Round up Part 2 & Leavings

Right so after the road trip & X&H went back to Canada for Xmas I settled down slightly to organise Ireland, apart from the normal drinks & a few early Xmas shindigs all was quite until mid December. I’m fairly happy with the places I’ve seen in England & the only 2 places I had yet to get to were Rugby & Bath. I’m not overly fussed about Rugby I hear there’s nothing there but a statue but Bath is another matter completely. Long time readers of this blog may have noticed how most road trips revolve around poor old Chris driving…Well I though this was unfair –Plus I like drinking with Chris- so I sorted out going to Bath by train instead of car, maybe £10 more but a shed load less hassle. Rolled into Bath about 11am & once we found the High Street fell in love with the town….Not to live in but retirement wise maybe (Spot the guy almost thirty, already thinking about retirement). We spent a few hours wondering around checking out the sights & sampling the local pubs and finally came upon the Roman Baths. Technically they should be called Celtic Baths as the hairy ones were worshiping the Goddess Sulis there way back before Mt Cook popped it’s head above water but it was the Romans that flashed it up & made it a money spinner (Kinda like what us white fallas did to New Zealand….JOKES!!!!) Anyway it was very cool and very interesting checking out not only the Baths but the Roman temple & altar as well as working out how those smart buggers sorted out plumping for a massive complex before Jesus was kicking around.
After checking out the old school baths we decided it would be wrong not to try the new school one since we were in town. These are WAY cooler that Miranda (Hot pools near Thames, NZ) with indoor pools, scented steam rooms & an awesome rooftop pool over looking Bath – The only pity is it wasn’t snowing. So after seeing how raisin like 2 hours of soaking will get you –very- it was on with sampling the local hospitality, on this note I can say Bath is a town of differences. With pubs were we meet some amazingly cute girls from some branch of Lloyds TSB on their Xmas do, to a pub that was trying to be the West Country version of the Red Lion out of ‘Once were Warriors’ (one of those 'Down the Pint in One' situations). Then off the McDs & the Offie to stock up for the train home to be back in London by 11pm. Wicked Day!
The next day I was up to West Hamstead for Orphan’s Xmas. Was a great day eating, drinking & catching up with old friends I don’t see as much of these days since moving out of Marlow Court.
I had several Xmas parties this year but as like last year no one made an arse of themselves by snogging the HR girl or telling the boss what you REALLY think of them or my personal favourite, climbing a mast of a boat so you can get a great picture of Sydney harbour only to get blasted by a high pressure hose & have to walk back onto the party dripping wet (We’d never do something that foolish ah Nick?) The biggest thing was a couple of Lads wasting A LOT of money on girls but that’s been happening since time began.

After 2 & a bit years I have finally seen Millwall score a goal live! (Every time I have been either down getting a beer or looking somewhere else in the grounds when the goal is scored) Also finally got to see Millwall win a game! Dec 29^th 2007, Millwall (2) – Crewe (0) - A day to remember.
On to the leaving partiesI’ve been catching up with people & having final drinks since I left CRUK but they have stepped up a notch in the last couple of weeks. They have all been fun & have acted as a timely reminder to me that outside of a few poor choices in the past I have been blessed with meeting some great people that I am lucky enough to call friends. It’s been a pleasure & an honour to roll with you all; with the power of the interweb & facebook I hope & expect you all to drop me a line whenever you in the part of the world I’m in at that time. Enough of the sentimental BS after a 5-6 year wait I bought a car the other day! YEAH BABY!92 VW Golf CL 1.8l
At 1.8l it’s smaller than most of the Cars I’ve owned but in saying that it’s way lighter than the Prelude or the Corolla. I was looking at hiring a car to get to Cork but only Avis would do it and they wanted £675 for 5 days rental, for the same price I’ve got this bad boy + Insurance for 4 months…Happy Days
Tonight I went to The Phantom of the Opera. I’ve been meaning to go ever since I turned up, but of course I wanted to take the love of my life. Unfortunately each time I remembered that I had a GF & it would be a good time to go, either I got bored of said love of my life or said love of my life moved on to better things (Story of my life). So with 3 days to go I bit the bullet & went solo. Her Majesty’s theatre is A LOT smaller than what I pictured in my head when playing the music as a child (isn’t everything) but the show was amazing, although like most shows I go to I spent half the time trying to work out how the props worked.
OK that’s the round up, off to Cork on Friday, Cheers for the good time London…BRING IT!