Well I said I was gonna blog on the weekend, and then I didn't the weather was just too damn nice so I spent my days outside in the sun, and my evening well.....

Where did I leave you last? I think it was about 2 weeks ago.... The weekend before Marks birthday, life had been a little strained and weird, but nothing inparticular was going on.

On Saturday 11th we headed up to London for a couple of reasons - we were supposed to go to Lyme Regis in Dorset for the weekend but it cost too much and would've taken an age to get there, plus Mark wanted to see his family before he got any older, and I had been invited along to dinner with some old school friends, and a party afterwards.
So we got on the train and settled in for what is supposed to be a 1 &1/2 train journey to London. However 'they' were doing work on the line so after 2 &1/2 hours of being fucked around by public transport we finally got into London and arrived at the restaurant late, but not too late. Everyone was there before us though, and it was almost like walking into the old year 11 and 12 'Common Room' but with heaps less people in it obviously.... But both Ben's were there, and of course, Em and Nell plus respective partners where available. Dinner was delicious, Italian food is almost always good, the conversation flowed on until well into the night, or early hours of the morning. After realising we'd gotten through 16 bottles of wine and it was 2.30am we called it a night and promised to do it again sometime.

We skipped the party, Mark and I headed back to Em's place in Hern Hill and we had more 'night caps' until it wasn't night anymore, instead it was 9am and our eyes were falling out of our heads. So we called it a day and got a few hours kip before getting up and heading over to Mark's Mum's place. A nice little walk with a short stop at the pub on the way and we were there in time for something to eat and drink and to spend some time doing the whole family catch up routine. Before we knew it the hours had gone again and it was time to head back to Hastings. We got home around midnight and both were completely knackered and collapsed into bed, fast asleep.

Thankfully I had a late start booked for Monday morning which was nice, I got a little sleep in before having to drag my sorry arse out of bed and into the office.

On Tuesday I was unwell, due to a Gridley Birthday fever, so I called in sick to work and spent the day enjoying the sunshine and helping Mark try to forget that he only has one more year of his thirties!! I got him a kite for his birthday which I excitedly gave him that morning before he'd properly woken up, and soon after we were putting it together and running outside to see if we could get it in the air.

It went straight up (apparently stunt kites are easy to fly...?) and then straight down as both strings snapped in the strong wind. Not letting that bother us though we headed to a not so windy spot for a picnic and a biffta. After having our fill we headed into the old town to find some string and have a 'quick' pint.

The string was the easy bit. When we were in the pub a television crew walked in and began interviewing various patrons. Mark and I were tucked away in the corner him hoping not to be interviewed and me not wanting to be on telly at all - I was supposed to be ill!! But luck wasn't with us, and the crew spotted us and sauntered over with all the bravado that these people seem to have and asked us if we would talk to them and the German public about what it meant to be English. I promptly pointed out that I wasn't the right candidate, but Mark, instead of taking his get out clause piped up and said he would. They interviewed him for all of 5 minutes, but he complained the rest of the day about being made to talk on telly on his birthday. Poor love.

When we got to the top of the hill back towards our we tried out the kite again, and it flew like a champion, Mark could do figure 8's, loop the loops and all sorts of tricky little stunty things. It was lovely to watch, and then he asked if I would like a go. I got it up there, and zig zagged a little across the sky and finally did a perfect nose dive straight into the ground and split the spine of the kite. Mr Mark wasn't very happy, but it wasn't completely broken, so he took the reigns and got her (are kites girls?) into the sky again. Just a few moments later he did exactly the same move as me, only this time the spine snapped in two with a loud crack! And that was the end of the kite fun for that day.

The rest of the week slunk by reasonably non-eventfully. Work, sleep and chores.

After what seemed an eternity, but in actual fact was only 3 days it was finally the weekend again, and we had another party to go to on the Saturday night. Not wanting to get ahead of myself though, we'll rewind a touch to Friday evening.

Mark met me at the train station and we headed into town for a few pints before getting home for some pizza and a smoke - a perfect way to begin the weekend I think! A relax in front of the telly, with a beer in one hand, a slice of pizza in the other and one stuck down the top of your pants - that's me; the one with the three hands....



Friday night telly is pretty funny here, and if you get the chance, check out a comedian called Johnny Vegas and his show 18 stone of Idiot, he's a complete pisser.

Anyways, a reasonably fun but uneventful Friday evening was had. Saturday morning rocked around and woke me in a bad mood - being summer it's getting light here at about 3.30am or so, and it seems that the neighbours are following the sun and getting up around the same time to put on their tap shoes and dance on the floor above our bedroom - which is our ceiling... Arrrgh! To top it off, the nextdoor neighbour was in his yard whistling. A conspiracy to put me in a bad mood, but instead I got up, found we were out of tea bags, cursed and rolled myself a fag then called home. None of you bastards were answering except for my lovely brother Aaron who after a while told me he was extremely busy pulling up carpet and he'd call me back....

Sigh... So I pestered Mark for a while and then we headed into town, missioning for some pieces to fix his broken kite.

We got all the bits for nothing - I think the people in the shop felt sorry for an old man with a broken kite... No seriously, we were just lucky. But we got the pieces and then in true Mark and Victoria style headed for the Nelson for a pint. With no breakfast in our bellies, after about 4 pints in the sun later and talking to some old man about anything and everything both of us were feeling a little.... shall we say - drunk? And so headed up the hill to home for a nap before the party. I fell asleep in a sweat hoping that I could sleep off the bad head I could already feel coming on, and Mark did much the same although his head wasn't anywhere near as bad as mine - he's had more beer practice.

A few hours later I woke to find that I wasn't successful and once again my brain was trying to escape from my skull. We got ready anyway, thinking that we'd stop at a milk bar or something on the way to the party for some panadol. Nothing was open for the whole distance there - about 1/2 an hour walk, and my heads banging became steadily louder the closer we got. When we arrived the beat of the music was out of sync with the banging in my head and I had to leave and go home. Mark was great and hailed a cab and came home with me - I felt terrible that he'd missed out on what looked like a load of fun just because I couldn't handle my afternoon drinking. SHAME ON ME!! When I got home I headed straight to the loo and let my illness reach its natural conclusion....

Sunday was pretty quiet, I was feeling fine again and the kite was fixed so we spent most of the day trying to fly it in the slight breeze, or sitting out on the green and looking out to sea or watching the world go by as we sunk a few Stella's. When will I ever learn?

Tit for tat, butter for fat, you kick my dog, I'll kill your cat....

Looking forward to the weekend. It's been a busy week with some interesting developments. I shall write more on this after the weekend.

Life ain't all Ha Ha Hee Hee, but even when it's not, you can still have a boogie!



I have been a bad blogger of late, and not feeling like writing anyway, so sorry to anyone out there who has continued to read on. It hasn't been terribly exciting so I can completely understand if I have lost my readership.

What can I say? Where did I leave it last time?? I can't remember so you'll have to skip past any duplications on the old what's been going on??

Weekend before last was a long weekend and the week before that came about was when Lee - Mark's brother - and his girlfriend Jemma got back from O.S where they'd been tripping around, and for some of the time staying with my older brother Aaron. Mark went up to Londond again to mee them at some ungodly hour of the morning - such a sweet caring person! Apparently they enjoyed themselves, and after spending the day in London after getting back they trekked down to Hastings with Mark to spend some time with us, although I wasn't about a hell of a lot, what with work etc... Still it was nice to have them stay and I know that Mark is pleased to have his li'l bruv back in the same country.

So that weekend we had a long weekend - Mark wanted to go to some music festival doolally that I wasn't interested in, so I headed up to London for the weekend while he remained in Hastings to play host to Lee, Jemma and a few other mates, in fact I am told that there were so many people in the flat the Mark had to sleep on the floor. Definitly a good time to use that annoying English saying - 'Ooooh Bless!!'

While Mark was sleeping on the floor, I was being well looked after in London by my mate Sue. I arrived there late afternoon and we headed straight to the pub, like all good mates would, for a chat over a few pints. Was a lovely day, and I even had the oportunity to wear summery clothes and use my sunnies for possibly the first time since being here (well not quite but hey) We chatted until late and then headed out to dinner with the rest of the housemates - all five of them - and that's not all of them, but that's another story that doesn't need to be told here. Dinner was delicious, Italian food with good yet fun service! Had a good laugh and a few more bevvies before the others decided to call it a day and Sue and I decided to check out the local clubs of Wimbledon. I quite liked the idea of gettin' on down with a womble.
Surprisingly there were no wombles on the dance floor, or in the club. But we stuck about and boogied all night in between giving shite to the DJ and bouncers until our legs felt like they were about to fall off. Once you have that feeling you know it's about time you went home! The club we went to - the watershed - was a load of fun. Reminded me a lot of 'The Club' back in Warragul, or some other little suburbia club in Melbourne. And it was a damn good laugh even though the music was predictable, and the crowd were damn pissed, and some guy who professed to be gay then tried to pick me up. Do I look like a man??
When we got home it appeared that Claire was sound asleep in her bed, where I was supposedly going to sleep. So in true good friends fashion, I stuck my fingers up her nose, and after doing so realised that it wasn't Claire at all, but another guest of theirs - much to Sue's delight and our own laughs. I promptly pulled them out again and apologised profusely as only a pissed up person can do. How do you face that one the next morning?
So we 'crept' out of the room (read stumbled and fell) and quietly closed the doors behind us into the living room (read slammed the doors) and sorted out the sofa bed where we both passed out after a few slurred 'goodnights'.

Next morning we decided to head off to Kew Gardens where they currently have a glass sculpture exhibition going on. Sounds excellent and the coffee table book that Claire got of the work there looks awesome. So we slowly got ourselves together and headed off for the tube to Kew. After an agonisingly slow tube ride (about an hour) we finally arrived and stopped at a coffee shop for a much needed coffee. Unfortunately for us though their idea of coffee for their shop was to have a machine that dispensed liquid like mud... Uuurrrrgh, but we drank it anyway, not wanting to waste that one pound ten...

We checked out the card shop with some funny pictures, and I almost bought yet another postcard for home but refrained (I'm getting good at that) and off we went to the gardens. I was expecting something like Melbourne botanic gardens, but can't tell you if I'm right or not because the whole place is surrounded by a 10 foot brick wall, and the queue to get in was a 1/2 hour wait if not more. So we turned around and went back, debating if we should head to Camden markets, or somewhere else. After discussing in earnest for a while we decided on pasta, a video and afternoon nap back at the ranch.

Sunday night was pretty quiet, just telly and a bottle fo gin between us - and tonic! And before we knew it the weekend was over and I had to get home again to get ready for the working week ahead.

Last week being only a four day affair went quite quickly. Nothing too much to report there, work was busy with new things to get done by yesterday, Mark and I had a few words and missed out on the last episode of Desperate Housewives - much to both of our disappointment, and then it was the weekend again! Can't complain about that.

On Friday night after work I met Mark at the train station in Brighton and we went out for drinks with Lisa (Linc's x-housemate) her boyfriend and Mark's mate Damian. Was a nice little pub called the earth and stars, not far from work and easy walking distance from the train station. Even so, Mark and I missed the last train and ended up at a wannabe posh club in Brighton with the rest of the guys. After me doing some random guys head in with rubbish talk and a few more drinks for the other guys (I'd switched to water by then) we left and tried to find a decent souva - damn near impossible in England. We did end up with a kebab, which is like the souva's poor cousin, served in a polystyrene container. Not the best pissed food you can get, but almost edible.
I woke up the next morning on Lisa's floor, Mark beside me and my brain deperately trying to fight it's way out of my skull. I don't think I have ever had a hangover that bad, and I'd even switched to water! After a few panadol and a half hours more sleep Mark and I decided it was time to find the train and head back home for a much needed showere and breakfast.

By the time we got back home we were both knackered and only just managed to get a few things we needed it town and then catch the chairlift up the hill. Great for those lazy days when I don't care how fast my arse is expanding.

The weekend streatched out for ages, felt like another long weekend! Yesterday we went to see Sin City, which was pretty crap - don't bother - but it was the only outing for the day and therefore somewhat enjoyable.

So that's it, pretty much up to date minus a few details here and there which don't need to be shared.