Posted on November 28th, 2009
Given that blogs seem to have gone out of favour of late, I think I’m going to go to a cheaper hosting package that does not have wordpress support. Of course, the photo pages will remain as that was the whole point of having the site in the first place. Anyone thinking otherwise should lodge an objection pronto.
Posted in Other | 2 Comments »
Posted on July 19th, 2009
What on earth is going on ? It’s supposed to be sodding July !
Posted in Grumps, Weather | 2 Comments »
Posted on July 5th, 2009
I spent a while looking for places that I’d like to visit rather than holidaying at home (again) and this was one of the places on my shortlist. Better still, I’ve just spotted that Easyjet do cheap flights to Tallinn from Stansted Airport. It would seem that there’s very little excuse not to now then, given that it would only cost about £150 if booked in advance.
Anyone up for a weekend away at some point ?
Posted in Holidays | No Comments »
Posted on June 30th, 2009
Oh well, I guess it was guaranteed to happen eventually. Well done Mr. Gates.
Posted in Games, Grumps | No Comments »
Posted on May 31st, 2009
I’d only just finished waving goodbye to Bungay, and was already making my way towards my next holiday destination, and the start of what ended up being a 24 hour journey. The plan was that I drove to Chris’ house near Bedford and swapped over into Jules’ Range Rover, but after an incident with it and a gate, we ended up taking Chris’ C-Class Merc. instead. This ended up being rather good as it saved us a fair packet in fuel and carbon footprint.
First stretch of the journey was off to Dover to catch the ferry. Make no mistake about it, Dover is an absolutely horrible place. Perhaps it has been made that way to make immigrants turn around and go in search of somewhere else nicer. We arrived super early and managed to change to an earlier ferry. We arrived in France at about 9 o’clock French time and headed off in search of somewhere nice to eat, ending up venturing into the town of Lens. We stopped at the first eatery we came across and it was a really nice little place. I had jacket potato and Chris and Jules had steak. I have to say that between Chris and myself, we managed to get everything we wanted and exactly how we wanted it using what we can remember of our GCSE French. Jules however (bless him) was rubbish in this department. After we left, I did most of the driving through the night. There was a fantastic lightning storm in the distance for about an hour of the journey, but it only rained for about 5 minutes tops, thankfully. French motorways are extremely windy (compared to English ones) and there are no cats eyes. Occasionally there are reflectors on the centre reservation, but that’s about it. All of this and we had to pay about 100€ in tolls for the privalege of driving the length of the country. All of a sudden UK road tax seems quite cheap in comparison. We arrived in Nice at about midday and completely shattered. We got the keys to the apartment, went for a couple of Beers (at 5€ a beer !) and I the world’s most amazing calzone and then then had a quick kip before another couple of beers and then that was it for the night.
The next day, I woke up quite late owing to a combination of not having had any sleep the night before and the fact that the roller shutters on the window blocked out 100% of the light from outside. I know that they look a bit ugly, but they are incredibly effective and in everywhere else in Europe apart from the UK. I want some. I had spent the previous day coming down with a cold , and by this point my nose could have passed for a tap, but was not as bad off as Chris who had managed to contract Delhi Belly. Up until this point we had been planning to catch le train into Italy as allegedly the first stop over the border is a little market town and this way we could add another country to our visit. After we had waited a bit to see if Chris got a bit better (which he didn’t), the time was getting on, so Jules and Myself decided that we would check out Monte Carlo instead and pick up the tickets saving us a job on Saturday.
After a bit of fun with the ticket machine at the station, we boarded the train. For some reason French trains do not tell you on the platform where the train stops, only it’s ultimate destination and this one was bound for Ventimiglia. Thankfully, there is a little display on the inside of the train that tells you, so panic over. We managed to get the grand prix tickets after a bit of a panic as you need to present some ID to the lady in the booth to prove that you are the person who purchased the tickets before they will hand them over. Chris had purchased his and Jules and of course he was still in Nice. Thankfully a quick phone call to Chris, we had the credit card number of the card they were purchased on and that seemed to suffice.
The track action on the Friday is confined to the morning and by the time we arrived is was the afternoon. We sort of stumbled onto the track, only to spot that we were standing on the start / finish line, so thought that we would do a lap of the track on-foot given that we would unlikely get the chance on the Saturday or the Sunday. Jules and his incrediblele thirst pulled us into a bar on the way up the hill at Beau Rivage overlooking the harbour and the many multi-million pound yachts. Some people really do have too much money. It’s a bit strange how blasé you get after seeing your 100th supercar, and that’s no exaggeration, they were everywhere. Usually in groups of two or three. You name it, we saw it, Ferraris, Astons, Lambourghinis, Maseratis, Zondas, Rolls-Royces, the lot. There was even a Bugatti Veyron, although it was covered up. We managed to get into the pit lane using our race day tickets. Result. After that we met headed back and met up with Chris in Nice and went out for a bite to eat and some more beverages, before turning in for the night.
Back into Monte Carlo the next day for qualifying. I’d forgotten just how noisy F1 cars are, but as soon as you exited the station, you could hear then thundering around the track. We went and found a nice pub in one of the backstreets (I dread to think how much we consumed between us on this holiday, but I we were well behaved, so that’s okay) where we met Dave. Dave had a black eye on the way from where he had (allegedly) fallen over and landed on his suitcase the night before after having a lucky night at the Casino. He seemed like a nice enough chap though. We headed off to find somewhere to park our carcases in the lovely ‘Secteur Rocher’ which is basically the standing area for people who are either to poor or too stingy to buy grandstand seats. We managed to find somewhere with a really good view of the pits and the last corner on the track. Jules spent most of the session watching the portable kangaroo.tv thing that he’d paid 85€ to hire for the weekend which meant that he could see the tv coverage. A bit expensive, but quite useful to see what is going on on the bits of the track you cannot see.
I’d have found qualifying a bit difficult to follow without Jules’ telly. Not a lot really happened apart from the session being red flagged whilst they prised the remains of Hamilton’s McLaren from the armco, and the cheer that us (and only us) put up when Button took pole. The place was mostly full of Renault and Ferrari fans rather than Brawn ones, so we were a might outnumbered. After qualifying it was back to Nice in search of food. We went to look around the old part of Nice, but ultimately ended up back in a cafe/bar on the main eatery street ‘Rue de France’. Nice is a really nice place and seems to be the place of choice for France and Italy’s attractive ladies to be seen. Alan would have been in his element here. Afterwards, Chris and Jules went for a night out at the Casino (spurred on by Dave’s tales of winnings) and I headed back to the apartment for an early night. A wise decision methinks.
Sunday was race day. We’d spotted that ‘Secteur Rocher’ was sold out for both the Saturday and the Sunday, so were not expecting there to be any more people there on the Sunday than there had been on the Saturday. WRONG! We arrived in what we thought would be plenty of time (an hour and a half beforehand), only to find that the place was heaving and we ended up miles away. We had a view of a quite considerable part of the track, but that meant that it was quite far away. We managed to make the most of it though, although Chris and Jules watched the entire race on his telly thing, but I was determined to make the most of the fact that the ticket had cost me £70. I’ll not recount the race, but Jenson won it, so that was all that mattered.
We went back to Nice to get showered and changed given that we’d just stood outside in the scorcing 26 degree sun for 4 hours and were a bit skanky as a result. Whilst this was going on Jules had been on the phone to his mate back home who had told him that he’d heard on the TV that John Button (Jenson’s dad) had said that he would be in his local pub and would buy anyone in there a beer, so we headed off back to Monaco in search of it. When we found the place, it was practically deserted. Apparently what he had actually said was that if he saw anyone in there next time he was in there, he would buy them a drink. Oh well, I can now say that I have drunk in Jenson Button’s Dad’s local pub.
Next morning we got up early to start the 20 hour drive back home. After a slow start we finally got going, only to get stuck in the aftermath of an accident. The journey home was pretty much uneventful apart from that. It was 34 degrees in Lyon when we pulled off the motorway to go to the supermarket to get something to eat for lunch. I want French weather here. It remained warm all the way through France until we got about 50Km outside of Calais, where it started raining. We stopped in Calais for our last meal on French soil and headed off to the ferry port. The ferry we ended up on was about as clapped out as ferries can get and still be legel for use in the EU (oh, and the shop was pretty much empty, apart from some broken bars of chocolate and some bottles of Eau de Girl Wrist). There was a pretty spectacular thunderstorm going on outside as we crossed the channel though. The final stint of driving was mine as I’d agreed to do it as I had to drive from Chris’ house anyway, and this way Chris and Jules could hit the red wine on the ferry. I eventually arrived home at 3am, tired, but having had a fantastic time.
Anyone up for it again next year ? Fly next time though, methinks.
Photos Here.
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Posted on May 31st, 2009
Bungay was always going to be a short one this year as I was off to Monte Carlo for the Grand Prix. Originally I had planned to turn up at some point late on the Saturday evening, but found myself with too many tasks left to do on the Saturday, as I was having to pack for two holidays, plus the weather was a bit manky on Saturday, so spent a relaxed evening in front of the Eurovision Song Contest instead. I still wasn’t desperately impressed with the UK entry, but the singer did okay and we came 5th overall. I think the Azerbaijan entry should have won, but in the end it went to that hideous Norway entry. Such is life.
Anyway, back onto topic, after a bit of a lie in on the Sunday morning, I packed the car and headed off to Bungay, via Leicester to pick up a phone charger and some sun cream (for Monaco). Arrived about 6pm, and from that point to when I left, it all becomes a bit of a chilled out kind of blur, so I’ll recount the interesting things that happened in no particular order from this point forward :
1) Someone had manged to hear that Cirque Du Soleil performed as part of the Eurovision Song Contest (which I hadn’t spotted, but it transpired that they opened the show and I missed the first ten minutes), so Jay (LP’s other half) had spent the last 24 hours downloading it (or so he thought) using our new Wi-Fi(eld) connection courtesy of Farmer Paul. As it transpired, Jay had actually downloaded the semi-final, so we ended up watching a rather jerky video from youtube that was somewhat too bandwidth intensive for a broadband connection in the back end of nowhere.
2) The buddhists that also make a visit to Chez-Farmer Paul each year have made a make shift hot tub out of a radiator, a couple of bits of pipe and plastic barrel, and were nice enough to let us have a play with it. After a few hours of it having been heated (and stirred with a plastic chair), Ewan, Lynne and the Scandinavian girl whose name escapes me decided to give it a try. After not very much debate, there were naked people climbing in, only to find out that it was rather on the hot side. Much hilarity ensued from that point onwards. I was tempted to have a go, but it was bugger cold that evening. That’s my excuse anyway, and I’m sticking to it.
3) Void had an application on his iPod (or possibly access to a website) that told him when the space station was flying overhead. The first night, we all stood outside like lemons looking at the sky for nothing, but the night that the hot tub was on, we did manage to spot it flying across the heavens, and it is indeed quite bright and pretty.
4) We went to the butchers in Bungay in an attempt to find something interesting to curry. We ended up with Pigeon. Was actually really quite nice and another unusual meat that I can cross off my ‘eaten it curried’ list. Still haven’t had kangaroo vindaloo yet though. The wait continues.
5) We went to the standard trip to the local pub (The Rumborough Buck) for tea one evening. Not really much to report other than rural Suffolk really doesn’t change much from year to year. Even the Jam fridge is still there (although they probably didn’t do very much trade this year as LP was providing competition for them with his home made jam). Apparently that makes him middle aged according to an article in the Sunday Times.
Unfortunately, just as I was getting into the Bungay flow spirit, it was time to leave (just in time to completely miss Mr. Beers). The last couple of hours were spent nattering, saying general goodbyes and helping Ana out with some plant themed translating.
Off to Monaco then (via the brewery of course, for some “souvenirs”).
The countdown to BBU 2010 begins here.
P.S. photos here.
Posted in Conventions, Holidays | No Comments »
Posted on May 4th, 2009
Why are bank holidays always manky ? This one has been particularly cold and unpleasant on a number of levels. I also feel a bit cack. Eek, Perhaps I have the onset of swine flu. Oh well, less than two weeks now until Bungay. Yay ! Bungay !
Posted in Grumps, Holidays | 5 Comments »
Posted on March 30th, 2009
I wasn’t home from the last visit to see Ana over new year and I was already having my arm twisted behind my back to go visit again. Given that it was Ana’s birthday and the credit crunch had dropped the price of the flight to £140 I couldn’t really say “no”. After a small amount of gentle persuasion later, Mr. Beers had decided that he could make it this time too.
A few conversations over Skype beforehand had resulted in the request for a couple of perfumes and a cross stitch pattern to accompany me on my journey. However, our wonderful postal service had completely failed to deliver one of them, so I had to depart without it. As of the day of writing this post, the postal service has now decided that they have actually lost it and so the shop is sending me a replacement item. How I am now going to deliver it to its final recipient? Grumble.
It was an early start on the Sunday to get to Birmingham Airport (via Chez-Beers), for an 08:30 flight and connection in Zurich (which was delayed by 45 minutes and was extremely noisy on take-off and climb). Arrival at Belgrade airport was pretty painless and customs and baggage reclaim equally so. A quick wander through the final bit of the airport led to a familiar smiley face which soon turned into my first death threat of the holiday as Ana’s posh sunglasses fell to the ground during the requisite welcome hug. The rest of the day was spent wandering around Belgrade (the first time I had seen the centre in the light) mixed in with a quick trip to the Greenet coffee shop and some burek. I like burek. The evening was spent pleasantly catching up in Ana’s flat and playing around on YouTube introducing Mr. Beers to some rather bad Bulgarian X Factor auditions and Ana to “History Today” and its ubiquitous catchphrase which got quoted rather a lot throughout the rest of the trip.
Monday was registering at the police station day. After a slight lie in (which we got told off for), it was into the car and off to Barajevo to register and quickly visit Ana’s mum and dad. Monday night was dancing night and we ended up travelling to it on the the bus (number 88 if I remember correctly) as Ana’s mum and dad needed the car to get to a show (or something along those lines). After standing outside for a bit and being introduced to some of Ana’s dancing chums we went inside and sat in the corner. Mr. Beers did his usual cringing at the warm up and I set the camera onto video mode for an interesting souvenir, which I managed to delete in a ‘Doh!’ moment. Thankfully I managed to get it undeleted when we got back to the flat.
Tuesday was sightseeing day. This consisted of trips to Sremski Karlovci (a rather picturesque little town) & Novi Sad (via the fortress on the hill). It rained most of the day, but that didn’t spoil it. The fortress is nowhere near as impressive as Kalemagdan in Belgrade, but it does have some rather commanding views of the town over the Danube river. We went for lunch in a place called “Foody” and after a spot of window shopping ended up in a coffee shop where I ended up having to drink Ana’s coffee as well as my own. Can’t remember what happened on Tuesday evening other than we stopped off to buy a present for Ivana (see tomorrow).
Wednesday was spent visiting some a couple of Ana’s friends, Ivana & Dragan in Požarevac. Tamara, who was one of the people I met last time came along too. They all seemed like rather nice people and I got to eat Plazma keks so that was me happy for the day. They have a Dacia Sandero, so eat your heart out James May. We were going to have take away in the evening, but ended up going out instead. The first place we went to (so chosen as they do burek and they knew we liked it) ended up being a non-starter as there were no tables big enough for a party our size, so we ended up at a place which specialised in pizza (which seemed loads nicer anyway). Before we left for home we headed off to a coffee shop where I ordered hot chocolate and ended up with something more akin to rice pudding. Hot, Yes. Chocolate, erm… No.
Ana had not been feeling too well all week, so we decided that Thursday was going to be our lazy day where Ana did not have to drive anywhere. This suited me quite nicely as I wanted to go for a stroll around Ada Lake and have coffee at some point in the trip anyway. This got cut slightly short as we had to pick up one of Ana’s nieces (a.k.a. bottoms) from playschool and deliver her home. We got to meet Ana’s sister again and play with Ana’s bottoms for a bit before heading off back to the flat for a 4 hour house watching marathon. In the middle of it we had to move into the lounge so that Mr. Beers could drift off to sleep. At approx. 1 minute past midnight, housemate Ana and Ratko piled into the room to wish Ana happy birthday. I waited for them to go and then wished Ana happy birthday too and we lay down and finished off watching house before finally heading off to bed in the wee small hours.
Friday was Ana’s actual birthday, but most of it was spent (bless her) with another trip to Barajevo to get us unregistered and then a wander around the Kalemagden fortress in Belgrade. The evening saw us going out for a meal and then off to meet up with Dušan and his girlfriend (who I met in the club at new year). The first place has a band playing covers of pop songs from the last 20 years or so, which I kinda liked (They did “Hot & Cold” by Katy Perry, which had me singing along). Had it not been for the lead singer of the band (and Alan’s preference for the, shall we say ‘less British’ kind of lady), I think he may have died of boredom, so off we went to another place. Alan seemed to like these better, but I preferred the first place. Can’t please everyone all the time I guess.
Saturday was essentially going home day, but we went via the supermarket to buy sweets and biscuits for work colleagues in the glorious sunshine that had descended upon Belgrade. Mr. Beers had a brief panic of finding contraband goods in his hand luggage after he’d checked in his hold baggage, which led to a trip to the post office in the airport. That was almost immediately followed another brief panic as an announcement came over the tannoy to say that the flight to Zurich was delayed (thankfully a quick check showed it to be the Jat flight, not ours). Phew! After a final goodbye hug (thankfully without sunglasses spillage this time) we headed off home for a nice turbulent flight back to the UK.
Once again, I would like to thank everyone that we met for being lovely and especially Ana for making this one birthday visit that I shall remember fondly for a long time to come.
Photos here
Posted in Holidays | 3 Comments »
Posted on February 28th, 2009
As part of a team event that I’m having to go on with work next week, they’ve hired in some people to analyse us. It consisted of asking some rather daft sounding questions with multiple choice answers as to which of the answers appealed most to you. I was horrifically sceptical of this, but the result seems be pretty accurate. Here’s what it came up with. I’d be interested in whether or not you agree. I’ve specifically blanked out the type so that you only get the text do decide.
At Their Best:
People with XXXX preferences carefully observe what is going on around them. Then, when the need arises, they move quickly to get to the core of a problem and solve it with the greatest efficiency and least effort. They are interested in how and why things work, but find abstract theories uninteresting unless they can quickly apply them. They often function as troubleshooters. XXXXs resist regimentation and rules, thrive on variety and novelty, and enjoy the challenge of solving a new, concrete, extensive problem.
Characteristics:
XXXXs use thinking, primarily internally to see the essential structure underlying the facts. Their minds seem to work almost like computers, organising data, reasoning impersonally and objectively. They make rational decisions based on a great deal of concrete data. XXXXs are likely to be:
XXXXs are realists, focusing on the existing situation and what can be done with it rather than on theoretical possibilities. They are often creative at dealing with the immediate problems and good at hands-on tasks. XXXXs are likely to be:
XXXXs are expedient and believe in economy of effort - doing only what is needed with the least possible discussion and fuss. Their focus is on getting the desired results.
How others may see them:
XXXXs are egalitarian and generally tolerant of a wide range of behaviour - until their ruling principles are attacked. At this point, they can surprise others by expressing their firm and clear judgements. XXXXs listen and seem to agree because they are not disagreeing; later, others may find that the XXXX was analysing and making internal judgements.
With their constant scanning for information and focus on results, XXXXs will change course readily if they see another more efficient way. Because of this, others sometimes have trouble in “reading” them. They tend to be quiet and reserved, though they can be quite talkative in areas in which they have a lot of knowledge. Others usually see XXXXs as:
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Posted on February 24th, 2009
Whoever came up with this has an even worse sense of humour than I do.
Posted in Humour, Other | No Comments »