lnr | Entries tagged with clubs

An evening in several parts:

Step one: Networking session. OK a drink and a chat in the USSC about interesting stuff that's going on in various bits of the university with a bunch of friends who work in assorted departments and colleges. Nice pint of Wherry.

Step two: A quick pint. Meet Mike for a drink in The Mill. (Conveniently just across the road). A half of Old Rosie and a G&T went down nicely, and we chatted and had a go at answering quiz questions even though we weren't doing the quiz. Rather liked watching the daft forfeit round: each team in turn over the course of the evening asked to nominate a player, who gets 5 points for downing a shot of butterscotch schnapps and 10 points if they succeed in potting a golf ball in a pint glass, up a bit of sloping floor. Anyone know when Canada Day is?

Step three: Dinner. Introduced Mike to Dojos. Mmm noodles. Mmm vietnamese spring rolls. Mmm green tea. Oof, full.

Step four: Clubbing! Mike and I promised Fiona we'd come to WUS. OK so we promised it over a month ago, at MBM's party, but we finally got round to it. And despite a slow start I had a really good time. They played just enough stuff that I knew that I could cope with dancing a bit. And there were plenty of people to talk to when I wasn't (Fiona, Richard Watts, John Sullivan, Natasha, Simon(?) who I met at the LJ picnic, ernie and of course Mike). More cider was consumed in the form of "Barnstormer" which is cheap and nasty, but hey cheap is good right? A successful introduction I think. Oh and I've promised John I'll make it to the Calling at least once this term.

Step five: Home. Cold cycle ride, comfy bed, toasty blanket, morning all too soon.

Alcohol: 10 units. Oops, I'm a binge drinker.

Current Mood: cheerful
Current Music: 6music

So after a late night of dancing on Friday night I was planning to take it easy on Saturday. Oops.

We met in the Globe for drinks, and I recognised a fair few faces, though the only name I could remember was Tracy's. Then over the road to the Saffron for food. They had an enormous party of 37 people in, which meant they rather struggled to accommodate our 15, which was a bit of a shame given we'd book, and is a bit disappointing given how good they usually are in there. George asked me what I was doing with this lot though, and where was "your other half". To which of course the only answer was "He dumped me in August" :-). He asked after ernie and Ned and Jamie though, and I promised I'd tell them to go visit. The food was good as ever, and the company pleasant.

Back over to the pub we were quietly chatting away when a row erupted between the birthday boy Ian and one of his colleagues, which was really quite impressive. It's not often you see someone that genuinely angry about something said in the pub. It was sad to see him leave on that note. But the rest of us kind of quietly glossed over the awkward atmosphere as Ian left. And for some reason someone decided it was a good idea to head to the Kambar and spend the rest of the night dancing. In the end it was me, Mike, Amin (sp?), Tracy, Pete and Andy, and they're all a nice bunch. Pete and Tracy left fairly early, and Amin sloped off around 1:30 or so, but Mike and I stuck it out til they threw us out at 3. We'd have said goodnight to Andy but he was busy snogging :-)

Today I hurt. My arms and shoulders are killing me and me knees are nearly as bad. Still, it's all exercise so I shall assume it was good for me, and I certainly had fun. A long lie-in and lunch have helped, but I suspect the rest of today will be spent rather sleepily. And I *finally* mananged to get a pair of NME tour tickets off ebay. Hurray! (And *ouch* at the price, but hey, we don't need to add train fare at least).

Current Mood: shattered

Bmovie was great, we arrived in plenty of time, joined by ernie since the people he's spending the weekend with didn't have any interesting plans for this evening. Had a couple of drinks and then hit the dancefloor, and as suspected in advance didn't leave it except to go to the loo, fetch a glass of water, and hug E-J goodbye, until it was time to go home. 4 hours of solid dancing is good for the soul, though less good for the soles, and in my case quite bad for the knees. Still I had a great time, and I think Mike did too. 80s night is a bit cheating as your first BMovie though, still it means I have an excuse to go to a proper one.

Andrew and Ali put us up in their spare room, and acquired a Jan and Owen on the futon in the living room too, which meant for a sociable morning with coffee and toast and hangovers round the kitchen table, before heading back to Kings Cross for lunch and the train home. I shopped on the way back through town: a 4 way plug, portable headphones that go over-ear rather than in-ear, and 63 quid on underwear in M&S. Still, that was on 13 items, so not *quite* so horrendous. I shall see if the bra is as impressively push-up as it claims.

And when I got home I took some pics of my new scarf:

Colinette Point 5 scarf
Click for rest of images

Next plan is to quietly geek for another hour or so then head back into town to meet Mike and his colleagues for dinner, celebrating someone's birthday with a curry at the Saffron. Which may be interesting, given I've only been in before with ernie and friends, and got to know George the manager quite well. It should be good anyway, since they have excellent curry. I'm a wee bit tired so may not drink much.

Current Mood: perky

I'm thirty!

Thanks to those who've sent birthday wishes. And thanks to Mike, Jenny and Florian (and Laura, Silvie and ~~thingy~~Fletcher) for a great night out. Good beer and chat in the pub. Bad beer and dancing in the Kambar. A very modern indie set, then a fun punky heavier bit, and ending very retro with The Stones, The Doors and The Beatles. And a complete stranger went home with my phone number on his arm in Jenny's eyeliner. All in all an absolutely excellent night out. And a great day to look forward to tomorrow.

*bounce*

Current Mood: a little tipsy, but fabulous

Wednesday I went out with Mike and Vicky to a gig, and had a fabulous time. I came home, wrote it up, and went to bed still grinning.

Thursday it wore off around lunchtime. I spent Thursday evening at home, and had an early night and more or less cried myself to sleep.

Tonight has been an odd mix of both feelings, but Wednesday's grinning is more or less winning out. It's not very often you decide to go out for the evening at 11pm in this country, but it was the right decision. Generator seems to be a guaranteed OK night out, and the last hour was fabulous. I'm still earwormed with Debaser. And I did my good deed for the day for a complete stranger who'll never know it was me who did it, and that makes me giggle. And I said hi to Mark (hi!) and swapped phone numbers so we can catch up properly at Whitby, and said hi to the CSR lads too, which is nice. And talked about Harry Potter with Florian - his copy he's hoping will arrive tomorrow. And yeah, for the most part being good friends who share a lot of music is a great thing, and only some of the time does it still hit me how much more I really want.

Oh and at some point I really must right at least a short review of Ladytron.

Current Mood: mostly perky
Current Music: /~ debaser, debaser ~/

I seem to be somewhat knackered. And feeling more and more inclined for a quiet night in. So, your assistance is requested: [Poll #567332]

Current Mood: knackered

Clubbing on a Thursday night. You know it makes no sense whatsoever but somehow after a tequila sunrise in the Maypole and a pint of Landlord in the Mitre it just becomes inevitable. Well done to the lads who spent so much effort flyering us through the window. And well done to whoever thought of having a mashup night at the Soul Tree. And bye bye Beth, you'll be missed but I'm sure you'll keep visiting and I'll look forward to it.

Well, I may have got a few entertaining reactions by posting lots of memes, but really I think of this thing as a diary, so what have I been up to since I last posted. I mentioned crocheting a hat, but have otherwise been silent in terms of real content for over a week.

Quiet nights in were had on at least Monday, Wednesday and Thursday. Which is why I had time enough to finish it. Tuesday however was excellent. Having spotted that BBC4 were doing a BritPop night to commemorate 10 years since the overhyped battle of the singles between Blur and Oasis we decided it would be excellent to watch, and invited Andrew, Becky and Mobbsy to join Richard, Mike and Myself for dinner and much music. And in the end much wine. A veggie cheesy crumble bake thing came out excellent and rather filling, and was ideal in the sort of leave-it-in-the-oven-doesn't-matter-if-people-are-late way that is sometimes necessary when people are relying on buses. The telly was actually by and large a little dull, with two (three) documentarie covering very similar ground - though the new one was by far the least good. Noel Gallagher in the one they showed last was actually pretty much a star and very witty and sharp, showing up his brother Liam something chronic. It was almost a shame this one had had half the info already used by previous ones. Butstill, they were interesting enough and gave us plenty to reminisce about. In between them however was an hour or so of material recorded by assorted bands at the time of the BritPop boom, with entertaining little "where are they now" bits of info popping up on the bottom of the screen. But it was just great to actually see them all again playing live in the studio a bunch of tracks which make us all feel 10 years younger again and remember just how much fun some of it was.

In contrast to a great night in last night was a great night out. Jamie and Mel drove up from Dorset to join us for the weekend. Mike and I had a few games of pool in the Alma while waiting for them, and I have to say all this practice I'm definitely improving. I may have only won one game of four but they were hard fought for and there were some lovely shots played for and made and not just fluked. And the Old Bob was rather nice actually, if a little expensive. Next stop was the Saffron, where amusingly it turns out both Ned and Mike had independently stopped in earlier and asked George to be on his best behaviour towards Mel. Awww, bless. Still, nice company and nice curry and lots of cobra made for 6 very full people who decided it was a good idea to go out dancing. So once again we hit the Kambar on a Friday night. Beth'd had a bit of a bad day with annoying news from her university that they'd overfilled the places for her course and were looking for people to defer and she might not get her place after all, so that made the party a little subdued. But in general I think we all had a good time. And we were joined by Florian again, as well as a bunch from CSR and a miracle in that George came out to meet us too - he's apparently only been promising it for years.

Anyway, I shall cut short as it's time to go out again. We stayed til late and staggered home and I've spent most of today sleeping. Work has been not bad this week despite tiredness, with a positive off-the-record meeting with James and Caroline and progress on various odds and ends.

Current Mood: perky

We had fun last week, so we thought we'd try it again. Generator seems to be playing a nice mix of Indie Rock stuff, with things dating from the 80s right up to the minute. Oh look they have a webpage, ooh and I can just make out Mike and Florian in this picture from last week [Poll #546204]

Current Mood: perky

Lovely Saturday evening quietly celebrating Kirsten's hen night, and later joined by Col's stag party. There was paddling pool, booze, burnt things, some of which on sticks, a guessing game, and a good time had by all. Didn't stay very late. Sunday was quite followed by an evening at The Red Cow in the basement bar at

covertmusic's IDM night Clear. Which was lovely actually. Nice bar, nice music, great company. Another earlyish night and a couple of productive days at work, with Monday at post-pizza with birthday cake for Kirsten and Tuesday at home with knitting. I slept like a log that night which made a lovely change, and decided last minute to take Wednesday off and got lots more knitting done, before joining Jacob, Rachel and Peter for a BBQ at Col and Kirsten and Benedict's. Lots of booze and far too late a night so I'm knackered again today, but hey it was good fun and worth it. Today I've tidied my room a bit and sorted a bunch of old photos into an album in more or less chronological order, which was quite a feat. Bedtime now, and weekend tomorrow night. Planning dinner with Ned and Beth then hopefully out clubbing again. Gosh doesn't a week go quickly.

Current Mood: sleepy

We'll gloss over most of the week. There was Red Dwarf, bridge, a work curry with Mike's work, and lots of sleep on Thursday, but it all seems a long time ago now. Last night however we went along to the Carlton and had a pleasant dinner with Ned and Beth, and were joined by Jenny from Mike's work (who wasn't at the curry) plus Florian who I've met a couple of times before, and Florian's housemates Sylvie (French) and her bloke (name forgotten) who's Aussie. A nice bunch anyway. When time came Mike, Jenny, Florian and I were up for some more partying, so we headed into town and wandered over to see what was on at the Kambar. Having vaguely heard of Generator and thinking the entry price not too steep we gave it a go. Good call. So the Kambar is a complete dive, and the crowd was fairly middling twenties and not very trendy but it was packed and the music was great. A slightly rockier end of indie, with stuff from early 80s right up to the minute. Some great mixing between tracks in the first hour or so, and then a bunch of crowd pleasers to end the night. So yeah, we drank lots and jumped up and down and yelled along. Mike stole a Reel Big Fish poster, and we stopped at the trailer of life for chips before sharing a taxi back as far as ours, where we left Jenny to continue to Cottenham.

This morning (ie 3:30 this afternoon) we got up with nasty hangovers, and I'm just beginning to feel better enough now, having accidentally had another nap for an hour around 6, to be ready to head out for Kirsten's hen night. But fabulous fun, and it's great to realise there's a club I'm happy to go out to on a Friday night in Cambridge. I see some more dancing in my future.