A mighty wind

Am I just having tsunami fear, or was the wind and rain last night particularly fierce? Kept me awake with thoughts of the roof of the house coming off, this place in Stokey never feels particularly secure...

Lazy day today, heading into town later to eat at Mildreds and drink at the Intrepid Fox avec chums...

2005 :: Comment / reply

Old Street Art Pranks

Saw a wacky situationist prank at Old Street this morning, a breakfast table set up on top of a bus shelter, with bowls, cups, plates, milk jugs, the lot. Snapped a pic but can't get it off my phone until I get home. It's got a mention in London By London this morning too.



COOL weekend, a bit rock actually... Friday night a cheeky one in the Wetherspoons on Farringdon Road, then on to The Trolley Stop in Dalston to meet up with old FortuneCity chums. Wow going internal link crazy today. Anyway the pub was deserted, we were the only people there, though it looks like an alright place, Irish jukebox and pool table. Had some food next door, then late drinking at Dalston Jazz Bar, very crowded, tiny little student party type place.

Saturday we planned our shopping and more or less completed it, most of it without actually leaving the house... we watched more of the documentaries on Return of the King then headed into town to meet up with the best man and his wife, which turned into such an ace evening. Wasn't really planning a big one, just thought a few quiet drinks and a bit to eat, but it developed a life of it's own. Started in the Hogshead near Leicester Square (at last one that BITE have), then fairly disappointing food in Soho Spice then on to ROCK at the Intrepid Fox. Not been there for such a long time, but it's inspired us to head to an old hangout of ours - The Air Balloon in Portsmouth - next weekend. We should have called it a night there, the country mice ran back to the station and JUST made their train back to Fareham. But we didn't stop there, we tubed it back to Finsbury Park and stayed in the 12 Pins drinking cider until our money ran out and howling along to some Irish duo. Then we went home and howled along to Once More With Feeling, so we slept most of Sunday... Shopped a bit, baked a pie, and that's about it.

And I can't be the last to mention this, predictive google, how on earth does it work? I'm guessing on each key press some JS runs and checks if it needs to import some more JS that has the latest stats on... amazing, but similar to it's address book stuff in gmail.google.com.

Wow, even Paul Stanley has something to say (on www.kissonline.com) about the death of Dimebag Darrel

I'm stunned. The taking of Dimebag Darrell's life in this horrific murder is a senseless tragedy for his fans and an unfathomable loss for his family. I send my deepest condolences to Vinnie and the rest of his family. My thoughts are also with the families of all the other victims of this heinous act." -- Paul Stanley

2004 :: Comment / reply

Particularly fulsome weekend, with curries.

Splendid weekend, a bit different this time, starting off with a half day on Friday. I headed to Winchester to meet up with some friends, and really needed the extra time to make the most of the night. Clare stayed home watching Children in Need after a particularly hard week at work organising The HHA's AGM, luckily it went AOK, AFAIK. Fairly easy train rides there, I didn't bother loitering anywhere in London, as there was a train ready to take me to Winchester as soon as I got to Waterloo, so I was there before anyone else was out of work. Had a walk around, it's a very nice city. I scoped out where we'd be going later, and then ended up in a great pub The Westgate Hotel, that I'd like to return to soon, maybe for a curry, as they have a connected Indian restaurant, unusual. Not sure it's the type of place my friends there would like though, they are after swanking London style bars which apparently there are not many of in Winchester, which surprised me. We went out to the newly opened Pitcher and Piano, which was nice, but as with any new bar a bit too busy so maybe service was a bit slower than it could have been. Then, on to my first curry of the weekend.

I can't remember what last time's curry at Winchester's Gurkha Chef was like, but I do know the name and that we went there, as I looked up the old blog post and emails and things and knew that we were going to a different place this time. So, Gurkha Kitchen it was then. I like Winchester Curry Club, some guys who review, uh, can you guess? They seem to say that Gurkha Kitchen is the best place in town, but I didn't think it was that great. My food was OK, nice and spicy anyway, but I wasn't sure about the carrot chutney we got with our popadoms, and the place generally seemed a bit faded. Still, the company more than compensated, nice to see so many friends at once, even though being on the end of the table rather than the middle, I didn't get to join in all the conversations. Took a few pictures in there, they didn't really turn out so well though, still getting used to this new camera. After the curry we had time for a cheeky night cap in a pub possibly called The Royal Oak, and then back to Rich and Miriams, as they were generously hosting me for the evening. Next morning I had a replacement bus service part of the way, so it took me a good couple of hours to get back to London, where I was meeting Clare for a days fun.

After a coffee, so we could sit down and plan out the days hilarity, time for lunch. For a very rare treet, we went to Wagamama, the one in Soho though, so really it was a completely different Saturday lunch for us, and not exactly the same as we always have. We met Emma, and shared a free bottle of wine, which was the promo of the day from www.wagamama.com, very nice. In the afternoon we sort of shopped, we were on a bit of a mission for something specific that we completely failed in, so we did some general ambling about, and went in some pubs. Oh we did manage to buy a case for our new camera, but that was about it I think.

Best pub of the afternoon was The Pontefract Castle, very nice there, and quite calm and relaxed (in the downstairs bar anyway) considering how close we were to Oxford Street
I hardly ever go for a curry these days, but next day we had another, in possibly the best curry house in London, if not the world, The Punjab. I had vegetable kofte and "Grandad's Special Dahl" which I always have I think, delicious, I should have ordered more rice and maybe a bread too.

Last stop of the night was The Intrepid Fox, at it's new (well new to me anyway) location under Center Point. Heavy Metal all the way, we weren't really dressed for it but we had a great time.

Long journey home on the vomit comet, I slept all the way though which passed the journey marvellously. We did try and get another drink for the journey, but by quarter past eleven none of the shops near the station were selling alcohol, I'm sure it never used to be this strict. We didn't really want it anyway, and not having that extra one means we feel fine and dandy today. Cold, man it's freezing here, but good.

Chili for dinner, and a film of some sort, maybe a costume drama or something. We have no crime to watch, Amazon have been rather letting us down recently in terms of how quickly they turn around our DVD rentals. That's how they can afford to do unlimited DVD rentals for 9.50 per month, you only get one at home at a time for that price.

Back to work tomorrow. We fitted a lot in, which made the weekend go even quicker. I feel sure I've missed out some stuff, but I've been on the computer too long today. I must emphasise again how nice it was to see friends that I don't see very often this weekend, and I am looking forward to the next social. Shame it's such a long way for me to travel, but easier than trying to get them all down here in Folkestone I suppose.

2007 :: Comment / reply