So Friday night saw me shaving my beard off to comply with the Movember rules before I trimmed my ‘tache down to a Hitler version, posting the photos on Facebook and then shaving it all back to skin. Chilly face time and I’m hoping it all grows back ASAP.
Then off to GT’s for a drink at the Marquis of Granby, then a meal at Pizza Express with a bottle of decent red wine and then on to watch “End of Watch” which I enjoyed, thanks.
Saturday saw a nice lay-in before heading off to watch GT take part in the Nonsuch 6.2km Cross Country event before a late lunch and some shopping and then off back into Epsom to meet friends for a couple of bottles of red – Crozes Hermitage – before heading home (and grabbing some noodles at Waterloo on the way).
Sunday saw me heading up to Norwich for the Sunderland match. Another great result following our now famous pre-match Nando’s 🙂
Now back in London washing shirts for a long week: London, Paris, London then Fuerteventura and the best hotel on the island!
Well, I couldn’t think of a better ‘b’ word for women without getting more insulting; ‘birds’? ‘Bints’? ‘Bitches’? Etc.  Anyway, last weekend I had the weekend free to myself so at the last minute I arranged with a friend, Yox, to head up to the NEC at Birmingham for the Motorcycle Live show. Yox said he’d arrange the show tickets and I arranged a couple of First Class rail tickets up there. He then stayed over at Chez Bleu on the Friday night after some pubbage and two massive XXL pizzas (which may have caused some ‘issues’ with air quality:
Scratch and Sniff
We couldn’t face breakfast early on Saturday morning so headed straight to Euston and then on to the NEC where we spent most of the day checking out the bikes, buying boots and bags and snapping away at one or two models – see my earlier update on my Blue Rex blog.
Then back to London, parting company at London Bridge.
I went back to Chez Bleu and packed my full camera kit and headed back to London Bridge to pick up some bits and bobs from the office, including another new ring flash adaptor, this one being for my Speedlites. I then picked up a friend, Alex, and off we went to do a bit of an impromptu shoot – again the results are on an earlier update.
A great laugh with us pratting about, but I got a few decent shots before we headed over to Brigade for dinner and fizzy pop for the second time in a week for me!
Sunday then saw me having a nice lay-in before heading over to Covent Garden to meet Amy for a late lunch at Wagamama and shopping. Still no sign of my iPad mini from the online store yet and none in stock at the Apple Store there, sadly. A long day’s shopping before heading home.
Monday evening was a rush: dashed back from the office to change and head back out to the O2 for the Marilyn Manson and Rob Zombie “Twins of Evil Tour” gig and a meal with GT. Great entertainment all round!
Zombie!
This week has brought some hectic juggling of my diary: Westminster and Birmingham this week and Westminster and Paris next week before I head off to Fuerteventura again for some well-earned R&R.
… is that you miss them when they’re gone, so you have to make the most of them while you can.
When I first separated four years ago, my daughter didn’t speak to me for over a year. It was awful. I’m really glad to say that we made up and are really good again – I met up with her for lunch yesterday at the excellent Brigade on Tooley Street, for instance, and she knows she can talk to me about anything. My son and I see each other regularly and get on really well too.
I love them to bits and can’t imagine what it would be like to be without them. So nothing will come between us.
Which is why I feel so sorry for families torn apart for sometimes bizarre reasons, perhaps with their children thrown out onto the streets, especially (in some cases) when they were the subject of custody battles, or where a child is abducted by a parent living abroad, for instance.
One moment your life can be happy and content with your family around you and everything you could ever want and the next it’s all collapsed around your ears with bitterness and emptiness because of a serious lack of judgment or changed circumstances or maybe blinded by false promises or the grass being greener. What a nightmare!
So I’m happy to count my blessings and know I can talk to my family whenever I want from wherever I happen to be. And that’s A Good Thing.
Having come back from Venice, we were out a couple of nights later for the Fields of the Nephilim gig at the O2 Shepherd’s Bush Empire. Great gig it was too plus we had Vietnamese food beforehand at the nearby Westfield shopping centre. And then the weekend.
As it was GT’s birthday a few days afterwards, I popped out to the Apple Store whilst I was up in Norwich seeing Norwich City beat Stoke and bought her a MacBook Pro to replace her ageing laptop, which I set up for her the following weekend … when we weren’t spending Sunday messing around the countryside paintballing!
Epic weekend. Especially singling out the Competitive Dads – what is with Surrey? – for slaughter!
Meanwhile at BlueCo, I was up to Glasgow training a Client which I decided to do with my replacement iPad. That still leaves me with my old iPad at home which Jack suggested I give him. And GT didn’t help by asking why I needed two and pointing out that I could always buy myself another one later.
Another gig the day after – Seether at the Electric Ballroom up at Camden – which was quite different from the Neph one due to the demographic of the audience, shall we say…
Jack led me astray after a great weekend this weekend – Manchester United getting beaten by City! – and gradually wore me down into saying yes he probably could have my old iPad and yes I probably should order myself an iPad mini. So I did. Two weeks’ delivery but somehow that translates in Cupertino to delivery on 10 December. After I go to Fuerteventura, when I was hoping to use it on the flights. Ho hum.
Bit of a weird time at the moment. A colleague and friend at work died the week before last with a heart attack. I’d guess he was early to mid-50s? Scary stuff, especially as he was into mountain-biking and wasn’t unhealthy. And last week an old and dear friend died from MND.
Makes you re-evaluate your life and think about those who mean the most to you.
Well it took long enough – nine months, in fact – for the lawyers to sort out our agreed settlement and the paperwork, but I’m now finally divorced, as of 17 October 2012 (a little over 22 years after being married). Young, free and single again! Well, maybe not that young…
And the best thing is that my ex-wife and I remain good friends.
So to celebrate, GT and I went off to Venice for the weekend.
OK, it wasnt the only reason we headed off: GT was taking part in the Venice Marathon, which is why I’d booked the Hotel Bucintoro as it was the nearest luxury hotel to the finish line!
And we weren’t disappointed with our suite there, including our own private rooftop balcony overlooking the lagoon:
Panoramic View from our Rooftop Balcony
We celebrated with a bottle of champagne chilled and ready for our arrival:
Cheers!
We had a quick explore and found a superb restaurant near the hotel: La Nuova Perla. So good, we went back there on the Sunday night too!
Sunday morning dawned very cold, wet and very windy: not good conditions for anything, let alone 26.2 miles running (including a 3 mile bridge to really test the mind and body). Our water taxi arrived at 6.15am to take us to one of the collection points where the runners boarded buses to take them to the start point on the mainland. I then walked back to the Piazza Le Roma to get on one of the boats that was running – the high tides were closing many stops – and head back to the hotel for breakfast and to watch the marathon.
Despite the conditions, GT was only 45 seconds slower than her London Marathon time! I grabbed her at the finish line and walked her back to our suite and a hot, deep bath. We then ordered up some lunch before heading out later that evening for more pasta and wine.
Monday was a beautiful day, crisp and bright, so we made the most of it with a gondola ride before lunch and another water taxi back to the airport and home.
September ended with the French Client I’d gone to do seminars for deciding to make a request for me to join them for the next three months … based 100% in Paris. This I wasn’t prepared to do, so we managed to suggest a colleague every bit as capable as me to do this instead. The best laid plans…
The first week in October found me heading for a day visit to two French Clients again in Paris, to have a strategy meeting with the first (and to introduce my colleague) and to be put forward for the a key role with the second. The second suggested I would be 50/50 in Paris and London but later changed their mind so that didn’t go ahead, which is just as well as my colleague is going back on a placement with another Client with whom he has a lengthy track record. So now I’m going to split my time between the UK and Paris up until the end of the year … at least.
Back in London, I did another breakfast seminar which the company wanted to video to add to our showreel. Tricky, as I was quoting from a court case which quotes the witnesses complete with swearing…
Well since I last updated this blog, a lot has happened. Obviously the main event was my trip along Route 66 on an Electra Glide (posts syndicated below and on my Big Trip Blog). Breathtaking!
A week back in the UK – missing the States a lot – and I was off to Paris for a couple of days again with one of our Clients.
Back in London and the weather was wonderful at last, making walking home from work lovely if challenging – trying to avoid pubs!
Silhouette
Paralympics were on, bringing with it the Mayor’s fun: a big screen on Potters Field between County Hall and Tower Bridge with stalls selling all sorts of food and a bar. Made walking home and indeed lunchtimes different and bringing out the crowds.
Tower Bridge Adornment
GT got us tickets for the weekend’s Paralympics so off we went for a look around and to be awestruck.
Coca-Cola “Bubbles”
I think GT’s favourite part of the Olympic Park was probably the champagne and seafood restaurant where we spent a pleasant hour or two!
Then the following week, it was my daughter’s 21st birthday, so she came down to stay at mine for the weekend, with a trip to the West End shops for a dress and a champagne afternoon tea at Harrods’ Georgian Restaurant (after we’d had the Best Milkshakes Ever!).
Shake It Baby!‘Arrods
My 21st birthday present to her was a vanity plate for her car: 1991 AM (her birth year and initials). This was the end of the weekend that I’d spent with GT shopping in Kingston for an LBD for a do coming up with a lovely vegetarian meal on the Thames.
The following week saw more meals out plus a trip and stay in the Midlands to train a client’s staff. Great fun as always, but hard work.
Last week was fun: GT came with me to a champagne drinks reception at the Spencer House in St James Place, hence the new Karen Millen dress and Jimmy Choo killer heels! Driving in the back of a cab over Waterloo Bridge, we saw a huge ride at the Southbank that we decided we had to go on, so plans were hatched for coming back last weekend to ride on Priceless London Wonderground’s high-spinning swing ride, the Star Flyer, the tallest travelling ride in the country at 60m tall, with amazing views of London (especially when we went back later, after dark.
That was a weekend of film too, seeing “Killing Them Softly” (slow-paced but well done) on the Friday night and “The Sweeney” (which was an enjoyable romp if paying only lip service to the original series) on the wet Sunday afternoon.
Quite pleased too, recently, with the release of iOS6 and the iPhone 5 which is a lovely shiny thing!
And finally, Esther, I’ll leave you with my favourite track during this period which sums up a lot of things (more of which later):
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