I have just had a cracking couple of days in Cardiff on my brother’s stag weekend along with 24 other like-minded fellows. It has to have been the most organized event of it’s type I’ve ever been on – we had a multi-page PDF before we went complete with full venue addresses (hotel, club, karting etc) and were all given business card-size laminated mini-itineraries when we got there. The best man, Chris, even came up with the idea of a ’stag phone’ – he had a pay-as-you-go phone in his possession with the phone number on the back of all of our obligatory comedy tops, the idea being that fellow drinkers could text the number with our nickname and get us to have a shot.
I’m still a little worse-for-wear some 48 hours after the event. Good times, but I’m glad we don’t do it too often!
A selection of photos can be found on the web courtesy of a fellow attendee. Stag phone results as compiled by Chris are also available. Next stop, the wedding.
We recently had the pleasure of Marc, Rachel and Jonah staying with us for a week on a trip over from NYC. They’re even lovelier than we remembered, and it was great to meet Jonah.
I just had to get this post in before January was over!
I turned 30 on New Year’s Eve and to mark the occasion we had hired The Old Neptune, a wonderful 15th century house in the centre of Ipswich. My wife had arranged everything (wonderful as she is); in order to secure the house over the New Year period we had to get a committed bunch of friends together and book it up in early 2005, which we managed to do. Although at first glance it seemed quite expensive, when divided up between 24 people and paid for in stages it didn’t seem that much.
The place looked amazing on the website and the rooms looked gorgeous. In order to make sure that everyone got a fair chance of bagging one of the bigger/ older rooms, a couple of weeks before we went we put everyone’s name into a bag and made a video of a ‘live’ draw which we then posted on YouTube for all to see.
In reality the place was even better than it had looked on the website. To be able to enjoy the gorgeous front room and fire, lovely big kitchen and the wonderful dining room with so many good friends was just great.
A few of us had organised a quiz for the first night and we had karaoke and dancing on the second (which degenerated into a bizarrehatfest) – it was only by the third evening that I went to bed even vaguely sober!
For my 30th my wife made me a wonderful book with photos from my very early years all the way up to present day – a really great gift.
In the daytime we headed off to some of the lovely surrounding villages for some winter walks and pub lunches – Felixstowe was lovely (cheese and pineapple toasties, anyone?), we had a bite to eat at the King’s Head in Woodbridge and an enjoyable wander around the pretty village of Aldeburgh.
Thanks to everyone for making my 30th such a fun and special one. More photos in the Flickr group.
A few weeks ago my wife and I went along to the wonderful NFT to see Antenna 18, the latest in a long line of evenings where they present a number of music videos and have some of the directors and producers there to be interviewed and answer quesitions from the audience.
We had a great time – two videos that I would recommend viewing are New Me by Jamie Lidell and Geisterschloss by Oliver Laric – both fantastic. In fact, Oliver Laric can be seen in the first video as well – he’s the guy bopping along dressed in white – as it was directed by his girlfriend, Aleksandra Domanovic. Finally, if you haven’t seen the Plan B video to No Good, you should definitely take a look – it’s like Sledgehammer revisited!
It was fab to do something different – London offers so many great cultural events and we don’t go to enough of them. We may well be back!
Just a reminder about the 25-mile summer cycle ride on Saturday 24 June around West London for Cystic Fibrosis. The website – www.cycle25.org – is now live with lots more information on my cousin as well as a route map and a registration form. If you’re not doing anything that Saturday why not join in?
Well, it all started with a suggestion from Mat that we meet for a beer after work at The Boat in Berkhamsted. Now that he and Steph are living so close to us we thought that we should be taking more advantage of it by getting out there and socialising. However, Friday night at the pub is always dangerous as everyone is tired and the beers don’t take quite as long as usual to take effect. We had a good time, but…well, I remember taking a video of Mat but I don’t remember it being quite this bizarre. The dangers of alcohol for all to see.
Speaking of cousins, one of my relatives has organised a sponsored cycle ride around West London on Saturday 24 June 2006 to raise money for Cystic Fibrosis. My cousin Chloe suffers from the disease and has to undergo a lot of physiotherapy, drugs and spells in hospital – by raising money for the Cystic Fibrosis Trust we hope to help her and others.
If you’re not doing anything on the 24 June why not join us for a ride? If you’re not a rider you can still donate using the justgiving.com page. Every penny helps!
Had a great night out on the town last night with Mat, Trevor, Stuart and Iain, visiting a few local pubs that we hadn’t been to before. We started off with a couple of beers at my place before wandering down to the High Street and into the Rose & Crown, a small and friendly ‘locals’ pub. Everyone was busy watching the football so we amused ourselves with a few games of ‘killer’ on the pool table – for money – where Stuart and Mat cleaned up and were very happy to take their winnings. After a couple of pints it was time to go – Tevor decided to take a last-minute trip to the loo and we took the opportunity to leg it and hide from him. Very amusing. We then progressed on to The Lamb which was a bit more lively – they had some good beer on tap and a comfy place for us to sit and talk rubbish for a bit. Once again Trevor thought it would be great to take a trip to loo land when we were about to move on and once again we did a runner. I don’t think I could get tired of that.
Next on the agenda was a pit-stop at the Curry Garden – a place that I seem to be visiting all the time these days – for a lovely meal and a couple of Cobras. Unfortunately we didn’t get the opportunity to leave Trevor this time.
On the way to Mat’s place, where we planned to continue our evening, we wandered past The Bull. Mat was paying more attention than the rest of us and shouted “It’s karaoke!” which is a temptation that I just couldn’t miss. We had a fantastic time, singing, dancing and laughing with the regulars and Stuart and Trevor entertained us all with a muderous rendition of You’re Beautiful at which point the organisers donned their ear protectors. Magic. Unfortunately it felt as though it was all over too soon but we consoled ourselves by heading back to Mat’s for some late-night Mighty Boosh (“I’m Old Greg”) and Halo 2.
Iain and I finally made it back to my place at a quarter to five so consequently I’m feeling pretty knackered today. Great night out though – thanks guys!
Posted by adoran2 
Posted by adoran2 
Posted by adoran2 
Just a reminder about the 25-mile summer cycle ride on Saturday 24 June around West London for Cystic Fibrosis. The website – 
Speaking of cousins, one of my relatives has organised a 
