Just for you Jakie...

I'm back. Firewall problems abound. I'm not even going to give you a run down of what's been happening since April, suffice to say that I've been having fun and that life is good. I'm not even sure whether this will post through the firewall, but it's illegal here, apparently... BREAKIN' THE LAW!.. BREAKIN' THE LAW! So anyhow, for the last couple of weeks I've been using May's Mum's car as she's nicely lent it to us so we could drive it to Norfolk for May's recent birthday. (Her actual birthday evening was spent at the new Conran restaurant, Boundary in Shoreditch. May had fish, I had entrails. The wine was good.).. Norfolk was fun fun fun. The weather hung out for us to all go swimming, surfing, bike riding, blue grassing, seal watching and sailing.. Oh, and drinking. Trying to beat the clock for a last drink at the local before tidy-up time, we arrived with seconds to spare but gave up and tucked into warm wine we'd brought with us. That Thursday night was spent dancing, Zoe and Ian were like the he and she in Grease with May and I combing our hair behind them. I suppose a Sharks and Jets analogy might work here. The following day we woke and sped off top speed on various bikes. Within minutes we were lost and minutes after that May had a blowout and we had to leave poor ol' Hercules in a hedge and ride backy with the Carribean Dream (Honestly, what a name for a bike!)... We made it finally to the pub in Cley. We couldn't find the cider garden so we sat in the beer garden. Four pints of Aspalls later and we were driving (driving!?) to Wells where in the fog we found our way to the sea and to somebodys propped up surfboard. We had a good 20 minutes before the guy came back and demanded we get off it. One quick vinegar-swiping stop off at Cookies and we were soon shovelling shellfish into our hungry mouths. That evening was hilarious. Bearing in mind we had been drinking mostly all day, we managed to make it over to the village hall to see the local Bluegrass band. It didn't take us long before we were dosie-doe-ing with the locals. I've never sweated so much from swinging sixty year olds around! On our walk home, we get the phonecall from the gays who had driven from Newcastle to get there. They turn up refusing help with the heavy luggage in the back of the car, so we get in and open more wine. 20 minutes later there's a knock on the door and a surprise arrival from Helen who was hiding under the luggage all along! Cheeky Helen. As we'd assumed she couldn't make it and she had, we cracked open more wine to celebrate. Urgh. My head the following morning hurt. Luckily so did everyone elses. Plus it was raining so we didn't make it out until afternoon which was fine. We headed back to Wells beach after the rain had stopped to hang out on the sand dunes. Safe... Soon afterwards though we found ourselves going back to the same beer garden for some more cider. We weren't quite so wild though and only offended a few of the locals this time. That evening we decided to have a barbeque instead of eat more seafood. It was all nice and mellow and we chatted politely whilst waiting and waiting for the food to cook. After a cheeky burger we made it to the local, all the while being teased with tunes from Grease floating in from a neighbouring house. We'd presumed it was a wedding and tryed our luck. It turned out it was the poshest wedding in the world and of course they welcomed a bunch of scruffy pissed kids. Did they fuck. I barely even managed to smell the smoke of the top-hatted guy's cigar before being ushed out by the mother(fucker) of the bride. On the way back through the beer garden we befrended some posh kids and brought them back to the balcony for beers. After we'd run out we made local lad go back to his granny's house and pinch all the wine. It was late when we finally got to bed.. And I hurt the following day again. Three days of boozing hurts. I'm no spring chicken. That Sunday we managed to lever ourselves out and down to the harbour so we could board the boat to take up out to see the silly seals. So cool... So worth it. After a pork roast afterwards we were in the cars heading home. A good good weekend and a bad bad head because of it! Right Jake, I'll be more together now. Expect regular updates of my whereabouts every hour on the hour. I hope this thing fucking works through the Firewall now. I've been typing for fucking ages!

AV Suite

At last!... Over a year of pushing has finally paid off with the delivery of the Audio-Visual suite. What started off as a written proposal I'd included in the Pentland Dragon's Den last March materialized on Paddy's wagon. Look at him smiling there with £35,000 worth of kit. Look at his little face... I was tempted to rip the boxes open there and then, but I'm going to have to wait.

Lucky boy

As Simon's girlfriend Marisa started having mini contractions on Tuesday, I decided to create a sweepstake, each betting a pound on when the baby would be born... Ed picked correct and won the grand prize of £18. Not bad being as he's only been working here for three days!

I hope Simon and Marisa call their little boy Elvis. Elvis was one of two names Simon bandied about. The other one was Nelson after Horatio.

Sunday at Birdcage

I like it when people come over to visit, it gives us a chance to tidy up. After the mammoth movie marathon, the place was a like a smackden. It's actually very therapeutic to clean and pretty lovely to have the flat back to it's stunning self. We'd just put away the rubber gloves when Jake and Jodie popped over to visit. It's good to see them, they only live down the road so they drove over after some confusion with the clocks going forward.

After a quick shuftie around, we headed over to the Birdcage for some afternoon pints and a well deserved pub roast. Looking out the window we could see what Jodie described as 'public theatre'... Some driver tried overtaking a bus without looking and pranged his BMW bumper. He wasn't going too quick and neither was the bus. We didn't think much of it there things happen all the time. An hour later there were about 30 firemen cutting the roof off the car and dragging him out. I'm not too sure the guy expected that level of treatment when he greedily lied to the police for the insurance scam.

Jake and Jodie stayed for a while but left May and I to leisurely walk back in the sunshine. Lovely.

Farewells and Film Marathons

Friday after work was a corker. The little milkmaid, Chloe finally picked up her milk buckets and said goodbye to Pentland.  A good turn out at the Dignity saw her off in as much style as the Dignity could muster. Obviously the shady Finchley regulars were shrugged off before we headed off to Camden. Before hitting Proud, May and I had a cheeky drink at The Mixer. There really are some fucking odd characters in that boozer. I've never really been sure that I even like the pub. This time around there was a deaf midget goth with shocking pink hair SHOUTING at some thick shit kid about what school she went to. We drank up and left after one pint. Proud was fun though, we caught up with everyone else and before we knew it we were slammin' and shootin' with the kids. TAXI!

The following day May and I were feeling rather hungover. It was a good night, but it wasn't worth feeling THAT bad. Urgh. We decided though to treat ourselves to an entirely self-indulgent day. It was brilliant actually, we broke out the sofabed and watched film after film after film after film... and ordered pizzas. May and I are into our bleak films and today was no exception. We moved from Bully to Happiness through The Constant Gardener to the much-needed fluff of The Commitments. Okay, lazy!

Dressed up for dinner

There was nothing in the fridge so May and myself decided to get REALLY dressed up and go out to the Three Crowns for a bite to eat. I wore a suit and May looked rather impressive in her LBD. I tell you what, people take you more seriously when you dress right up. I should have used my lofty social status to tell the waitress to back down and shut the fuck up. I hate over-familiar waitresses and she was THE WORST. If you're spending money, you expect a little bit of polite chatter, not some joker trying to make you laugh. However, the food was delicious. I had the steak and May had the Fillet-O-Fish... Naturellement.

Na'er cast a clout

Na'er cast a clout 'til May is out they say... What a load of crap, it was such lovely weather all weekend. It was almost balmy on Saturday, it gives you a real taste of summer. God knows we need it. I've not seen any sun since Colin's Ibizan stag do and pre-credit crunch, that seems a LONG time ago. Hanging out on Islington Green instead of life-drawing, I saw some stupid individuals in their Birkenstocks and Havaianas, cadaverous toes poking through like worms through topsoil. Urgh... In fact it was possibly a good thing we decided against life-drawing because it turned out that Jess was modelling! *chortle*... It would probably be a little awkward when I saw her at work on Monday after drawing her little bee stings!

Anyway, we hung out on the green and drew the people around us until it was time to wander around the antiques market, the shops and the Sainsburys to get ingredients for the Sunday's lasagne...

... Which went down a treat. May's mum, dad and brother came over for Mother's day loaded with various treats and surprises for the house. We now have an antique Turkish rug in the living room, a full herb garden on the balcony and also the inclination to go garden now we know what we're doing! ... Roll on REAL summer!