Bogey the Glasshopper

I was just here at work seeing if it had stopped raining and I spotted this little fella on our window. We named him Bogey because he's green! I don't know how he got up here cos this is on a first floor window... and there's no grass outside - it's a carpark!

Ten minutes after this shot was taken it started chucking it down and he was washed off the window and was hanging onto the window sill for dear life! He survived the torential downpour and gailforce winds until it died down and then he chilled out until he dried and then hopped off.

FIRE!! ... well, next door anyway!

Last Wednesday there was a fire in one of the flats in the house next door to Lisa's! We heard the alarm going off but it sounded like a car alarm. We only knew it was a fire when we walked out of the garden to go to the shop and saw the people living next door stood outside on the phone and trying to turn the alarm off. When we got to the corner of our road we saw 2 fire engines rushing to the scene!! We were like wtf?!? Anyway, we casually carried on to get some wine and when we came back they were still there.

Apparently it was a frying pan fire. The guy who lived in the flat fell asleep (He was obviously stoned - being an ex-kaner I know what people look like kaned!) and all he was concerned about was how did they get in cos he was sure he locked his door. He was trying to find out who kicked his door open and seemed more pissed off about that than the fact that his life was saved!! Geez, some people!!!

The Weekend (22nd-24th)

Jesus what a hectic weekend! Was planning to have a chilled one this week but NOOOOO! Social events just kept piling on top of each other and it woulda bee rude not to attend!

First up: Friday. Kim and Paul were down for a couple of days and wanted a catch up with friends and family (and monkeys too - they went to Monkey World!) She rang up a couple of days before to organise a small night out at 60 Million Postcards in Bournemouth. The place used to be Edwards. It still pretty much looks the same - same sorta lay-out - but with new decor and much better music taste. We got there a bit late cos I cooked us a pasta bake and it didn't finish cooking til 7:50 and we were meant to be there at 8:30!! Kim taught me how to make kick-ass pasta bake 3 years ago. Tonight my pasta bake tasted kick-ass!!

After feeding (and drinking a whole bottle of Pinot Grigio between us) we jumped on the next bus into town to meet Kim, Paul, Kirsty and new boyfriend, Glenn. I'd met Glenn briefly at Castlepoint a couple of months back. He's a sound bloke, really nice. Doesn't seem like Kirsty's usual type in that this one's NOT a complete selfish arsehole that will shit on her and drain her of her last penny! She needs someone like this and has said to me loads "Why can't I find someone who's just nice??" I hope they stay together. We got very drunk (no no... VERY DRUNK), caught up on the gossip, had a bit of a dance and took loads of mental pictures like these...

Me and Lisa decided to go home early ... well, I say early but we actually left at around 1am and didn't get back home til around 2ish. We walked home via a garage to grab some nosh to soak up the booze. We went the back roads back past a lot of the blocks of flats that Lisa used to deal with. One of them was a converted hotel and the reception area still looks like a hotel foyer from the 50's...

The rest of the pics are HERE...
Saturday morning I woke up with the worlds worst hangover knowing that I've got to go to my mum's at around 11ish!! Nightmare! I told her that I had a bit of a hangover and to expect me to be a "bit tired" and she was cool about it. Stayed there for a couple of hours doing a few chores here and there and ate some stew. She seemed to be in a relatively good mood despite all her usual aches and pains. At around 2:30ish I set off to get home - I wanted to meet up with Lisa in Boscombe. She stayed at mine hoping to have a couple extra hours kip but had a phonecall from Jen reminding her about the Harley Davidson ralley in Bournemouth (I think it was by the pier) so she had to go that. Initially she went begrudgingly cos she didn't want to let Jen down but by the end she was glad she went. She had a wicked time and it cleared her hangover... for a bit at least. We met up in Lansdowne and went to Costa Coffee for a refresher. Lisa had a Hot Chocolate with marshmallows (yuk!) and I wanted one of those fruity drinks I had before. I went for a Raspberry one. When I got it it turned out to be a raspberry milkshake and NOT the juicy fruit drink I was hoping. I stuck with it for a while but was not feeling the love so Lisa got me the Summer Fruits juice drink I really wanted! Yippee!!!

I know, check out
the bags under our eyes!

We got back to try and have a nap but that didn't really happen - I think we both got about 20 mins sleep before we had to get up and get ready to go out again and get pissed!!!

Tonight we had a birthday party to go to. My former housemate Kate White has turned 30 along with a lot of my friends recently - including me (although, mine was in January!) Plan was to go to Bar Vin for a couple of drinks and then moving onwards to Cagney's for the very last Room 101. Me and Lisa got to Bar Vin before everyone else even thought we were actually 30 mins late from the arranged time. in fact we were there a good 20 - 30 mins before everyone else and the way we were feeling from the night before we were thinking of going home and just hitting the bed. But then everybody arrived and drinks did floweth (I had couple lagers, Southern Comfort & lemonade and JD & coke). Was introduced to some new people including Sarah's new girlfriend, Lisa. She's absolutely lovely and hope it works out for them both (YAY! About time too, Sarah!!)

Cagney's was absolutely crammed full of people. Most of them have really dressed for the occasion. Room 101 has a retro Mod feel to it so there were guys in sharp suits (think Style Council) and girls in 60's mini-dresses. The music was great too. I'd been there before a couple of times in the past and it's been practically dead so it was good to see it packed. Drinks did floweth again (4 lagers, a shot of tequila and a shot of apple schnapps!)

Once again we left at 1ish and shared a taxi with Sarah & Lisa. Got home at 1:30ish to see Mooro and Alex leaving our flat just as we were going in. Had a little chat and said our goodbyes and went upstairs. Kim, Paul, Gary and Simone were still here! Gary and Scott were doing some weird experimental photography involving slow shutter speeds, movement and light... so I got involved in that. We were kinda hoping to go straight to bed once we got home but we soon shrugged off the tiredness once we started chatting again. Here's a few pics of that...

continued...

Richard Hammond in Hospital!

Little Richard!

Oh my god! Last night during the 10 o'clock news a report came over that Richard 'the hamster' Hammond, one of the presenters of Top Gear, was in hospital after a serious crash while recording the show. He was driving a jet powered car at around 300MPH when then thing veered off to one side and rolled leaving him uncouncious with serious head injuries. All three of us (me, Lisa, Scott) were totally shocked!!

First thing I did this morning is check out the BBC News website to see what the latest is - this morning his condition was 'improving' and now (at the time of writing this) his condition is 'stable' Read more about it HERE...

Get well soon, Hammy.

Speaking of cars (and stuff), Lamborghini have unveiled the new Gallardo Nera! Just look at this beauty!

Supergrass

... And cut finger £2.99. We just went to Choices to take back Star Wars Lego ... 3 days late. Had to pay a fine of £1.45. I thought it would've been more but nope! They had the new one there so we HAD to rent it out. While I was doing that Scott was rummaging around the ex-rental DVD's box and spotted a film he likes called The Supergrass. I'd never seen it myself but he had to make the purchase.

...oh and he cut his finger at work on a knife while cutting a roll at lunch!

Second test blog

Walking along the drive this morning with a fresh 2 pints of milk. My breakfast would've been dry without it!!

First test blog from K800i

My computer desk at home! About 9:00 last night!!

NEW PHONE !!!!

My wicked new phone...
The Sony Ericcson K800i

Yay!! I've got a new mobile phone!! Just as I was leaving work yesterday and struggling with my keys, sunglasses, sunglasses case, coat and trying to close the window at the same time - I got a call from Carphone Warehouse informing me that I am now able to upgrade my new phone. I thought it was odd, and was starting to wonder whether it was a prank call, because I went into Carphone Warehouse a couple of weeks ago and they said I couldn't get an upgrade until October 11th. The bloke must've just read the date wrong cos it actually said September 11th!!!

I pretty much quick marched it to Carphone Warehouse in Boscombe and asked if I could upgrade. She asked me if there was a phone I had in mind and without hesitation I said "Oh yesssss, the Sony Ericcson K800i thankyouverymuch!!!" She tapped away at the PC and checked whether I could upgrade to that and she said I could as long as I altered my contract to a 18 month contract (instead of 12) and that I have 200 free minutes talk time and 100 free texts for £25 per month (instead of £20 per month - which was what I was paying for my Motorola Razr v3) It actually was going to be saving me money as I was paying far too much in calls and texts! Try £40+ per month!!!

After skipping home with my lovely new phone and charging it for 2.5 hours (just like it said in the Quickstart Manual) I slung in my SIM card and started to play! I must admit I'm a bit of a Somy Ericcson fanboy. I used to have the T610 and the K700 and loved every minute of owning one. But last year I thought I'd try something new and went for Motorola. I was a fool! I shoulda known!! My first mobile phone I ever had was a Motorola Memphis (Just checked Google and it's actually called the MR201) and, although I was excited about having it cos it was my first phone, WAS A PILE OF SHIT!!!!!

The Motorola MR201
Not an actual picture of my phone...
I ripped this pic from eBay!!

And ever motorola I'd seen afterward (whether it belonged to friends or saw it in a shop) was also shit and never innovated. So what made me decide to go for the Razr V3? The fact that it looked cool! To be fair it's not a bad phone, y'know. I did enjoy having it. But after owning a K700 it felt like a step backwards.

Now I'm back with Sony Ericcson and, to be honest, I'm totally blown away with how cool it is. It's got enough built in memory to hold a couple albums worth of music. It's got a build in radio. It has a 3.1 Mega pixel camera in it - with flash, macro, zoom, and lots of other cool stuff. Only yesterday I posted a blog about how I miss having a decent camera. Now I'm back in action. The photos won't be the same quality of a proper digital camera but it's not far off. I can also do direct posts to this Blog from that phone!! Aceness!!! So expect to see little posts above this one from my phone in the next ten minutes. WORD!

Sunny Monday

Y'know, it's been forecast to be really rubbish weather today! But it ain't! It's actually really hot and sunny. Just like it was over the weekend just gone. Yet again the forecast was for storms and rain etc but instead it's been clear blue skies and blazing sunshine! Brucey bonus. Gives me a chance to top-up my alreadying fading summertime suntan.

Granted, I'm stuck in the office right now but on Sunday I was at a car-boot sale in Swindon taking in all the suns harmful rays while nursing a hangover by eating a lovely greasy bacon and egg roll! Nothin' was bought at the car-boot sale, although I almost bought a polaroid camera. I just stopped myself from getting it cos I remembered I've got one kicking around somewhere at my mums. I love the look of polaroid photos. They give a different feel to fond memories somehow. The problem with Polaroid photos is that the film is stooooopidly expensive.

Y'see? I'm even thinking about my Polaroid again because of my lack of digital camera!! AAAAARGH this is driving me NUTS!!!!

Feel like shit today!!!

Last night I didn't get to sleep til about 4:30 - 5am this morning!! I had the worlds worst indigestion and heartburn known to man! It must've been something to do with what I ate at 11:30! Basically for dinner at about 7:00 I cooked us a massive baton-roll filled with sausages and relish with a side order of chips. The roll was so big I only ate half of it and finished off the chips and thought I'd leave the rest til later. I'm not sure what time I ate the second half of the roll but I think it was around 11:30. We were watching 9/11 Farenheit on More4 and I really didn't know what time it was. Also some of the imagery was pretty fuckin gross and freaked me out a bit!! That was playing on my mind while I was trying to sleep.

This morning when my alarm was going off I hit Snooze 4 times and then switched it off but didn't get up til 8:58!! I was gonna ring in sick but though "Fuck it, man. I'm only tired!" and stumbled into work at 9:20. And like the subject says - I feel like absolute shit today!

Still, We've got a band practice later so hopefully that will cheer me up - I just hope I'm not snappy!!

Lee Ditcher's Solo Gig

Me, Lisa and Scott went to The Portman pub last night to give some support to Lee Ditcher (of Lounge). It was his first solo gig in 2 years and he was playing all new material - none of the lounge stuff. We completely forgot all about it until I suddenly remembered and told the guys. We'd all had are heart set on staying in and chilling out but we did promise Lee that we'd be there for him, and I really wanted to check it out.

We left the flat at about 9ish. When we got there Connie told us that quite a few people had pulled out. But that was a bonus for the other acts cos it means they get more stage time. The Green Room was completely packed so we sat out in the bar for a bit until Lee came on. Connie told everyone on the mic that "...members of Blind Voyeurs are in the bar drinking sherrys!" Arf!

Lee played quite late (2nd from headlining I think) and did really well. I couldn't tell whether he was nervous or buzzing with adrenaline (or both) but hew pulled out a great performance... despite Scott and I heckling to "Do your chores!" and "Play it from the heart!" He saw the funny side of it. He played 5 songs, each of which were good songs ranging from pretty up-tempo to slow numbers. One of the slow ones had a 3/3 time signature that threw Scott for a while but once I counted it out he got it.

After saying our goodbye's to Lee and commending his work we set off for home. It wasn't until we got outside that we realised how tipsy we were!! Finally got home and chilled out with some sounds from Scott's iPod before hitting the sack at about 11:30ish.

Wales

Goddamm it I wish my camera worked properly. Need to buy a new one!

Went to Wales with Lisa a while back for a bit of a holiday. We stayed at lisa's parents for first two nights, went camping for another 2 nights and stayed at lisa's parents for next two nights!

Came home!

That's it!

Like I said, I wish my camera worked cos I can't even begin to explain what we did. I could of told you about when we ate fish & chips in the official worlds best fish & chips restaurant! (My God it was amazing!) Or about the time our tent almost got blown off of a cliff face in the middle of the night with us in it during a massive storm! Then there's the day I went for a walk along some amazingly picturesque rapids and waterfalls. Or I could tell you all about when we visited the worlds smallest city (it's basically a village that just happens to have a cathedral - therefore it's officially a city)! I could've shown you my fear when I was taken for a walk along a clifftop trek that was 200 feet above violent waves and rocks with the path literally 6 inches away from a sheer drop in gale force winds!!! Or I could've shown you the milky way that I saw for the first time because there was no light polution from nearby streetlights - beautiful!

But alas, I have no photographic evidence. Well, ok I've got some pictures on my phone but for some unknown reason the Motorola Photo Tools software that comes with the phone has decided to stop working and therefore cannot retrieve all the pictures! Gah!

Instead I'll show you a picture of my make of phone and you can imagine it's my phone and that you can see all the lovely pictures I took in low quality, badly compressed VGA jpegs. *sigh!*

V Festival 2006

On the 18th and 19th August we went to the V Festival in Weston Park, Staffordshire. Kim and Paul came down from Leeds and Gary and Simone went up to stay with them a couple of night before hand and then went to the festival with them. I went up there with Lisa, Lottie and Scott in Lisa's car. Lisa's got a Peugeot 205 and it woulda been a squeeze with just me and Lisa with all our stuff but we also had Scott and Lottie in the back with all there stuff too!!!! They had a ton of stuff in the middle of the seat between them and a ton of stuff on their laps. Sleeping bags, dufel bags, carrier bags, they had food, they had alcahol, they had little fold-away stools, jackets and jumpers incase it got cold on the way.... you name it, they were buried in it. You literally couldn't see them for stuff!

On the way up about 2.5 hours into the journey we stopped off at a Little Chef near Reading. While we were here we texted to check up on the others, y'know to find out if they were there yet, to see if they're saved us a space and to let them know where we were. On the returning text we were told that they were already there, had saved up a space and that it was a mudbath. Great!!! A mudbath! Now I went to Glastonbury during one of they're roughest years (I think it was in '97 - I never can remember, that's how wasted I got!) so I was quite prepared for it and knew what to expect. Lisa, on the other hand, had not been to a festival before. She'd gone to the Isle Of Wight festival but she didn't sleep over in a text. She just had a day ticket. So I was kinda worried more for her than anything.

After waiting for nearly an hour for really shit food at a stupidly high price we set off back on the road. We decided not to take the M6 around Birmingham, instead we took to a couple of A-Roads around the other way through Kidderminster. It was actually better going this way cos we had better senery and more interesting surroundings to drive through (such as deep red rock cliffs, castles and general countryside) - it's a lot better than being on a monotonous 3 lane road going in a straight line. Anyway we got arrived to the queue for the festival and was let in and parked pretty quickly - I'd say within 15 minutes! The weather was ok when we got there - no rain just clouds and just a little mud. We found out that they were just winding us up about it being a mudbath! Gits! From here I'm gonna let the pics do the talking....

Paul on the phone to me telling me it's a mud-bath!


The V2006 gang!
(l-r:Paul, Simone, Kim, Lottie, Scotty, Gary, Lisa, Me!)


Inflating the 9 foot whale


Inflated!!!


Lisa loving Kula Shaker


Kripsin from Kula Shaker


Lisa having a pee with our protection!!


We Are Scientists


Radiohead's Thom Yorke

For more pics check out the Flickr Photoset

Yamaha SU10

On Tuesday night I was just surfing eBay, y'know, as you do, and was just looking to see how much cheap Casio keyboards are when I stumbled upon this tiny little kids electronic keyboard that I saw the previous day in the Poundland! The thing obviously normally sells for £1 in Poundland but some tight bastard was selling one on eBay and bids had alreeady pushed it up to £2.30 with a Postage & Packaging price of £3.99!! Bleedin crafty beggar!! Anyway, then I started thinking about getting an SK-5 cos of the cool old skool 8-bit sampling capabilities and then Scott started talking about thursdays practice. Blind Voyeurs are planning to have an all-day practice and try and get some stuff recorded and stuff. Then Scott remembered that he has a sampler in his room gathering dust. It was one that Dan Gale gave to him before he moved to Brazil! They used it a couple of times in The Hat. Anyway, we had a little muck about with it and had a quick once through of the instruction manual and before we knew it we were sampling things left, right and indeed centre!

Great!! This will come in handy. Blind Voyeurs now have a new toy!

Saturday Curry

I love curry! Curry is goooooood!! So when Scott texted me asking if Me and Lisa wanted a curry we jumped at the chance. The origianl idea was planted by James and Emma and they asked Scott if all three of us would like to go. The idea was a winner from the start and before long we were all sat around a table at the Original Balti House, drinking beer, eating popodums and mango chutney and onions (yummy - I could eat that all night!) and trying to keep our manners in check and our anecdotes on the right side of decency. That manners and decency bit lasted about five minutes and before long both me and Scott were making the rest of us laugh with rudeness while simultaneously getting disgusted looks from the rest of the restaurant. Ahh it's Boscombe, for christsakes - what can they expect!! Anyway, the curry kicked ass - I had a chicken bhuna with pilau rice washed down with a couple of Kronenbourgs.

After the meal and getting ourselves fat to the point of exploding we all headed back my mine (and Scotts) for a couple more drinks and chats and stuff. During this time I noticed some blue flashing lights outside - my nosier side decided to go take a look-see. The lights were from an ambulance arriving to the scene of a car crash right outside our window outside The Bell pub in Pokesdown. Emma said she thoguht she heard something 'about 5 minutes ago'. They sat in the window and watched for the next couple of hours. And I thoguht I was nosey! It looked like two boy-racers were trying to race eachother pulling away at the traffic lights and then BAM!! One fucked axel, airbags expelled and girlfriend with whiplash!

Meanwhile, while the girls were tending to their voyeuristic side, the boys decided to get out some musical instruments and started playing some music. We were gonna have another go at making another album like the Knights of the 31st album... but just do a 3 track EP. We started to jam out an idea and then James suggested he wanted to make a fully over produced cheesy pop-song. It was a good idea but it sorta took the spontaneity out of it. Nothing worth keeping was recorded!

Back up in the window the girls watched the ambulances and the police drive off. Shortly after the father of one of the guys in the accident arrived and arranged a tow-truck to take one of the cars away. The other was left there unlocked! And then some people from The Bell started nicking stuff out of the car - like a road map and the stereo etc. Lisa, being a law abiding citizen and all that, called the police and reported it. Just as she was doing that they put the stuff back in the cars and went back in the pub. The police still investigated it and Lisa and Emma had to go talk to the police.

I was a bit worried that me and Scott would end up with a brick through our window but I think that was just a bit of paranoia kicking in. Everything was cool..... and yet total random madness!!

Betika Album Launch

The night of Friday 28th July, 2006 was, to the majority of the local music scene, a long awaited night. For that night was the party to celebrate Betika FINALLY releasing their new album 'Half Love'. The party was held at Centrestage, Westbourne. It's mainly a comedy club but occassionally they have bands play too. It was a truly great night out. If you were invited but couldn't make it for some reason then you shouldn't hesitate and go see a shrink! If you're involved in the Bournemouth music scene then this was the single most important event of 2006!

Lisa, Scott and I arrived at about 9:00, and bumped into Jenko (the drummer) on the way in. We had a quick chat about the evenings events and then went inside where we were greeted by Carolyn at the front desk with a kiss, a badge and some cakes! Mooro was also beside the cd player and mixer as he was DJing between and after the acts. The venue was already 80% packed and Toupe were in full swing. We completely missed the first act, the Old Psychiatrist Club (not sure if I spelt that right!). I'd never seen them before but we hear they're worth checking out!

I'd also never seen Toupe before but I thought they were really cool. The band is a 3-piece set-up consisting of 2 bass players and a drummer... and NO GUITARS!! Yep, you read that right - no guitars! One of the bass players was playing through a distortion pedal, thus mimicking an electric guitar but with a more beefier tone. It actually worked really well. They had a definite urban feel to them ... a kind of Rage Against The Machine funk but with smooth-guy drawled lyrics. Check them out.

During Toupe's set more people turned up and the temperture was started to rise! It was already a really hot mid-summers night outside and inside it was getting hotter. The ice in your drinks lasted all of 6 minutes tops!

At the back of the club (the opposite side to the stage) in front of the mixing desk/box was a table stacked out with copies of Betika's lovely new Album, each sheathed in all it's shrink-wrapped glory waiting to be snapped up for a tenner. The quality of the packaging, artwork and music ensure that it's a tenner well spent.... and the fact that I got a mention in the 'Thanks to...' section!! Brucie bonus! Lexi was on hand to smile sweetly and collect the cash. I already had an advanced copy given to me by Simone a couple of days previous so I had to hand my money to Lexi with an explanation as to why it looked like I was giving her cash for nothing!!

Lee from Lounge surprisingly arrived without Glen or Mark. Glen was looking after the baby and Mark was with Claire on some family thing. Lee made me laugh cos when he arrived to the front door her saw a sign saying 'By Invitation Only!!' and he was like 'Shit, I dunno if I should go in or not'. He gingerly walked through the front door to be greeted by Connie with the guest list saying 'Aha, Lounge! In you go!' Tick!

After a small interlude of music from DJ Mooro and shuffling of equipment on the stage it was time for Betika to entertain the masses. Before they went on stage they had their team-building group hug, which is now recognised as the norm to regular Betika gig-goers. After the hug instead of donning the stage they unexpectedly ducked the opposite direction to dive into a tent and walk to the stage in a tent! Hmmmm.

Introductions were not needed tonight as we all knew who was about to play. At the start Dave implored people to gather closer to the stage to avoid the 'Bournemouth Gig Gap' and to be as quiet as possible for the start of the first song ('You Can Call Me Brother') starts with nothing but a few whispery vocals from Carolyn. As soon as the song kicked in to the first verse we could all make as much noise as we liked and the dancing began.

While Betika were on stage Carolyn asked Simone and Lisa to man the entrance and make sure only guests were allowed in. This is where I spent most of the rest of the evening, not that it was a problem.... there was lots of room to dance and it was right next to the bar!!

Also by the front door was Alex and Mooro. Much randomness occured such as doodling drawings over the edges of the guest list....

... mocking eachother, pinching, flirting etc... just general mucking about and having a laugh.... as this clip will show...



...and stuffing a cake into Conrad's face...

Betika's set continued to create smiley faces all round. The set-list consisted of playing the album's songs in their entirety and in the order that they are on the album... although the played 'I Killed a Fly'! Rumour has it that they wanted to put this song on the album but decided not to at the last minute... and now they want it back on there again. So the next batch of Half Love COULD have 'I Killed a Fly' on it, thus making the ones that were purchased on the night limited editions!! One of the things that makes Betika's gigs so special is that audience participation is thoroughly encouraged and as per usual the audience was participating. Betika even went so far as to supply make-shift percussion instruments for the audience consisting of empty plastic bottles with brown rice in them. These proved popular and ran short in supply quickly. But that's ok, the one's who missed out grabbed anything within reach to shake or bang together so as not to be left out. At the end of 'Girlshaped' during Jenko's Samba-style drum solo was the bit where the now 100-strong percussion section came into their own. Led by Dave going mental at the front of the stage with a spare snaredrum.... cue clip...



They finished their set with 'The Best Thing Ever' and then left the stage to cheers and chants for more.... it was all a big wind-up cos an encore was always gonna be on the cards... they were just working the audience. That's entertainment. For their encore they sang a cover of Happy Monday's 'Step On' with a small section of Neneh Cherry's 'Buffalo Stance' for the middle eight section! Genius.

The evening was wrapped up with another quick DJ set from Mooro while everyone packed up and drank up. By this time the heat in Centerstage was at fever pitch so everyone started to spill outside and into the road and car-park opposite. All in all it was a good night.

Freak Lightning Storm on Wednesday

On Wednesday night me and Lisa were chilling out with a meal and watched Sideways. I hadn't seen it before but I've heard lots of critical acclaim for it and was intrigued by it upon it's first theatrical release. I saw it in ASDA for £3.50 so thought I'd snap it up. All I gotta say is it's a great film and it HAS to be watched. A work of genius!

Anyway, it finished at 9 o'clock just in time for Big Brother ... but it turned out it wasn't starting til 10:00!! So I suggested we go for a walk cos it was still warm out and it looked like there was gonna be a nice sunset. As we were walking through Fisherman's Walk towards the clifftop we thought we saw a few flashes of lightning. We thought it couldn't be lightning and just put it down to holiday makers and foreign students taking pics. By the time we got to the clifftop we suddenly realised that it was, in fact, a lightning storm miles out at sea. The weird thing was the fact that there was no sound. There was no thunder or rumbling sounds, just the freakish light show. It was totally mesmerising and eerily still. We watched it come in from the sea (somewhere over France) and went north west towards Southampton, then it started flashing behind us. Before we knew it we were surrounded by the lightning and it started to rain. The time was coming up to 9:50 so we ran back to the flat (collecting Lisa's car on the way - she'd parked it miles away from her flat cos of holiday makers nicking her parking space!).

The next day there were news reports of buildings that were stuck by the lightning - one of which was just down the road from us in Boscombe!!! Click HERE for BBC News report and HERE for the map of where it was. It was literally just round the corner from my house!!!

EMAP Awards

Last Thursday was the usual annual work event - the EMAP Awards! This is a regular outing for employees of EMAP where we all bundle into a coach and get driven up to london to the Grosvenor House Hotel in Park Lane for free food and booze... oh yeah, and there's an awards ceremony to celebrate all the hard work people have done over the year. Each year we have a celebrity to present the awards. Hosts have included Phill Jupitus, Jonathan Ross and Claire Sweeney(!) This year we had Dr Neil Fox.

The coach journey is always a bore. Some people take alcohol with them to reduce boredom, some people take little travel games with them, other people try to sleep through it. The group of people I was with played a name game where one person has to think of a person (celeb, character, politician, whatever) and the others have to guess who they are by asking Yes/NO questions. ie. Are you Male? Are you in a band? etc. That killed time for most of the journey.

When we arrived we had a champagne reception. As it was free I kept going back for more until we were all ushered to our tables. I think I had 4 glasses of champagne! When we got to our tables there was a little shuffle around as to who was gonna sit where and it turns out that the MD and the Head of Research had a whole table to themselves so they came and joined out table. Bummer! I poured myself a white wine as the last glass of champagne was almost finished and then the food arrived. It was actually quite nice this year compared to last year.

Things tended to get REALLY hazy at this point cos I was starting to feel the effects of excessive drinking. Er.... I think I ended up going on stage with a colleague for an award that wasn't for us and got a free bottle of champane and shook Dr Fox's hand (very surreal moment). Hmmm but I do remember getting so drunk to the point where I thought I was gonna puke! I had to find a quiet corner somewhere and sit on the floor with my head between my knees for the last 30 mins!!

Anyway, on with the pics....

...incidently, that last pic was taken while I'd disappeared to try and sober myself up! You could probably tell because of the 'arty' angle!

At midnight, the coach arrived to take us all back to sunny Bournemouth. The weird thing was, as soon as I got on the coach and started chatting I sobered up! I think at one point we were all chanting 'England til I die' for no real reason. I can't remember much else!! Except when we got back I went back to Richard and Emma's house with a bunch of people to play Singstar til about 4:30 in the morning!! More pics..

...as per usual, there are more pics available to view on my Flickr account HERE!