needed. Pepys would dine with business partners occassionally but usually stayed away from the idea. He made sure to finish his dealings before he went out and even dealt with his money in the sactity of his home.
Samuel Pepys could possibly have lived the most lavish lifestyle of anyone not considered royalty in the 1600's. The fact that he wrote in his diary every day is even more impressive to us. Pepys may have been a ladies man but he will be remembered more of as an extrovert.
Pepys diary for the month of August 1665:
http://www.pepysdiary.com/archive/1665/08/
Links for pictures of Pepys and his lifestyle: http://www.waterhistory.org/histories/london/pepys1.jpg
Contemporary picture: http://img.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2007/08_03/pepysDM2408_468x445.jpg
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