Sore feet and tired legs are the order of the day, after 2 nights of dancing. Friday night was Four Corners night at The Croft. Biggest crowd so far, and some of the strangest dancing yet seen, thanks to a strange Mr Been meets Max Wall chap, who had Orynthia and I chuckling, when we weren’t swiftly moving our toes out the firing line. Then last night it was off to Blowpop, to see Scott Hendy and Andy Smith in action, along with the Blowpop regulars. It was a treat to see Pete Smithson, briefly recreating the glory of his nights on the dance floor.

Prior to Blowpop, we joined Crescentia and some of her friends for a birthday meal at La Quentos. Strangely the conditions in the restaurant matched the rain swept streets outside, as an air conditioning unit leaked water on Orynthia for most of the evening. I suppose it helped to give us the authentic high humidity experience of a Mexican night out. The staff were mortified and the delicious complementary cocktail that came Orynthia’s way made up for the strange experience of eating in the middle of fine drizzle.

On the subject of food Teresa has pointed out that I forgot to mention the lovely brunch that we enjoyed last Sunday with her and Steve Dew. We went to Café Maitreya on St Marks road. It is a fairly new vegetarian place, where Teresa appears to eat at least twice a week. Really nice food, fantastic Cheesecake although as we were one of the last groups of people eating they did not have enough for all of us to have a portion. Run by really nice people, I expect that we shall be returning, although it may not be easy, as it’s reputation is spreading quickly leading to problems in getting a table.

Yesterday. We bought one of the super small digital camera’s for £40. It is an amazing thing. The qualty of the pictures is not fantastic, but for quick, fun photo’s it great. Took a few shots round town today after we failed to get into the animation festival at The Watershed. Hope to put some of these on the site. Also went to a new outdoor market in St Pauls. Of course it rained and blew a gale! Needs to have a few more stalls but could be an interesting addition to Sundays in Bristol.

Orynthia has started a new job in the last week or so. She is now back in the world of the web, which is really good news and better still her new office is across the road from mine, which means that we can meet up for lunch or after work. So as well as an interesting job, she gets the chance to travel in wonderful old fashioned style of the train journey from Redland to Temple Meads.

The train journey is a really nice way to start and end the day. Redland station is 15 minute walk from our house, a lovely walk it is too. Through Redland Green, watching the Squirrels rushing around whilst the birds swish noisily too and fro, It is my idea of perfect countryside – because it is in the middle of the town!

Been buying a few CD’s of late. Picked up new releases by Elvis Costello and Craig Armstrong yesterday as well as an EP by the raucous Yeah Yeah Yeahs. Then last night we caught up with our good friend Steve Vowles, who has been working in Madrid for the last 6 months. As a thank you for looking after his city ticket whilst he was away, Steve gave us a lovely CD by a Spanish group called La Buena Viola, although it is sung in Spanish and I don’t understand a word of it, I love it. It matches the mood of the glorious sunny weather that we are experiencing at present, subtle melodies, understated vocals with occasional lush but not overbearing string arrangements. It is a fine piece of work. Imagine that Belle and Sebastian had grown in San Sebastian rather than Glasgow and you won’t be far wrong.

Just started reading another book that has been recommended by our friend Bill from New York. It’s called The unexpected Salami and was written by Laurie Gwen Shapiro. It gets a mention in the Australian section of the epic travelogue that is on the website that Bill and Doreen put together after their world trip. The site is really interesting with some great photos and I’m not even a twitcher so I’m sure that a lot of the really exciting stuff goes over my head. I’ll let you know what I think of the book.

Today was the last day of Bristol City’s season. We drew 1-1 at home to Stoke City. We finish in 7 position in the league, 2 places better than last season but not good enough for the promotion playoffs. I’m not upset about the prospect of another year in division 2. As I get older, I start to value the social side of going to the match almost as much as the quality of football itself. I’ve been going o a regular basis since 1970 and have accepted the fact that City will never become a Manchester United or even a Southampton. We have bad games and good games. Obviously I love the really great performances by the team or indeed the really exciting games such as the recent game with Reading. However on many occasions I have the most fun on days when the football is not too good. I have been lucky enough to watch the matches with the same group of people for the last 6 or 7 years (indeed in some cases for nearer 20 years!), I also meet up with lots of people in the Nova Scotia pub for a quick drink before the game. Some of the people are amongst my closet friends, many more of them are only linked to me through football. Now the popular conception of the English football fan is of a racist, beer monster storming around the country abusing anyone who is not one of them. This people do exist, however my experience of going to football is an ever expanding collection of interesting, funny, loyal people. It is great to spend time with people that have searched out life in so many different places all over the world. It is also great to be in a place where no class system exists. The view of the 17 year old person with an underpaid agency job is just as valid as the millionaire popstar, the accountant or the unemployed 55 year old. We all moan and groan as the season progresses but it is lovely thing to say to so many people today, "Have a good summer, see you next August" and know that you will be able to pick just were we left off this afternoon.

Orynthia and I went to 24 hour party people earlier this week. It is the film that tell the tale of the rise and fall of Factory Records. Steve Coogan who plays Tony Wilson the figurehead for the company narrates it. The film concentrates on Joy Division, The Hacienda, and Happy Mondays. I was one of gloomy young men that took Joy Division to their hearts, and remember being devastated when John Peel announced that Ian Curtis was dead. I saw them play once at Trinity Hall, and they were fantastic. Watching them in a semi-derelict church, seemed like the perfect way experience them. I went to Hacienda, I think only once (maybe twice) and it was an eye opening evening for me. In Bristol at the time, clubs small, dark, edgy places. So to step into this warehouse of a building was quite a culture shock. As was the music. At the time dancing was not something that any one liked to admit to doing. The culture in Manchester was very different, not yet in its full ecstasy driven madness, it was still a sight to behold. The film caught the wonderful contradictions of the period really well.

Orynthia has had an amazing week of job related issues. Nothing is fully resolved yet so I won't go into any more detail. Fingers crossed it should all be resolved in the next week.

At last, I have managed (with a lot of help from Webmaster Orynthia) to put up some pictures of our trip to Guadalupe for the wedding of Felipe and Mercedes. If you want to read what I had to say about it at the time, you can, by looking at my entry from March 7th.If you want to look at the pictures go to the link to Felipes & Mercedes Wedding.

At least City have managed to put us out of our misery today. 4-0 down after only 34 minutes, we ended up losing 5-1 at Blackpool. Huddersfield won, so we stay in division 2 for another season.

I have just finished reading The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho. It was leant to me by Ian Wallen (literally my oldest friend, as I have known him since I was less than 4 years old). It came highly recommended but I have to say that it did not really do much for me. The writing style, such as it is, is very simple. I felt as though I was back in school reading something in a bible studies class. The blurb on the back advises that Paulo Coelho has sold over 20 million books worldwide. Then again a lot of people like Sting!

Well the period of national mourning is almost over. I suppose we all knew that it was going to happen, it’s just that the timing is so unfortunate. Only a couple of weeks after the last warning that even he is mortal, it happened – David Beckham is injured! What fantastic irony that in the midst of the 20th anniversary of the Falklands war and with less than a couple of months before the next titanic meeting between England and Argentina, that the major star of English football, should be felled by an Argentinean pre-emptive strike. The initial despair of last night has started to lift, everyone that I spoke to today suddenly knows the innermost detail of recovery times for broken bones in the foot, and they all confidently pronounce "6 weeks, he’ll be ready. No Problem". We will have to wait and see, at the moment it is Argentina 1 England 0.

Last night we went to The Old Vic to see the fantastic Peter Postlethwaite in Scaramouche Jones. It is an epic one-man show as a man looks back on his extraordinary life and the century that he has spent it in. I was a little dubious, as I saw a brief clip of the play on TV, which showed "PP" in full clown get-up over acting to not very comic effect. I have never been a fan of clowns, indeed the older one gets the less funny they become. However, within the opening couple of minutes of curtain up, the snippet I had scene emerged and it was clear that it meant to be a cheesy aside, in stark contrast to the rest of the performance. A gripping and moving piece of writing from Justin Butcher.

Orynthia has had a mad week with work related stuff. She has a short-term contract with an excellent local web company, starting next Monday. It is a really exciting opening. We wait to see what it could lead to.

Shock horror, the football on Monday night went well. I could still walk on Tuesday, well with the aid of a stick anyway – only joking.

Back to work today. Not too bad considering that I had been off since 29/3.
Just heard that we have been awarded a huge 2% pay rise!! Still, lots of our
friends have been losing jobs lately, so I can't complain.
The weekend went well, had a good time at both Four Corners and Espionage,
hooked up with lots of people and danced our way into the small hours at
both nights. Local noise merchants The Heads played at Espionage and
although I quite enjoyed the sonic rush for a short while, I must admit that
Orynthia and I had to take cover at the back of the boat after about 20
minutes. Lightweights!!

Whilst we were at Four Corners I received an unexpected and slightly belated
birthday gift from John Stapleton and Jane Tily. Sometime in the late
1950's or early 60's a series of record were released which featured actors
reading lines from a script (which was included with the record) then
leaving a pause for you to reply. A bit like a language tape, but with a two
way dialogue rather than repetition. I have had one of these records
featuring a wildly over the top Vincent Price for a number of years. John
managed to find one with the marvellous "Slapsy" Maxie Rosenbloom. Now, you
may not be aware (I wasn't) that Slapsy was world champion boxer in the
1930's before turning to the silver screen, playing mainly, and no surprise
here, punch drunk old boxers for comedy effect. The record features lots of
sketches written with Slapsy in mind. It is a fine thing. I'll be looking to
pick-up more of these if I can.

We had a great meal on Saturday evening at a newish restaurant called Tico
Express. It features interesting tapas style (in portion size and cost but
not always in the type of food) dishes, which wiz around the room on the
sort of conveyor belt that you see in those swanky London sushi bars. Plus a
small selection of hot dishes. We really enjoyed the food, and it is good to
see a non stop procession of dishes heading towards you.

Bristol City managed a win on the weekend to just about keep our promotion
hopes alive. We have to rely on Huddersfield dropping points, it could
happen and we may yet find ourselves embroiled in the dreaded playoffs.
Could all come down to our final game of the season, when we are at home to
Stoke. Get those calculators ready!!

Finally, The Guardian had an interesting piece,talking
about old Jazz musician's that have fallen on hard times. It features Abdul
Zahir Batin, who we met whilst we were in New York. In fact we bought one of
his tapes and enjoyed it.

I playing football tonight for the first time since the middle of December,
My legs are starting to wobble already at the thought of it!

Here we are back in Bristol, after a couple of nice days in London. Thanks to the wonder of the APEX ticket, managed to travel on the train for only £18 pounds each. Also managed to find a nice little hotel just between Edgeware Road an Marble Arc for only £40 including breakfast!! Bargins all round. To continue on the theme of bargins, once we had dumped our bags in the hotel, we set off, in the warm spring sunshine, to West Norwood, in deepest south London. For a journey that took about 80 minutes, we were only charged £1 each! By Bristol standards - amazing. We spent a few hours with Orynthia's splendidly named Aunty Tiny, before heading back towards Brixton for the Belle & Sebastian gig at Brixton Academy. We had a quick walk round the fantastic food shops in Brixton before sitting down for a drink in a bar just down the road from the venue. The clientle at the bar was a glorious mix of boisterous elderly West Indians and geeky indie types. Then off to Academy, my first visit to this huge old cinema. The first band to play were a Glasgow 4 piece call "Life Without Buildings", not huge on conventional song stucture, but I did quite enjoy the bass driven melodic lines that lurked beneath the surfice. Reminded me of The Au-Pairs being fronted by Bijork. Around 09:15 B&S ambled onto the stage. A similar set to last years tour but this time instead of being joined by a Dixieland jazz band, this time a local Steel band provided a bizzare but entertaining interlude. Afraid to say that the "sound" was not as good as it could have been, we were about 4 songs in before the string section could really be heard. An enjoyable gig but not a great one.

Thursday was Orynthia's birthday. So as a treat for her we went to see an exhibition of photo's taken by Kevin Cummins featuring The Smiths (Orynthia has always been rather smitten with Johnny Marr). Lots of memories came flooding back, enjoyed seeing the pictures of the fans as much as the band. What splendid hair we all had in those days!! Then it was off to the Conran shop for a nose around at all the things we can't afford, before heading to Soho for lunch. A really nice little Italian in Frith Street set us out in the afternoon, with tastebuds suitably tickled. Saw Lenny Henry in a book shop on Charing Cross Road, before heading off to Hyde Park to watch the Belle & Sebastian invitation football match. I did have thoughts of playing, however it was about 20 a side, on a very bumpy pitch, so I thought I would just enjoy the food whilst watching the indie boys (and a couple of girls) indulge in a fairly robust match. Orynthia also spotted her 2nd Nissan Figaro of the day, to round off her birthday in style. The train home was almost on time, quite rare for a train out of Paddington!

The birthday celebrations continue this evening at The Croft, where we aim to dance the night away with John Stapleton, Ian Green and Phil Darby in control of the decks.

Well, the long Easter weekend is over.
Football first: For Bristol City it was a weekend that may have ended our promotion hopes. On Saturday, we watched the best game of the season at Ashton Gate. Top of the league Reading stormed into a two goal lead with only 4 minutes gone and we all feared the worst. Against all odd's we were back on level terms within a further 8 minutes, thanks to a fine strike by Lee Peacock and a very dubious penalty, converted by Bell. However in the 14th minute we conceded another goal! 2-3 down and only 14 minutes played. Reading shaded the rest of the first half. The second half belonged, in the main, to City. We got back on level terms with about 20 minutes to go but we were not able to force a fourth goal. So, it was off to second placed Brighton on Easter Monday. After conceding a soft goal just before half time, we fought back to equalise with 35 minutes to go. Despite creating chance after chance, we failed to score again. In fact in injury time, Tony Thorpe had a header cleared on the line before Brighton went straight onto the attack to clinch the game 2-1. We now need to win our last 3 games and hope that Cardiff slip up. Can't see it happening. Oh Well.

Sunday was spent with Orynthia's family. Huge amounts of food were consumed. Two Peking Ducks, multiple curry dishes, noodles and Chicken Satay. Before, rounding it all off with fantastic Tiramisu and Banoffi Pie, both made by Orynthia. Then off to see my sister and her boys for lots of music chat before meeting up with Jane and John for a quiet drink. Went to bed still feeling very, very full.

Tomorrow, we are off to London for the Bell & Sebastian gig and to celebrate Orynthia's birthday. Looks like a busy weekend as we are aiming to go out dancing on both Friday and Saturday night. Will our old bodies be able to take it?

Today is the first day of a week away from work, as well as the easter bank holidays of today and Monday, we are both taking Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday off as well. This is mainly because we are going to London on Wednesday to see Belle & Sebastian.

Spent most of the day hacking away at things in the garden, whilst Orynthia did the more creative things. Managed to clear a path through to old Air Raid shelter. One day we will finally empty it of all the old junk that has left to rot over the years. Not sure what we will do with it then, it's been on our things to do list for about 5 years now!! You can't rush these things.

We are off for a bit of 80's nostalgia tonight. Pete Wylie is in town. Wah, in most of their guises were one of fav bands back then. Although Pete has troubled the charts on a few occasions, I think that he has troubled his bank manager rather more! We saw him play in Cardiff about 6 months ago and he was great. Started the gig with the old Johnny Thunders classic "You can't put your arms round a memory" and went on to play all the hits that should have been as well as telling tales of the confused and strange life that he has lived . Also playing tonight is a certain Glen Matlock once of the Sex Pistols. 25 years on from "God save the Queen" will the middle aged people of Bristol be pogoing through the night?

Big weekend for Bristol City, home to top of the table Reading tomorrow, then away to 2nd placed Brighton on Monday. I think we need 4 points from these games to stay in the hunt for a play off place. I'm not confident that we will get them. our record against the top teams of the past couple of seasons has not been good.

Just finished reading "When we were orphans" by Kazuo Ishiguro . Like all his novels, his languid style, which initially is frustrating. does really draw me in. His books seem to feature the most pompous people doing the most mundane things. Somehow Ishiguro makes this compelling. I wish he would turn his attention to something more contemporary. I would love to see what he has to say about todays issues.

Just in from seeing The Royal Tenenbaums at last. Really enjoyed the film, lots of great scenes, my favourite being the discussion between Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson about the suicide note. I won't say any more in case you have not seen it. Also enjoyed the music, nice to hear Nick Drake and The Velvet Underground amongst others.

Being thinking quite a lot about Margaret Thatcher over the past few days. Not nice I know but it all started when it was announced that her medical people had told her to give up public speaking as she could have another stroke at any time. At last I thought, no more of her bitter ramblings. Then on Saturday evenings Critical List show on Radio 2, Stuart Maconie played both Margaret on the guillotine by Morrissey and Tramp the dirt down by Elvis Costello. Both of which look forward to the day that she dies with vitriolic glee. Now, I don't like to think of myself as a nasty person but I must say that the when the day comes, it will bring many memories of those awful spiteful days, when the only thing that mattered was individual wealth and selfishness. It was also strange to see Ian Duncan Smith trying to claim that the Tory party, could be the party to help the people at risk in our society. We will have to wait to see what happens, when the day does come. I won't shed any tears for her but I may just do so at the thought of the foul, self obsessed, small minded England that she helped to create in those dark days.

Well, I just put a webcounter on this site. Will it get into double figures before the end of the year?

Shocking news - City manage to win! A 3-1 victory at Bournmouth keeps us in the top 6 and may just be the spur that the team need in the quest for promotion. Huge game for us next weekend, when we are at home to top of the league Reading.

Had a long sleep-in this morning following a late night on Friday. I went out straight from work , to wish good luck to a couple of work colleagues that were leaving the company. Then I met up with Orynthia at The Croft for the latest Four Corners night out. Loads of friends were out and we had a fine dance (well, we danced a lot, i guess other people should judge the actual quality of the performance!)

Today we (along we lots of other people) helped Heather and Spider shift some stuff into their splendid new house. Managed to catch up with Babs who has just returned from a great trip to the States. Babs and Mark went to Vegas before heading down to Austin, Texas for the South By Southwest music festival. It sound's as though Austin is really good place to visit. Maybe one day, we will manage to get to the states and move beyond New York.

Picked up a few second hand LP's in the afternoon. A great Isley Brothers one from 1967, a strange LP of Jewish comedy sketches called "You don't have to be Jewish.." recorded in New York in 1964, and a fairly generic blues album by a guy who's name I have forgotten already. Set us back the grand total of £4 for the lot, so I can't complain. Earlier in the week I also picked up the soundtrack to the glorious Mulholland Dr. and a CD of amazing early work from Steve Reich. Not easy to listen to, the sort of thing that I find really compelling but sends Orynthia rushing out of the room as fast as she can make it.

Off for a Dim Sum lunch with the family members that went to the Prince Buster gig at 12;30 tomorrow, so I guess I should head off to bed now. Then tomorrow evening John Stapleton has invited us down to little session that he is doing at il Bordelo (a fairly new club on a boat. So it's a mixture of food and music tomorrow - what could be better?

I have been a bit slack, when it comes to updating this site. the trouble is we never seem to be at home. Had a really good weekend, the highlight of which was seeing Prince Buster on Sunday evening. That's right the ska legend came to town and what a man he is. He had the large crowd dancing like lunatics for 80 minutes. After the show Orynthia even managed to get him to sign a CD. The gig should have taken place last year but was postponed in the wake of September 11th. We had started to worry that it would never happen but the man came good.

On the advice of my friend Bill, I have just read the excellent Are You Experienced? by William Sutcliffe. A splendidly funny read about a young man "Doing" india for all the wrong reasons. Although we have never done the full backpacking thing, anyone who has done the slightest amount of self organized travel will recognize the fantastically observed portraits of the people who delight in telling you that you have just done it all wrong!! They always know a better place or cheaper deal and relish telling you all about it.

I was delighted to see an illustration by Marcellus Hall in the latest edition of the New Yorker. I really like his work. In a recent edition of the same magazine he did a great piece on the Knitting Factory in New York. We spent a couple of nights in the Knitting Factory at the end of last year (including New Years Eve) and he really caught the atmosphere of the place. I might send him an email to see if he minds me putting a link to it on this site. You take a look at some of his other work by go to his web site by clicking on his name.

I also learnt from the New Yorker that they are starting to worry about a water shortage due the lack of rain. No such problems here, another day of howling gales and drenching rain. Good old England.

Bristol City go from bad to worse, lost to lowly Notts County on the weekend, to slip to 6th place in the league. As I write this the team are in action at Chesterfield. We really have to start winning some games or we are going to miss out on the Promotion play offs, let alone outright promotion. COME ON YOU REDS!!!

Whilst watching the local news on TV last night, we were curious to see that Stapleton Road in Bristol, was named by David Blunkett MP as one of the 5 most dangerous places in the UK. Many of our friends live in the Easton area and are quite happy to do so. That's not to say that we are not aware of the problems that do exist in the area. It was very strange to see the TV debate on the state of the area taking place in The Casbah cafe on the wonderful St Marks road. The coverage made it sound as though, only a madman would venture onto these streets. The same streets and indeed cafe where we have enjoyed lots of fine nights out. Good food in a relaxed enviroment. We just hope that the bad coverage does not put people off going to this part of town. What the traders and community need is more money being spent in the area by people from other parts of Bristol, not less.

Sad news in Bristol, Vital Distribution is closing the Bristol warehouse. Now the name Vital, may not ring a bell with most people but for many years it has been part of the fabric of the music scene in Bristol.

It all started from the back room of Revolver Records back in the late 1970's. Revolver was, for me, a crucial shop. It turned into a place of Saturday morning pilgrimage, as I would venture into town, my head buzzing with the names of obscure bands that I had heard on the John Peel show during the course of the previous week. Where else could you go to get those singles by Spizz Oil, O level, Those naughty lumps, This Heat and hundreds of other bands of dubious musical pedigree. Well Virgin may well have sold them in those days (unlike now), but it just could not compare with the magic of slipping into that small doorway and the journey up the stairs and along the small corridor festooned with scrappy bits of paper, from people who were "into Slits, Wire, Gang of Four - seek Bass player - enthusiasm more important than ability". You then emerged into a small room, which was a cornucopia of delights for the enquiring musical mind. I sure that this was the first place that I heard the like of Captain Beefheart , Big Youth, Tom Waites and many more. The staff were different as well. They actual knew about and loved music. Over the years we enjoyed great if opinionated service from Mike Chadwick, Steph Thornton, Grant Marshall (yes, Grant from Massive Attack), Sean Mayo, and Bob Jones.

Then the shop started to distribute records as well as just selling them, soon it became an important cog in the whole post punk music scene. Although Orynthia and I never worked for Revolver (Which changed it's name to Vital at some point), countless numbers of friends did and although many of them moved onto other things, the "Vital" social crew are still a great bunch of people to be with.

In the 1990's the shop was sold and was never really quite the same, it limped on for may years before closing a few years ago. Vital hit a peek on the back of the Oasis explosion before dark clouds started to appear a while back.

Bristol just will not be quite the same. Then again, no place ever is.

More on the trip to Spain.
On the Saturday morning, we set out for Guadalupe in the new car that Pedro had bought with his TV winnings (He was featured on a popular Spanish quiz show, whilst we were in Madrid). Steve and Janet were taken by the lovely Jorge and Annalise. After about an hour of fairly dull motorway driving, we turned to head into the mountains. Immediately we saw some wonderful birds which were either Cranes or Storks. This was the start of an amazing twisting journey through the mountains. Poor Pedro had to wrestle with his steering wheel as we turned this way and that for about 45 mins. Eventually we arrived at this amazing small town which was completely dominated by the monastery that was to be the setting for the wedding. We have lots of pictures waiting to be scanned. I think these will do more justice to the setting and the day itself than I can. It was a great occasion and the Spanish people really went out of their way to make 2 humble speakers of the English language only, very welcome.

We finally made it to our bed at around 4 in the morning, having danced to some truly awful Euro pop. Never mind, the atmosphere remained splendidly good natured right to the end, and although everyone had more than enough to drink, no one was suddenly turned into the sort of raging English person that we see all too often.

The journey back to Madrid was even more spectacular the journey out. Overnight, snow had turned the previously rugged mountain ranges into soft and gentle cotton wool covered fantasy lands. Not the best of conditions for driving. I was pleased that Pedro was at the wheel rather than me. Upon our descent, we then ran into very thick fog for a couple of miles before this gave way to rain for the rest of trip back to Madrid.

On our return to the hotel, we were pleased to see that we had been allocated a much larger room for the last couple of days of our trip. On the Monday, Orynthia, Janet and I went on a walk through the old town to the Segovia bridge managing to catch site of a woodpecker in one of the parks along the way. We returned to our lunch by way of the grounds of the Royal Palace, where we saw some very strange green birds, as yet they remain unidentified. Our last night in Madrid was spent with Steve and 4 of his female friends, and we had a few drinks in a couple of nice bars.

Lucky me. I don't have to return to work until 11th March. Orynthia is working, so I am just mooching around for a couple of days. Nothing I like more.

Well, we are back from our trip to Spain, and a fine time we had.

On arrival in Spain, we were a little surprised to find that our room was about the same size as the double bed which filled it! However, it was very cheap and in an amazing location - Within 30 yards of the magical Plaza Mayor. Within 30 mins Steve Vowles (from Bristol), Felipé (soon to be married) and Pedro (current TV star) met us in the hotel. As is the way in Madrid we found ourselves heading out for the evening at around 11pm for Tapas and wine.

Over the next few days, we visited the Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza and the Reina Sofia museum. We almost went into the huge Prado, but decided that the collections were just too old for us. In many ways we are very predictable in our choice of art, we really only like 20th century stuff. Managed to find lots to enjoy although the Warhol / Basquiat/ Clemente exhibition took about 5 mins of our time. I think that was about 4mins 50 seconds too long. Maybe I am just getting old, but I just don't get the inane scribbles that Basquiat managed to pass off as art.

Had quite a relaxed time really as we all knew that we had a big weekend in front of us with the wedding in Guadalupe. Managed to have a crazy walk around the back streets of Madrid when about 8 of us were trying to find a vegetarian that Felipé had allegedly booked us into on the Thursday evening. Poor old Pilar was walking around on a crutch following a skiing accident. Of course, when we found the place it was closed whilst building work went on. Another walk around before sitting down to eat at around midnight.
To be continued.....

Oh I forgot to say - Lamchop, that new CD is just fantastic!!!!

Well the weekend rushed past, mainly because we drove for 90 mins to sit in a room for 3 hours, whilst people attempted to sell us a Timeshare deal. We managed to resist, it was not hard really. Our prize for doing this is a free trip to Australia!!!! Not yet sure when this will take place, as we still have a few hurdles to overcome.

Spent Saturday night at my Dad's new(ish) place in Dunkerswell, Devon, before heading home on Sunday morning.
City drew 0-0 away at Colchester, so we slip to 4th. Home to Peterborough tomorrow night. Then we head off to Madrid on Wednesday.

That's about it for now.