Brighton Pride [London on Sea]

It was brighton pride this weekend. So a group of us travelled down on Friday night to make the most of the weekend. Allan, Jacs, Helen and I stayed at the Old Ship Hotel down on the seafront (and very nice it was too). We travelled down with Northy and whilst he went to Richie and Tara’s to settle in we checked in and got changed before meeting at a restaurant for more wine than food.
We then moved onto Dr Brightons for more drinks and meeting up with yet more people. It seemed like half of London was down already.
Saturday morning and we were up early for breakfast and to catch the start of the parade. It turns out (having compared photo’s) that Jan from work and I were stood really close but didn’t see each other.
After being shocked to see some mates int he parade (in the police section) we headed to the bar for some beers. I made a detour to boots for some essential medicine and then we all headed to Preston Park for festivities. This was when we realised all of London was in Brighton.
It was one of the hottest days of the year so far and with no breeze to speak of it became unbearably hot. I was abstaining from beers as I was still under the weather from the previous week.

Circus Circus was our stop en route to the park and from it with lots of opportunity for people watching as the crowds thronged to and from the park.
Many people were looking slightly worse for wear by 7pm when we headed to the hotel for a quick change and to a party at Andy Roo’s newly refurbished flat in Kemp Town.

After drinks and food we headed back into town along the promenade – the pier was open late too and it was busier down on the beach than we expected.

Sunday was a day of relaxing on the beach and then for a lazy long lunch at Due South before heading to the St James Street Party.

Lots of discussions about clubbing together and buying a house/flat down there again this trip! I’m sure we’ll have the same ones when we head up to Manchester Pride though too.

rush hour

Olympia station was strangely busy this evening.

Turns out to be the beer festival šŸ˜‰

new phone = new toy

I hear voices no I really do šŸ™‚ They tell me to check my phone when I have a text message or if I have a call!

SMS *

CALL *

* you need quicktime installed

preparing for emergencies

Yes I know most of you will have seen it already – it’s been in the papers and everything but hey.
The government in the UK in an attempt to scaremonger are producing pamphlets on how to deal with emergencies. Copies of the booklet will be sent to all households in the UK throughout August. Once the delivery is completed, people will be able to order alternative versions by post, or download them from the website.
So some bright spark has spoofed the website. That’s what makes the internet fun!
The real one (useful in an emergency when your internet connection has gone to hell and all forms of communication are down)
The spoof one (useful for laughing with your mates in the pub at the weekend)

The Stepford Wives

I go to Clapham Picturehouse quite a lot now I’ve discovered how nice it is and that it’s local too. So when the picturehouse group opened a new cinema by work (Olympia Cinema) I decided to go check it out. Last weekend was the opening weekend so along with lots of other people in the know I was invited to a sneak preview of The Stepford Wives.

The Olympia Cinema is actually the conference centre with a screen at the weekends. Nice enough but not as cosy as a real cinema.

The Stepford Wives was kind of the same. Nice enough but not a patch on the original. This version is a comedy but unlike it’s alter ego was lacking the black humour and suspense. I’ll not spoil the plot since it doesn’t open for another couple of weeks but one point where they mention AOL had the whole cinema (excluding me) laughing.
Well worth going but don’t expect suspense or to be thrilled.

flat pack is evil

Some friends of mine have just moved their business from their front room into brand spanking new offices in Clapham Old Town – and lovely they are too. Only problem is all the flat pack furniture. I’m glad I was only in charge of the Internet connection, network and wireless network.
Carole looking perplexed by the instructions

Paul on a roll

note to self: new camera phone is not good

So last night we ended up going out for drinks and erm it all got a bit messy šŸ˜‰ We ended up at the 2Brewers (after a rebrand and another change around it seems to be getting better). New Nokia 7610 with it’s 1 megapixel camera is not good when you are drunk though!

‘Arty’ shot of the floor

Perving with Andy Beer Drinker

Perving yet ‘arty’

Okay just perving

Very drunk and blurry

amish in the city

So reality TV has hit a new low. Or has it?
Amish in the city is a show from UPN which is going to take five young amish and put them in a house with five other youngsters.
Sounds mad. It probably is mad. The US news are going crazy about it. People are up in arms about it.
Can I just mention that no one forced these people to apply or appear on TV.
Amish tradition means they test their faith and devotion to their lifestyle by leaving it, returning better people no doubt. If these five young people can cope with the reality TV fest and then return to a low tech simple life then they are sure to be better people for it.
On a side note is Randy – the one in the middle – cute or am I blinded by the blonde hair and cute smile?