Cookies World

eet

2009-06-22T23:56:00.002+01:00

Today was the first day of my holidays. I got to look and smile at y work email full of dilemmas which would normally stress me out in the full knowledge that just for the moment its not MY problem :D

I spent the day working on my house, no surprises, found a really cheap place to buy bits of plastic, called scot plas in Stockport. I bought a 5 meter length (I only needed 2 meters but 5 was all they sold) to cover part of the window near my kitchen sink, it only cost £3!

I also bought a doorbell which proved a complete arse to fit, I spent most of the afternoon fitting it but eventually my dad and I got it done. We got home around 7 just time for me to walk the dog before dinner.

Phil had a van for a job tomorrow, so he called and offered to drop off a spare bit of carpet his parents didn't want. I also convinced him to help me move the bbq that has been sat outside the front of my parents house since next door but two moved away. After verything was transported we headed to the unicorn for a couple of pints. During which we tossed around the idea of holding another lan party next month.

Walcott

2009-06-20T21:22:00.002+01:00

I have a week off work, bliss! To celebrate I got my hair cut then went to work on my house. I managed to talk Jo and Holly into coming over to help me out. In fairness I did help Jo move several tons of top soils when he moved into his house, ad I made a couple of appearances helping Together with my dada we were able to make load of progress stripping the walls.
By the time we left a significant portion of the halls stairs and landing had been cleared. I wish I could make such progress everytime.
I fell out with my dad because he decided to use the smallest brush known to man to paint, and despite the fact is a place no-one will see and its was already painted to redo a cupboard in the study. I appreciate the help but at the same tie i want to move in and not everwhere has to be done to such a high standard. This is afterall a mid terrace house not a palace.

Gah

2009-06-18T21:25:00.002+01:00

Stupid stupid stupid computers! Already having been forced to use an old pc thanks to the early demise of my motherboard (which Aria refuse to honour the warranty on). Now the damn hard drive in my spare pc has gone pop so I have only my 6 year old Apple powerbook and my works laptop to use. Neither is good for games ;(

Tambourine man

2009-06-17T21:08:00.003+01:00

Today was Steve's funeral. Quiet a few if us went to pay our respects. It was a Catholic service in Prestwich, it was a very traditional service. There were a lot of people there, his family had come from as far away as Australia to be part of the proceedings. It was amazing how much of a family resemblance there was. His son Peter is like a carbon copy of his father. The girl who helped try and give Steve cpr came to the funeral with her husband, she seemed very upset by the proceedings.

Following the funeral we headed to the crematorium, Steve's nephew gave an excellent eulogy full of good messages from his family and colleagues. He had some excellent song choices, Pink Floyd, Bob Dylan and The rolling Stones.

After the cremation we went back to the family house after the cremation it was a bit awkward really, I don't think any of us knew any of the family apart from Martin. Actually I particularly felt shell shocked. Mercifully the others felt the same so we did not tally too long.

Fire

2009-06-16T00:08:00.003+01:00

I got absolutely soaked walking storm this evening. I could hear thunder went I left the house but I thought that I might be quick enough to avoid it. At lunch time I had been for a walk into Macclesfield, it was really hot and sunny, strange a few hours later I was stood in the community centre freezing being pelted with hailstone. Its didn't seem to bother Storm though he enjoyed playing catch in spite of the bad weather.

I watched a film call career girls. It was really a film about not much, it charted the lives of two girls who met at college. In a series of flashback you saw the shared experiences that bound two very different people together. I quiet enjoyed it as a causal watch. Filmed in 1997 it made me feel somewhat nostalgic for my own youth long lost somewhere in the late 90s.

eet

2009-06-14T20:18:00.004+01:00

Bruce and I decided to forgo the sunshine and disappear into Urbis to see the Video Game Nation. Jon Hare the man behind Sensible software was giving a talk. The website said it started at 12 so we mooched down to Manchester arriving with 15 minutes to spare. In typical British fashion no-one at Urbis knew where to go, and do bear in mind that Urbis is fairly small. We were initially directed to the exhibition, only Jon Hares talk was in a different room and we were told that we had to go to the shop to buy a ticket. The girl in the shop had no idea what we were talking about and had to call on the radio to find out. She sold us the tickets but was unsure of the room to we headed to the cafe. Apparently we could have just gone there in the first place, they were even selling tickets on the door, however the talk was postponed until 2pm.
To kill time we walked around the exhibition. It was pretty interesting, it reminded me of retro games but with more explanation.
I especially like the Beneath the steel exhibit a wall full of scenes from the game. I hadnt realised how important the UK and Manchester were in the computer games arena especially in the 80s and 90s. Ocean software one of the biggest publishers lived on Deansgate, people did amazing things with the Spectrum, C64, Amiga, yet somehow the IBM PC revolution killed a lot of that home grown innovation.

Jon Hare gave a talk at 2pm, it was really interesting to hear about Sensible Software. Apparently of all the games they did Mega-lo-menia was his favorite achievement, it always brings back memories for me of Phils old house Squarefield, the Amiga and washing cars.

Jon Hare explained how they [Sensible Software] were a small team working on stuff they enjoyed in a fun atmosphere, I was so jealous! After his talk there was a sensible soccer, which actually saw him lose in the final. Ill hopefully be going again to VideoGame nation to see David Brabham creator of Elite and Frontier one of my all time favorite games.

Happiness is overrated

2009-06-13T21:24:00.003+01:00

I'm sat at my desk enjoying a bottle of Peroni, listening to The Airborne Toxic Event, and ruminating on life. They [Airborne Toxic Event] have a couple of songs that completely encapsulate moments in my life. I have been the guy in Sometime around midnight, and felt like Happiness is overrated. While I am starting to feel normal again, I am still in a dark place. There was a while when I just felt numb, I could see his dead face every time I closed my eyes fortunately that is no longer the case.

Today I went to my house and did the usual Saturday DIY, its nice to get back into it. There still seems to be so much to do though.

Last night I went round to Bruce's. I had a terrible day at work, I am really not coping very well at the moment a lot of things are getting on top of me. Unfortunately I took this hope with me and ended up having an argument with my parents. By the time I arrived at Bruce's I felt sullen and withdrawn. Nina made dinner, spicy beef Fajitas and cheese covered nachos. It was a very tasty and I managed to relax a little. We watched the Tison documentary film, I had forgotten how awesome and ferocious a boxer he was before the rate conviction and the ear biting incidents.

While watching the film I played with their kittens and relaxed, it was nice just not to have any email answer for a few minutes. After Tison we started watching Britons hardest, it was real trash TV so I elected to head to bed.

This evening I went for a drink at the Unicorn with Bruce and Phil. The place was nearly empty. I cant imagine how they turn a profit with such slim pickings. The sign on the bar made me laugh, as well as a soup of the day they do a sausage of the day :D

Shoot the runner

2009-06-08T00:03:00.003+01:00

I tried to pack a lot into the weekend, just to keep busy try not to dwell too much on last weeks events.

On Saturday night I went to Oasis with Phil Bruce and Nina. I had got Bruce and Phil tickets for their birthdays. In reality I wasn't really in the mood for a concert I still felt pretty numb. Nina elected to drive but as the area around Heaton
Park was closed we parked in the centre and caught the metro in.

They has a cup return policy at the bar. Each cup returned was worth 10p. Phil became the cup collection king. We got several free beers and a free pizza simply by dint of picking up cups, at one point he returned 70.

We eneded up quite far back Bruce and Nina dont realy like to get into the action and well I certinaly wasnt in the mood to be jostled by thousands of fans. The bands were all really good and mercifully the rain held off. I enjoyed singing along to the old Oasis it reminded me of happy days at school.

Andy and Emily were also at the gig and in a strange twist we met each other on the walk back to the town centre. I was spoking to Emily she had all these great stories about America and handing in her assignment while I was all drunken and dark about my week, oh dear.

Sunday night I went round to Bruces for a curry. We watched slumdog millionaire, I can see why it was so popular. Just the right mix of happyness sweet but not sacarine.

Wonder

2009-06-04T23:30:00.003+01:00

Today was one of the most surreal of my life. After yesterdays events I was actually afraid to go into the office. They say you go through stages of grief this morning I hit denial, I saw Steve's car in the car park, took me a few minutes to process it was left overnight. My next stage was anger, a customer was hassling me and basically lost it. I should have put it off, I thought working would help.

Walking into the office was weird, the buttons from Steve shirt littered the floor. Tony arrived before me, everyone I spoke to was sad about it some of the guys have known Steve for 25 years. I found it hard to concentrate on anything really, work was more of a token gesture, I kept trying not to remember his face, terrible and swollen. The image haunts me I spoke to colleges about some of the good memories, I think its better to try and focus on that.

Dawn the women who helped us give him first aid looked terrible, we had a quick chat I tried to remind her that we did everything possible we could.

I got home, took the dog for a walk to the polling centre along with my neighbours son and my mum. We took turned to mind the dog while voting, cant believe how big the form was, 13 choices!

It was Bruce's birthday today, so he Nina and myself went out to catch the New Terminator film. It was pretty good much better than number 3 (it pretty much forgets that film existed). The only thing that let it down for me was the abysmal sugar coated scene near the end.

2009-06-03T20:54:00.002+01:00

Unfortunately I received a phone call from my boss which confirmed Steve had in died. I'd like to pass my condolences to his wife and children, he will be sorely missed. As both a great programmer and a really nice guy, who worked hard but was also so good natured and easy going, Steve Rest in peace.

Terrible

2009-06-03T18:22:00.003+01:00

At 4.40 a guy I work with, have worked with for several years collapsed in front of my eyes. It was so sudden, he made a noise dropped to the floor and started to turn blue. I called an ambulance while some people from the office attempted to put him into the recovery position but his breathing was erratic and his skin was swollen the wrong colour. The paramedics arrive within 5 minutes and they asked us to leave while they attempted to revive him.
I felt shocked, my hands were shacking, I made a phone call to head office to get details of his next of kin for the paramedics.
Twenty minutes later they cleared out, one of the team told us it looked bad essentially he was dead, they hadn't been unable to revive him, efforts would continue at the hospital. I hold out the hope that they will be able to help him, but I the picture of how terrible he looked out of my mind.
I got a lift home, now I feel terrible I've never witnessed anything like it, was so shocking. He had been fine all day we even went together to get a sandwich, I still cannot believe it.

Don't leave me

2009-05-27T23:20:00.002+01:00

I have been amusing myself tonight coding and listening to songs from my youth thanks to Spotify. Just in case it has passed you by Spotify is a 100% legal way to listen to music on demand. It is advertising supported but at the moment sends out less than commercial Radio like say Key 103, and you get to be the DJ. Basically you search choose and album and listen, every couple of songs there is an advert its easy to use, and has pretty much every album I can thing of to search for including the Rex the Dog remix of The Knifes Heartbeats.

This evening I caught up with the Green Day early albums, then tuned into the Smashing Pumpkins. I forgot how angst ridden the early Green Day was, and its certainly been way too long since i heard Today, and Bullet with Butterfly Wings.

Free Coldplay

2009-05-26T20:45:00.002+01:00

You can download a free live Coldplay album "Left Right Left" here

Tracklisting

Glass of water

Clocks

Strawberry Swing

The Hardest Part / Postcards From Far Away

Viva La Vida

Death Will Never Conquer

Fix You

Death And All His Friends

Viva La Gloria

2009-05-24T15:10:00.003+01:00

Friday night I went out for a few drinks with Gilly and Nick. Nick wasnt staying out to late as he and Charlotte were going on a holiday to London the next day.

Phil and Bruce came and join us and I managed to convince them to join me on Saturday doing some stripping. Fortunately the only things that were bare at the end were the walls. We managed to get the whole master bedroom freed from the wallpaper which was great going. I hope to move in sometime next month, a few more days like this, I wonder what Jo and Holly are upto next week...

I dont really see much of Martin these days like me he is busy with his house and work. It was his birthday earlier this month to to celebrate we took a visit to the Chinese buffet in Stockport. I ate a lot of Chinese food, for a buffet it was actually very tasty. I especially liked the Peppered Steak. Phil ate his own body weight in duck, and everyone else seem to enjoy themselves.

After the meal we went to Cobdens, which was awful, blasting out tinny loud music. Adam Steph and Young Martin beat a hasty retreat. I chatted to Martin about his wedding apparently I am invited hurrah, Char told me she read this blog which is scary in itself. Nina suggested we moved to thier house.
Martin had never been to the Tonge residence before, he was fasinated with the Echoing bridge nearby. We all chatted and discussed the various thing we were upto on our houses, well until my eyes and belly felt so heavy I needed to sleep.

Before leaving Nina and Bruce gave Phil and I a picture from their wedding of us with Bruce which was really nice :)

Skype Numerology: Squirrel

2009-05-18T00:36:00.000+01:00

Skype Numerology: Squirrel

Last Night On Earth

2009-05-18T00:16:00.002+01:00

Another weekend, another birthday party; This time is was Nina playing host to celebrate her 26th.

I had spent the day at my house filling cracks cleaning and removing wall paper. My Dad gave me a crash course in the art of filling holes. I was pretty tired by the time I got to Bruce house.

Holly and Joe were there, we had a catch up about Danny's party last week. Bruce was attempting to make Pizza bases in the kitchen, something in the oven smelt very nice. Nina had made two lasagne's one vegetarian and one with meat. They were both very tasty. To go with that was pizza and salad, I enjoyed it very much.

Bruce, Holly and I compared work we had been doing on our houses and the allotment. It was interesting to be stood in the kitchen and see the work that had gone into making it good.

It was the first time I saw Jane and Lindsey the bridesmaids from Nina&39;s wedding I had seen them. Phil didn't seem too impressed that Jane brought her boyfriend along.

It was my turn to drink, and so I did. Too much in fact I had a stinking hangover all day. I felt incredibly depressed it was all couples (except Phil and I) and I thought to myself that I am missing out. Kasia doesn&39;t want to meet my friends which is upsetting to me as they are important to me. I am sure she would have enjoyed it too.

21st Century Breakdown

2009-05-10T01:39:00.004+01:00

Friday night, Danny has planned a theme Party to celebrate his 28th Birthday. The evenings theme was to be a Chav. I improvised a little, but most people made a really big effort, I was most impressed with Woller and Danny.

I elected to drive and managed to arrive at the same time as Ian. We were stood outside listening to the neighbours while Ian unloaded his wine and ice. I had a big fall out with Kasia so I didn't feel like drinking in case I got too depressed.

Jen had made a load of food, which sat on the table looking tasty. We weren't allowed to eat just yet. Instead Danny give me a tour of the house, which is quite a nice terraced affair.

I caught up with Paul, Saskia, Joe Holly and Woller, the atmosphere was really good everyone having a great laugh. The food was served and I must say Jen had done a great job, it was all very tasty. I especially enjoyed the spicy chips and curry :)

We talked we drank (I stuck to soft drinks) I spent a lot of time in the kitchen and outside. At one point a slightly drunk Jo managed to knock a shelf down. The offending shelf was pretty poorly constructed only really for decoration I think not to hold any weight. Despite his intoxication level Danny ran off grabbed a tool-case and his drill and set about fixing the shelf. Judging by the shine it seemed like it was a little used tool, I didn't mention that while using the bigger screws he omitted to counter sink the holes. It was a funny scene dressed in Chav wielding a drill.

Paul was excited about his new album and video he filmed. He also was making me incredibility jealous with picture from Abbey Road studio where his CD was being mastered.

By midnight pretty much everyone was drunken except me Michelle and Holly. Ian was especially drunken at one point falling over and held up by Holly. The party split between people playing singstar in the living room and people drinking and chatting in the kitchen. I offered an opening service for bottles of Lambrini, and chatted to people until my eyes started to feel heavy.

Red Tulip

2009-04-27T22:52:00.001+01:00

Red Tulip
Originally uploaded by j0hncooke

The only red tulip in my mums bag of 'mixed' bulbs, it bloomed for one day before storm crushed it flopping down after chasing a ball

Sleepwalking

2009-04-27T22:44:00.002+01:00

All writers have different style of writing some have bursts of energy some discipline themselves, Hemingway was said to write 500 words a day. Not that I would put myself in the same sort of bracket, indeed blogging is all about indisapline and autobiography. However it has been an age since I made a post, I keep thinking of things I want to write about but always at the wrong time, life somehow takes over and drains my energy away. This evening though I was talking to Martin, its been ages since I saw him in the flesh, but we had a really good catch up. I told him about Storm and he told me how he nearly had John Terrys boxer puppy. After our conversatoin I thought I should make the effort and write something, because its something I enjoy, a release.

Looks like the neighbours dog has moved in here. I went for a few drinks with Bruce on Saturday night, I awoke at about 4am needing a glass of water and nearly tripped over Storm who was fast asleep outside my room. Talking to my dad on Sunday it turned out my dad was woken up about 2 by Storm trying to get in he was cold and tired having been left out, he has been at our house since. I really enjoy this time of year, the flowers blooming Cherry blossom everywhere, it really great walking around with Storm taking it all in.

I spent Saturday mostly working, I had to try and get something done over the weekend, it ended up being a bit of a disaster, but the bad stuff didn't materialise until people started to use the site today [Monday].

Sunday, I spent most of the day migrating servers for work. Punctuated by Bruce and Nina coming over. They had been shopping at Woodford Garden centre. We took storm for a walk around the Community centre then as Nina had never been to my house we popped in to take a look. She even started to peel off some of the wallpaper, I handed her a scraper and got some mileage out of the situation. Nick turned up while we chatting to do some more work on the skirting boards.

After chatting for a while I extricated myself Nina and Bruce so that Nick could get on with the job. I hope my neighbours weren't too annoyed by the noise. It looks a lot more house like now the kitchen is in (minus a splashbacks and some other snagging) not so much more to do now. My main stumbling block at the moment it trying to get everything paid for, my savings are going and the work situation means I am somewhat struggling at the moment.

House aside, I walked Storm again then headed to the pub with Phil for a quiet drink. Julie was chatting to us for a while about a fancy dress party she had been too, Phil and I were checking out the pictures on Facebook while we supped our drinks.

Everyone's at It

2009-04-17T00:17:00.002+01:00

Tuesday I went to see Kasia, we had a wonderful evening together and it made me wish we could spend more time together.
Today was another bad day, a microcosm of my life. My car went for a service, it need new brakes, a new timing belt sigh more expense. The gas guy came to plumb in the gas to my hobs, he took hours to connect, complained there was no room even though he moved the pipe himself and charged my £l65. That is additional to the £35 he charged me to move 3 centimetres last week. All in all £110's to extend one pipe less than 20centimetres, sigh.
In the afternoon I got a really fun phone call form the people I bought the kitchen off. Apparently they messed up and I owe them another £200. I took real issue with this as I paid them in good faith. They rung me before sending the kitchen out and asked me for payment, I gave the girl my credit card details and as far as I was concerned made a full and final payment. I thought they were basically trying it on to ask for any more money after the fact. Nick similarly knocked them back and I think they will basically give up. I felt bad to start with, then I realised how much they messed me about delivering the wrong things, and that I am small bean compared to the mega kitchen Phil's Parents bought.
I managed to cheer myself up after work walking storm, he is never upset. A little dog attacked him while we were playing catch but he hardly seemed to notice, just wanting me to throw the ball so he could run round some more. Such boundless optimism despite all the troubles in his life.
This evening I got two phone calls from friend who wanted advise, I just about managed to give it to them without going crazy, it was a close run thing though.

Glass

2009-04-11T20:46:00.004+01:00

I had to take my parents and gran to John Lewis. My grans microwave had blown up (she has a knack of destroying them somehow), this is a problem as she uses it to do most of her cooking. So off to John Lewis where she bought a new Panasonic. Its a pretty nifty one as microwaves go, it can actually sense the gasses coming off the food and adjust the output accordingly. I used some vouchers to buy a kettle a pan and a frying pan for the house, was kind of strange to be buying my own appliances, I have always shared.

It was a glorious day today, I took the dog for a long walk in the sunshine playing catch at Woodford Rec for ages, until he got tired and decided a better game was tug of war with the rope pull, he virtually destroyed it!

My mums friend came over to see her and somehow convinced me to show her my house. Nick was there finishing some boxing in on the kitchen, she seemed to like it. I feel like its getting close, but at the same time there is a huge list of jobs left to do, and I am feeling pretty skint right now. I am sure Ill manage to find a way to get there though, I feel optimistic today.

I'm off to Bramhall to meet Gilly Nick and Phil.

Moon and moon

2009-04-10T18:35:00.003+01:00

I had quite a nice week, though busy. My company has moved to a new office which means I now have to travel all the way to Macclesfield.

Tuesday Night I went to see Bat for Lashes at the Ritz. Martina had asked me to buy the tickets while she was away in Birmingham, it was to be the start of her new tour to promote her new album so we were treated to the new songs. It was a really nice concert despite some technical problems with the piano.

Wednesday I went to Halifax for a business meeting, there has certainly been a lot of work to come of way because of it, which should in time help with the cashflow crises.

Everyone seems to be switching to Twitter at the moment, but I am far too verbose to be able to fit anything reasonable into 140 characters, so when I have the time I am going to keep it real with blogger :)

A Different Way

2009-04-05T21:31:00.002+01:00

Its Sunday already another week and more importantly weekend has thundered by. I spent Saturday putting back the floor boards, all but 3 are back down. I have used over three hundred screws over the last couple of weekends putting them down. Just like everything with the house it wasn't just a simple proposition of laying them back down. Im many cases I had to build noggins to hold up the boards. I felt like I was back at technology class at Bramhall High chiselling out bits of wood sawing and plaining. It was hard work but very satisfying to see it laid back down.

Saturday evening Phil and I went round to Bruce and Nina's, to watch a movie. He had a copy of the new X-Men film. It was an unfinished version the effects and some camera shots were not finished, but that paled into insignificance compared to the thinness of the plot.

Today I spent most of the day outside. It was a great day, the sun was out so I agreed to do some things at my parents house for a change. I mowed the lawn, then refelted some of the shed roof where the wind had blown off the felt. My neighbours dog was happy to see us vaulting over the hedge and watching me work. I took him for a walk after lunch to Woodford recreation gronud. He is so happy and easily pleased its impossible to be unhappy spending time with him. I think he has basically adopted us as we pay him attention. He often sits outside our front door waiting for me or my mum.

Non-Entity

2009-03-25T21:01:00.003Z

Well the good news at this point is part of my kitchen is installed, and because of Howdens screw up I managed to get a draw unit for the price of a cabinet. Unfortunately there have been a number of setbacks, the most painful is that a gas pipe is right in the middle of where two units meet. This means Ill have to get a gas engineer out to move it then get the kitchen fitting finished then get the gas engineer back to connect the gas hob. Also due to another minor screw up the sockets on one side of the kitchen were a few cm to the wrong side ;( Not much I can do about it unfortunately just got to get the people back rejig things and hope it all looks nice in the end.

You Know What You Are?

2009-03-22T12:24:00.004Z

For some time Faye has been organising a surprise party for Ian. So Saturday morning at twenty to nine he was greeted by Nick, Phil, Bruce, Dave, Sambo and myself. He seemed somewhat dumbfounded when Faye told him we were all there to take him paintballing.

Faye production lined Bacon butties and cups of tea for us all, while Ian sort of stood still trying to piece together what just happened. After the tasty bacon barm, we hit the road to Elland near Huddersfield for the paintball session.

We went in two cars, Phils sat nav took us to the wrong place, so we were a little late. Arriving at the venue I was shicked to see so many people. Teams were chosen on the basis of the arrival number, I was 65! That put me on the same team as Ian, Nick, and Sam. Were donned our boiler suits and loaded up on paint, there were also all sorts of armaments. Paint grenades, smoke bomb and flashbangs were on sale. I just stuck to pain, wish I had bought a pair of gloves like Bruce and Phil though.

The first game was attack defend, it was pretty hectic with so many people. The place was not organised the same way as the one I had been to for Bruces stag do. In fact they just seemed to want us to run off as many paintballs as possible, and no wonder at £ 30 for 500 balls.

Bruce must have been glad that we werent like the stag party there, on the VIP game were the object is to protect the VIP, the Stags friends (and team mates) unloaded 100 paintballs a piece from close range. He was writhing on the floor in agony, and nearly throwing up with the pain.

I got shot a lot, like to run in death or glory style but at one point during the second attack defend (waste as much paint as possible session) I got trapped and shot a lot, my back and shoulders are covered in bruises.

I did have one inspirational moment, when during the second VIP game I used a kid as a human shield I managed to tag a couple of players. While the kid got shot to pieces I was safe, bad John.

There was a second surprise for Ian, a Party at Fayes house. He knew nothing after the paintball other than he Faye Nick and Charlotte were having a meal. We all went home to change, and met back at Fayes before 8.30, cars hidden around the corner so Ian wouldn't suspect. We were all waiting in the kitchen when they arrived, Ian forgot his keys, so Faye answered the door and led him into the kitchen, he was surprised by everyone. Opening the door to be confronted by the Rocky sound track and his friend all screaming "Surprise!"

Danny had prepared a really good music selection for the evening, which served as a soundtrack to the party. I mingled, chatted to Bruce, Nina, Holly, Paul, Righni, Faye, Michelle, Ian, Holly, Jo and Gilly amongst others. I drank and dances and generally everyone seemed to have a great time.

Nick and Charlotte were looking very couple like, Nick seems happier than I have seen in a while, though I hope he maintains some sort of balance and doesnt try and rush things too much.

Holly was in a great mood too we were discussing ways to keep optimistic about long term projects where it can be hard to see the work done compared with the tasks ahead. Paul was on usual form drawing everyone attention, though he wasn't most popular with Ian and Faye when he decided to bed down in their room :D

Fayes parents are an inspiration, they have such a good sense of fun and ha obviously helped Faye a lot with the food. The food was really tasty, a choice of curry or lasagne, I had the curry and found it very enjoyable. I was actually bowled over by the effort that Faye had put into the whole party especially keeping totally on the QT from Ian, very impressive work. It made me wonder if Ian ever popped the question how well organised their wedding would be.

As always however the better the evening the more painful the next day. I felt like I was hit by a freight train, my body ached from all the painball hits and alcohol consumption. The morning was a a right off, this afternoon I just about made it to the house to put a couple of floor board back and do some preparation for the kitchen installation.