Thursday, July 23, 2009
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If you have ever tried to delete alot of items in a SharePoint list (programatically) you will realise that this can be very time consuming (by the server) as it needs to iterate over EVERY object in the item collection and delete the list items one by one - that is if you use the standard SharePoint API. Luckily there is ProcessBatchData method available on the SPWeb item which allows you to do batch processing on particular methods in SharePoint - and deleting items in a list is a perfect candidate for this.
Basically all you need to do is pass an XML packet to the ProcessBatchData method which gives it the instructions on what to do. In this case we are using the Delete command.
On the MSDN code gallery there is already an implementation of
this, however I changed this myself so that I could change it and use it as a single method in a utility class. In the end the method I ended up with is:
public
static void DeleteAllItems(SPWeb currentWeb, SPList currentList)
{
StringBuilder sbDelete = new StringBuilder();
sbDelete.Append("<?xml version=\"1.0\" encoding=\"UTF-8\"?><Batch>");
string command = "<Method><SetList Scope=\"Request\">" + currentList.ID +"</SetList><SetVar Name=\"ID\">{0}</SetVar><SetVar Name=\"Cmd\">Delete</SetVar></Method>";
foreach (SPListItem item in currentList.Items)
{
sbDelete.Append(string.Format(command, item.ID.ToString()));
}
sbDelete.Append("</Batch>");
currentWeb.ProcessBatchData(sbDelete.ToString());
}
All you need to do now is pass in the current SPWeb (eg SPContext.Current.Web) and the current list object, then call this method and all your list items will be nicely deleted!
Wednesday, July 22, 2009
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Ever had the problem where you are working on a timer job in SharePoint, but no matter what you do to try and tune your code, it just doesn't fix? Well there is a simple reason for this - the SharePoint Timer Job caches your assembly!
I discovered this (again recently) after creating a timer job and updating the assembly myself. No matter how many times I redeployed the assembly or restarted IIS or reactivated the feature which installed and uninstalled my timer job - nothing seemed to fix my broken code. I finally resorted to restarting the Timer Job Service and like magic the code started working.
So moral of the story - if you are using timer jobs and have already installed it and just want to update the code - simply redeploy your assembly to the GAC AND restart the timer service. Better still if you use batch files for doing all this for you, then add the following code to your batch file to restart the Timer Service for you:
net stop sptimerv3
net start sptimerv3
Friday, July 17, 2009
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If you have been doing SharePoint development for some time it is more than likely that you have developed your fair share of custom pages and custom controls/webparts for MOSS 2007. Where possible I try and leverage the existing SharePoint controls (such as the People Picker) to use on my pages as Microsoft has already done all the work developing these controls. One aspect I had never been able to get going until recently though was adding a spell checker control to my pages. I have just discovered that this is alot easier than I thought.
To add the out of the box spell checker all you need to do is:
1. Make sure you have the right page directive on the page you are adding the control to
<%@ Register TagPrefix="SharePoint" Namespace="Microsoft.SharePoint.WebControls" Assembly="Microsoft.SharePoint, Version=12.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=71e9bce111e9429c" %>
2. To the head of your page, add the following controls, which will give you the javascript required for the spell checker to run:
<SharePoint:ScriptLink ID="ScriptLink1" Language="javascript" Name="core.js" runat="server" />
<SharePoint:ScriptLink ID="ScriptLink2" Language="javascript" Name="bform.js" runat="server" />
<SharePoint:ScriptLink ID="ScriptLink3" Language="javascript" Name="SpellCheckEntirePage.js" runat="server" />
3. Add the following block of javascript code to your page:
<script language="javascript" type="text/javascript">
function doSpellCheck() {
SpellCheckEntirePage('/_vti_bin/SpellCheck.asmx', '/_layouts/SpellChecker.aspx');
}</script>
4. Now all you need to do is create a link or a button which starts the spell checker. to this you just need to add the onclick javascript method 'doSpellCheck()'
<a class="ms-toolbar" href="javascript:doSpellCheck()">Spelling...</a>
As a result of using this on click event, SharePoint will invoke a popup control which will enable your users to run a spell check against any input control that is on your page. Of course there might be certain controls on your page that you do not want to spell check against (such as People Pickers!) so all you need to do is add the attribute excludeFromSpellCheck="true" to any control that should not be spell checked:
<asp:TextBox ID="txtDontSpellCheck" runat="server" CssClass="ms-long" excludeFromSpellCheck="true"></asp:TextBox>
All in all, for a few lines of code, this really adds a heck of a lot of power and useability to your custom SharePoint pages!
Tuesday, June 16, 2009
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An issue I have always had is finding an easy way to generate SQL Scripts for moving data from one database to another. Obviously if you are doing a straight copy this is easy, however using only SQL Management Studio I was never able to find an easy way to get the data into a simply SQL script that I could give to a Database administrator for deployment.
Today I discovered a nifty commandline tool 'SqlPubWiz' that actually comes with SQL Server to do this.
Simply navigate on the server your database is on to the folder C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\90\Tools\Publishing\ and within this folder (or in one of the versioned subfolders) you will find a tool called sqlpubwiz. By running this at the command line and pointing this to your database, you can easily now generate the SQL scripts you require for your data.
ie sqlpubwiz script -d MyDataBaseName "C:\NameOfFileToGenerateScriptFo.sql" -dataonly
Friday, June 05, 2009
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Been doing heaps of stuff with jQuery lately, so thought I should start jotting down some of the more useable code that I have done.
A really useful bit of code was adding validation to check if at least one checkbox is checked. The following bit of code does that really easily.
First you will need to create a simple custom validator for your page:
<asp:CustomValidator ID="valCheckBoxes" runat="server"
ErrorMessage="You must select at least one checkbox"
ClientValidationFunction="CheckAnyCheckBoxChecked" Display="Dynamic"></asp:CustomValidator>
Once you have the validator, make sure that it has a ClientValidationFunction. You will then need to create this method. Using jQuery you can easily search for any checkbox that is checked. If none are checked, then throw the validation exception. Easy!!
<script type="text/javascript">
function CheckAnyCheckBoxChecked(sender, args)
{
var isChecked = false;
$("input[type=checkbox][checked]").each(
function() {
//Check if checkbox is checked
if($(this).is(':checked'))
{
isChecked = true;
}
}
);
args.IsValid = isChecked;
return;
}
</script>
If you have specific checkboxes that you don't want to validate, then you can add a bit more jQuery to the script to check for specific items. Below I am doing a check on any checkbox that does not have the class 'NonMandatory' assigned to it (note:// I am using the parent check for the class as with ASP.NET the CSSClass of a checkbox is assigned to the span class that surrounds the checkbox control).
<script type="text/javascript">
function CheckAnyCheckBoxChecked(sender, args)
{
var isChecked = false;
$("input[type=checkbox][checked]").each(
function() {
//Don't check for non mandatory check boxes
if($(this).parent().hasClass('NonMandatory') == false)
{
//Check if checkbox is checked
if($(this).is(':checked'))
{
isChecked = true;
}
}
}
);
args.IsValid = isChecked;
return;
}
</script>
Thursday, April 23, 2009
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Twice in the past week I have had the issue in my MOSS code where it is throwing an exception:
"The security validation for this page is invalid. Click Back in your Web browser, refresh the page, and try your operation again"
As it turns out the problem isn't so had to fix. Basically you need to set FormDigestSettings to disabled. This can be done in your code as follows:
SPWebApplication webApp = site.WebApplication;
bool formDigestSettingsEnabled = webApp.FormDigestSettings.Enabled;
webApp.FormDigestSettings.Enabled = false;
//Do all your code in here where it is throwing the error..
webApp.FormDigestSettings.Enabled = formDigestSettingsEnabled;
This can also be fixed by turning off the security validation for an application in Central Admin (however I probably wouldn't recommend this):
Central Admin -> Application Management -> General Settings -> Turn security validation off
Thursday, January 22, 2009
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When you are viewing lists of items in SharePoint, the context menu is fantastic as it allows you to edit documents directly from certain native applications. For example with a Word document you are able to select 'Edit In Microsoft Word' from the context menu, which when clicked fires up Microsoft Word and enables you to edit the document. However when you start creating your own custom webparts from SharePoint list items, you lose this ability. Today I had the challenge of providing a link to a document that was stored in a SharePoint list, but I needed to be able to fire the document up directly from the link.
After quite a bit of trawling through the web I found this great article which really got me going in the right direction:
http://wiki.threewill.com/display/is/2007/10/.
Basically you need to call a javascript method called dispex() which will open the application for you (instead of opening the document as read only).
So within my code I already had my Hyperlink control (lnkDocumentDownload) which was populated by an SPListItem. This also has the URL of the document set in lnkDocumentDownload.NavigateUrl. This needs to be set for this to work, and of course for applications that don't have integration with SharePoint, they will just use this link to go to the document.
What I needed to additionally add to enable the launching of the application was:
lnkDocumentDownload.Attributes.Add(
"onfocus", "OnLink(this)");
lnkDocumentDownload.Attributes.Add( "onclick", @"DispEx(this,event,'TRUE','FALSE','FALSE','SharePoint.OpenDocuments.3','0','SharePoint.OpenDocuments','','','','2','0','0','0x7fffffffffffffff')");
Once I added this in, whenever I clicked the link in my control, it would behave in the same way as clicking on 'Edit in Microsoft Word'.
I also found some 'kind of' (not really) helpful documentation on the javascript methods on the Microsoft website here: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc264013.aspx
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
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Yesterday I did a presentation for the Perth SharePoint User group on MOSS 2007 search and enhancing it with Longitude (a product by BA Insight).
'Longitude' is a third party product by BA Insight which extends SharePoint's search capabilities to deliver document page previews, relevance optimization, parametric navigation, enhanced sorting and a number of other additional features. In this presentation Clinton will cover MOSS Search and how businesses are using it, then will give a demo of Longitude highlighting how this can be used to extend SharePoint Search to deliver a more efficient and relevant search experience for end users.
For details about the presentation check out the UserGroup site
here.
If you are interested in downloading the presentation (which includes notes in the slides), then you can use one of the links below:
Friday, January 16, 2009
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I had an issue today trying to call File.SaveBinary() method of an SPListItem in the ItemUpdated method. Everytime I treid to call it it seemed to throw an error. In the end there was an easy fix for this - make sure AllowUnsafeUpdates is set to true. Once this is set, the binary can be saved no problem. The other method you should call before you save the binary is the this.DisableEventFiring(); method to ensure that the event does not go into an endless loop.
ie
this
.DisableEventFiring();
SPListItem item = properties.ListItem;
item.Web.AllowUnsafeUpdates =
true;
item.File.SaveBinary(updatedFile);
item.Web.AllowUnsafeUpdates =
false;
this
.EnableEventFiring();
Clinton added some photos to Facebook on 11/4/2008
Clinton added some photos to Facebook on 11/2/2008
Clinton added some photos to Facebook on 10/26/2008
Clinton added some photos to Facebook on 10/25/2008
Clinton added some photos to Facebook on 10/18/2008
New stuff for ClintonCherry.com
Friday, October 17, 2008
Because I rarely get an opportunity to edit my website I have decided to integrate
some other cool features into my website. Now as a part of the website any updates
that I do on Flickr, Facebook or on the other blogs that I write (boring nerd stuff
mainly) will appear here on ClintonCherry.com. This way you will get a much more accurate
idea of what I am up to (rather than an update every 6 months...)
Clinton added some photos to Facebook on 10/11/2008
Wednesday, October 08, 2008
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A query that came through to me this week was could we display the content type for an item in the search results? …and the answer of course was yes. I wrote a little function to drop into the XSL to do this, which isn’t that pretty, but does work. Basically this query works by referencing each of the known SharePoint Content Types and giving them a friendly name.
This can easily be implemented into the search results web part in MOSS.
As such my (not so short) template is:
<xsl:template name="GetContentType">
<xsl:param name="SharePointContentType"></xsl:param>
<xsl:choose>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'STS_Web')">Site</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'STS_List_850')">Page Library</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'STS_ListItem_850')">Page</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'STS_List_DocumentLibrary')">Document Library</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'STS_ListItem_DocumentLibrary')">Document Library Items</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'STS_List_Links')">Links List</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'STS_ListItem_Links')">Links List Item</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'STS_List_Tasks')">Tasks List</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'STS_ListItem_Tasks')">Tasks List Item</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'STS_List_Events')">Events List</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'STS_ListItem_Events')">Events List Item</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'STS_List_Announcements')">Announcements List</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'STS_ListItem_Announcements')">Announcements List Item</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'STS_List_Contacts')">Contacts List</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'STS_ListItem_Contacts')">Contacts List Item</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'STS_List_DiscussionBoard')">Discussion List</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'STS_ListItem_DiscussionBoard')">Discussion List Item</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'STS_List_IssueTracking')">Issue Tracking List</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'STS_ListItem_IssueTracking')">Issue Tracking List Item</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'STS_List_GanttTasks')">Project Tasks List</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'STS_ListItem_GanttTasks')">Project Tasks List Item</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'STS_List_Survey')">Survey List</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'STS_ListItem_Survey')">Survey List Item</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'STS_List_PictureLibrary')">Picture Library</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'STS_ListItem_PictureLibrary')">Picture Library Item</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'STS_List_WebPageLibrary')">Web Page Library</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'STS_ListItem_WebPageLibrary')">Web Page Library Item</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'STS_List_XMLForm')">Form Library</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'STS_ListItem_XMLForm')">Form Library Item</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'STS_ListItem')">Custom List Item</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'STS_List')">Custom List</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'urn:content-class:SPSSearchQuery')">Search Query</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'urn:content-class:SPSListing:News')">News Listing</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'urn:content-class:SPSPeople')">People</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'urn:content-class:SPSCategory')">Category</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'urn:content-class:SPSListing')">Listing</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'urn:content-class:SPSPersonListing')">Person Listing</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'urn:content-class:SPSTextListing')">Text Listing</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'urn:content-class:SPSSiteListing')">Site Listing</xsl:when>
<xsl:when test="contains($SharePointContentType,'urn:content-class:SPSSiteRegistry')">Site Registry Listing</xsl:when>
<xsl:otherwise>
Webpage (<xsl:value-of select="$SharePointContentType"/>)
</xsl:otherwise>
</xsl:choose>
</xsl:template>
Then to reference this in your search results simply call this template and pass in the variable ‘contentclass’ which appears on all search result pages:
<xsl:call-template name="GetContentType">
<xsl:with-param name="SharePointContentType" select="contentclass"/>
</xsl:call-template>
Clinton added some photos to Facebook on 10/5/2008
Clinton added some photos to Facebook on 10/3/2008
Clinton added some photos to Facebook on 10/1/2008
Friday, September 26, 2008
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I am (still) do heaps of work in SharePoint (MOSS) 2007 search which means I am (still) do heaps of work in XSL. An interesting task I had this week was to show and hide a body of text - however a brief summary of the text needed to be shown first, with the capability to expand the text to see more information. As there was no summary text per se, this meant the actual text needed to be shown partially, and when a link to show more is clicked, show it in it's entirety. Also, as part of keeping this all looking professional, the summary should not have any words chopped off.
Basically for the javascript show/hide we already had an existing bit of script I used, however if you need to try this out I thought I'd share this anyway:
<script type="text/javascript">
function toggleLayer( whichLayer )
{
var elem, vis;
if (document.getElementById) // this is the way the standards work
elem = document.getElementById( whichLayer );
else if( document.all ) // this is the way old msie versions work
elem = document.all[whichLayer];
else if( document.layers ) // this is the way nn4 works
elem = document.layers[whichLayer];
vis = elem.style;
// if the style.display value is blank we try to figure it out here
if(vis.display==''&&elem.offsetWidth!=undefined&&elem.offsetHeight!=undefined)
vis.display = (elem.offsetWidth!=0&&elem.offsetHeight!=0)?'block':'none';
vis.display = (vis.display==''||vis.display=='block')?'none':'block';
}
</script>
In order to specify the number of characters I was trimming initially, I added this as a simple XSL parameter to my XSL page ie:
<xsl:param name="AbstractSummaryLength">400</xsl:param>
Next I created an XSL method called 'trim' which basically works by recursively calling itself to continue to trim until it reaches a space, and hence the end of a word.
<xsl:template name="trim">
<xsl:param name="in"/>
<xsl:choose>
<xsl:when test="substring($in, string-length($in), 1)=' '">
<xsl:value-of select="$in"/>
</xsl:when>
<xsl:otherwise>
<xsl:call-template name="trim">
<xsl:with-param name="in"
select="substring($in, 1, string-length($in)-1)"/>
</xsl:call-template>
</xsl:otherwise>
</xsl:choose>
</xsl:template>
In order to get the summary of text (for a specified length) the substring method in XSL is great (assuming the field with our data is called 'abstract').
<xsl:variable name="summaryabstract" select="substring($abstract, 1, $AbstractSummaryLength)"/>
We can then pass this value to the trim method to ensure we get an entire word at the end of the summary:
<xsl:variable name="summaryabstracttrimmed">
<xsl:call-template name="trim">
<xsl:with-param name="in" select="$summaryabstract"/>
</xsl:call-template>
</xsl:variable>
<xsl:variable name="abstractstartposition" select="string-length($summaryabstracttrimmed)"/>
Finally, we just put together our variables and HTML, and we have a nice little piece of code to show and hide our full summary:
<!--Start of abstract-->
<div>
<xsl:attribute name="id">AbstractSummary<xsl:value-of select="id"/></xsl:attribute>
<xsl:value-of disable-output-escaping="yes" select="$summaryabstracttrimmed"/>
[<a title="Show Abstract">
<xsl:attribute name="href">
javascript:toggleLayer('Abstract<xsl:value-of select="id"/>');
javascript:toggleLayer('AbstractSummary<xsl:value-of select="id"/>');
</xsl:attribute>more...</a>]
</div>
<div style="display:none">
<xsl:attribute name="id">Abstract<xsl:value-of select="id"/></xsl:attribute>
<!-- Remainder of abstract-->
<!--<xsl:value-of disable-output-escaping="yes" select="substring($abstract, $abstractstartposition)"/>-->
<!-- Full abstract-->
<xsl:value-of disable-output-escaping="yes" select="$abstract"/>
[<a title="Hide Abstract">
<xsl:attribute name="href">
javascript:toggleLayer('Abstract<xsl:value-of select="id"/>');
javascript:toggleLayer('AbstractSummary<xsl:value-of select="id"/>');
</xsl:attribute>Hide</a>]
</div>
</xsl:if>
Wednesday, September 10, 2008
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I have recently been getting highly frustrated by a DBTextworks database that we are trying to index in SharePoint. In order to index this resource I ended up creating a proxy web service which got the data from DBTextworks database. I then used the Business Data Catalogue (BDC) in SharePoint to connect to this web service so that it could connect and index the data within MOSS. Unfortunately due to the very 'fickle' nature of DBTextWorks, as soon as you access about 5000 rows of a database in quick succession (as what happens when using the BDC) the database tends to corrupt itself (the way the BDC crawler works is to make a web service call for EVERY record).
As the business wasn't too keen on having their data corrupted I needed a solution to get all the data out of DBTextWorks and index it without corrupting the database. While I had the option of creating a SQL Server database, copying the data to it and then using the SQL BDC connector, this seemed like a lot of work when I already had the web services written. So in the end I decided to use the 'Caching'
Enterprise Application block. By simply adding a new method which cached the contents of the entire database, each individual call from the webservice queried the cached object rather than the dbTextWorks database - which also drastically increased the performance of the webservice. Obviously this did make for a rather large cache item, but we do have the infrastructure to support this, and now with only a single call required to the DBTextWorks database, the entire catalogue can be quickly indexed by SharePoint and the DBTextWorks database is not corrupted.
In order to prevent issues of 'old' data I also restricted the caching time to an hour, as the index was taking about 10 minutes to run, which was all that was needed for the caching.
Wednesday, July 09, 2008
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Calculated fields in SharePoint are often a good way to provide additional mechanisms for sorting and grouping your lists on particular aspects of data. Unfortunately it isn’t always easy to get the desired results you want without some playing around. For example, today there was the requirement to have a group of tasks grouped and ordered by the month they are due.
In order to do this a couple of steps was involved. First a new column was created as a calculated field. For this example lets call it MonthColumn, and the column we are getting data from is called DueDate. In order to display the month for this field, we got the value of the month using the following calculated value:
=TEXT([DueDate],"MMMM")
The view for the list is then changed so that it is grouped by MonthColumn. Unfortunately the next issue I got was that this was now ordered alphabetically. In order to get around this, the easiest and quickest way was to append the year and month to the front of the column, so it then became:
=YEAR([Some Date])&"/"&MONTH([Some Date])&" - "&TEXT([Some Date],"MMMM")
Unfortunately this still presented the issue that the ordering went January, November, February etc due to the numbers been 1,11,2 etc for each of the months. Finally I used the following formatting to get the value to Month value formatted to 2 spaces and it finally worked:
=YEAR([Some Date])&"/"&TEXT([Some Date],"MM")&" - "&TEXT([Some Date],"MMMM")
The longshot is when using dates with calculated fields it is generally better to use the Text() function with the date formatting masks rather than the specific functions (such as MONTH, YEAR), as you have more control over the display that appears and how it works. However once you get a handle on some of the functions available in calculated fields they can come in quite handy.
You can view some more examples here.
Friday, July 04, 2008
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When using SharePoint 2007 you can often get troublesome web parts throwing errors which in turn causes the page not to load. This can often prove frustrating, especially if you need to close or delete a troublesome webpart, however can not get the page into edit mode in order to be able to do this. Luckily there is a way to easily view the ‘Manage Web Parts’ page which enables you to easily close or delete web parts from an easy to use interface.
In order to get this you simply need to use the path:
http://<SHAREPOINTSERVER>/_layouts/1033/spcontnt.aspx?&url=yourpage.aspx
This will give you a management screen for the web parts of the page entered in the query string (in the example above this would be ‘yourpage.aspx’.
The above example will work for pages located in the root site, however if you have sub sites, you will also need to add the sub site folder name to the URL string:
http://<SHAREPOINTSERVER>/SUBSITE/_layouts/1033/spcontnt.aspx?&url=/SUBSITE/yourpageaspx
Tuesday, July 01, 2008
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I am sure that many of you use VPC images or similar for your development environments, and often the requirement will arise to create a new image based on an existing image - for a new developer or a new project or for a variety of other reasons. When developing with SharePoint 2007 (MOSS) and having this on your development environment, this can cause some serious headaches - mainly because you have to give the new image a new name (unless it is not on the same network) and as soon as you rename a SharePoint server it throws a hissy fit (as does SQL Server if this is also on your development environment).
Anyway, I thought I'd share the steps that I go through when duplicated a SharePoint image (and these are pretty much the same steps as renaming an image should this be what you needed to do.
- Go to the Sharepoint Central Administration > Operations > Services on Server and stop "Windows SharePoint Services Search"
- Rename your server, however wait until step 5 until you restart it
- If you have MS SQL Server installed, you will also need to rename this. Go to "SQL Server Management Studio" and execute the following script
EXEC sp_dropserver '<old_name>'
GO
EXEC sp_addserver '<new_name>', 'local'
- Update SharePoint references of the new name by calling the script:
stsadm -o renameserver -oldservername <old server name> -newservername <new server name>
- Restart your PC
- If you try to open Central Administration after restarting PC it will try to open the site with the old server name. To recreate your Central Administration site for the new server name, call the following command using a port number for the new location of central admin:
psconfig -cmd adminvs -provision -port 12345 -windowsauthprovider onlyusentlm
- Restart IIS and try to open your Central Admin site. It should successfully open your site with new server name
- Go to the "Application Management" and remove websites that reference the old machine name
- If you already have a search index drop this, and rebuild it
Now you should have a nicely renamed machine. You may find you need to create your site collections for SSP and My Sites, but this shouldn't be too hard.
UPDATE: Today I tried a different method of doing this which also works. I got the steps from a post on the SharePoint University site: http://www.sharepointblogs.com/mirjam/archive/2007/08/06/renaming-a-moss-server.aspx
Here are the steps:
Change each alternate access mapping for your MOSS/WSS deployment in Central Administration:
- Open Central Administration, "Operations" Tab, "Alternate access mappings" link
- Modify each mapping item to reflect your newly chosen server name
Use stsadm.exe to invoke the "renameserver" command option:
- Open a command prompt window
- cd "C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\web server extensions\12\BIN"
- stsadm -o renameserver -newservername <newname> -oldservername <oldname>
Rename your Server via Change Name Operation in Windows Server 2003:
- Start Menu | Control Panel | System, "Computer Name" tab, "Change" button.
- Input your new server name
Reboot the server NOW.
After reboot, open command prompt
- cd C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\web server extensions\12\BIN
- stsadm -o updatefarmcredentials -userlogin <domainuser> -password <password>
- iisreset /noforce
Check all application pool identities in IIS, update where the old machine name is still there.
If you already have a search index drop this, and rebuild it
Thursday, June 26, 2008
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here
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Have you ever needed to update the web.config for your MOSS environment? This can be quite a difficult process as you need to modify it on every server in your farm, and of course monitor it. Today I stumbled over what seems like a pretty good way of doing this using some programming and a feature to deploy the changes. I haven't tried it yet, but probably will have to in the near future so will let you know how it goes.
In the meantime you can enlighten yourself by reading how to do it here.
Friday, June 06, 2008
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here
to view the article
Some time ago I wrote an article on styling the 'Best Bets' results in SharePoint. Recently I was looking at this XSL, and realised there is a much cleaner way of executing the same solution.
Instead of running a test within each match as per my first example, I think it is actually easier (and cleaner) to create a seperate xsl:template for all best bet results, which calls the individual xsl:template for each result.
So, for example, you would add a new template such as this:
<xsl:template match="Root/BestBetResults">
<xsl:if test="count(Result) > 0">
<p>Recommended Results</p>
<xsl:apply-templates select="Result"/>
<p>Search Results</p>
</xsl:if>
</xsl:template>Then you would need to adjust the result template as follows (and of course you can remove the checking to see if it is the first result etc.
<!--The Best Bets template-->
<xsl:template match="Result">
<xsl:if test="$DisplayBB = 'True'" >
<xsl:if test="position() <= $BBLimit" >
... <!-- Standard stuff in here -->
</xsl:if>
</xsl:if>
</xsl:template>
Tuesday, June 03, 2008
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I have previously written about one of the great under used features of MOSS 2007 which is email enabled lists, which enables users to be able to send content to an email address, and then have this content automatically appear in a SharePoint list. One of the unfortunate aspects of this is that it can be quite difficult and painful to setup, and there isn't always the most abundant amount of information floating around about it.
I recently setup email enabled lists for a client of mine's production environment but was having all kinds of difficulty. I installed the SMTP component of the setup on the application server, and email seemed to all send to Exchange fine and get into the SMTP queue on the SharePoint Application Server, however it never moved from this queue.
I realised after some playing around that the SMTP server should be on the web front end servers, however this wasn't of much use if I wanted to keep this separate in terms of the Farm setup for our environment. Fortunately I discovered a work around which seems to work fine, which is to create a share on the SMTP drop folder, give the SharePoint Timer Service account permissions to this file share, and then use this file share in the incoming mail settings.
So to configure this in central admin (after setting up the share on the incoming mail folder - by default c:\inetpub\mailroot\drop):
- Go to 'Configure incoming e-mail settings'
- Set 'Enable Incoming E-mail' 'Settings mode' to 'Advanced'
- Set the e-mail drop folder to the shared folder
eg \\<SMTPSERVER>\drop$
What is Clinton up to?
Friday, May 23, 2008
For anyone who randomly visits this site, you will notice that it no longer gets updated
with the frequency it used to. In a bid to make this site more up to date with what
I am up to, I am looking to start to get information from a number of sources and
publish my activities also using this.
One such application I use is Twitter, which enables me to send updates via the web
or SMS as to what I am doing (my thoughts, activities, ponderings etc) and as such
you will notice to the left there is a section 'My Twitterings', which will change
all the time as I update Twitter.
In the future I'd like to see my updates to photo albums, Facebook or other applications
also appear on here, as well of course as still updating my diary entries here!
Tuesday, May 06, 2008
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here
to view the article
One of the features of SharePoint 2007 (MOSS) is that when you can easily make templates out of any custom list you are using. Once you create a template of this list, this template can be easily used by other users of SharePoint if they want to create a similiar list. These lists simply append themselves to the create page in SharePoint (http://<sharepoint>/_layouts/create.aspx). This is a great little add in to have, however sometimes you want to target these various custom lists at different groups of users, or hide them all together, however don't want to delete them from the List Template Gallery. Luckily there is an easy fix for this.
Simply go to the List Template Gallery (http://<sharepoint>/_catalogs/lt/Forms/AllItems.aspx) then
- Either create a new view or edit the existing view.
- In the columns list, make sure you check the column name 'Name (linked to document with edit menu)'
- Save the view
Now when you go to the items in the list template gallery, you will now have a context menu to edit the permissions for each item in the gallery. To hide these items from different groups of viewers, simply change the permissions for who can access the various items in this gallery. If a user doesn't have any access to the item, then it will not appear on their create page in SharePoint, as this is automatically security trimmed!
Betting week 5
Friday, April 25, 2008
Well to start with, last week didn't end up so good. A draw in the AFL and Man U going
down in an upset meant for the first time I lost money on a weekend, and ended up
$12 down for the weekend. I will post results later...
Moving forward I have put a stack of bets on this weekend!
IN the AFL at $4.85 I have $5 on Freo. At $4 I have $5 on West Coast. And Saints at
$2.30 was too good a bargain to pass up for $5. I have also perserveered and put $3
on Buddy to kick the most goals at $4.25, while I put my 4 pick on Coll-Geel-Adel-WC
for $2 at 12.5 to 1.
A huge week in the premier league so have put some money down there. I have $5 on
the Man U Chelsea draw at $3.20, for the same odds I have $5 on Middlesborough for
a win over Sunderland and another $5 on Liverpool at $2.45. I whacked $10 on Arsenal
at $1.27 which should be a breeze, and finally put $3 on Ronaldo to be the first scorer
in the blockbuster (at 6/1) as well as $5 that there will be at least 3 goals at for
odds of 2.3/1!
Thursday, April 24, 2008
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here
to view the article
I was having to do some work today in JavaScript where I was building URL's using variables passed to the script. One of the variables that I had to pass was the URL, and as part of this came across the issue that in appending the querystring value to the URL, that the URL may already have a value for the querystring.
However after a little scope around the web I found a nice little bit of javascript that checks the URL for the querystring value, and replaces it if required using a regular expression - so I thought I'd share it. Neat. Easy.
function replaceQueryString(url,param,value) {
var re = new RegExp("([?|&])" + param + "=.*?(&|$)","i");
if (url.match(re))
return url.replace(re,'$1' + param + "=" + value + '$2');
else
return url + '&' + param + "=" + value;
}
Tips for the weekend starting April 17
Saturday, April 19, 2008
Well I am a bit late to submit my bets for the week, but early on the bets I have
placed have already gone well. Chelsea won on Thursday night (which I had $10 on at
2/1) and then last night with the start of the IPL I had $10 on the Knight Riders
(at $1.72) which also came in.
So to the Premier League and Man U at $1.60 seem like a good bet for this weekend
for $10, and I have put another $10 on Arsenal at a low $1.31.
To the AFL and for my pick 4 I have gone for Saints, Geelong, Freo and Hawks which
was paying a healthy $8.10 (so I have $3 there) and another $1 on Judd to get the
most possessions at $13. Finally I have put $10 on the Eagles who are paying $2.17
at home against a team that has not won a game yet!
Betting results week 4
Thursday, April 17, 2008
Well another week down, and another week up. Though only made $10 this week, so wasn't
as lucrative as of late. Probably didn't help that I had a couple of late betting
splurges. I put $5 on Big Bad Barry to get 6 weeks or less at $1.90 which didn't come
in (but I'm not upset about that. Chelsea also didn't come in, but likewise I am happy
to lose money on them as that opens the door for Chelsea.
On the plus I put $2 on Richmond at 5.5/1 which brought me in a nice $11. Plus my
four pick of favourites came in, along with Man United and Man City.
Results
Bet: $40
Won: $50
Net: +$10
Net Total: +$110
Chelsea are playing tonight so have another $10 on them at $2.10 which isn't too bad
and will be part of next weekends winnings should they come in.
Predictions - Week 4
Friday, April 11, 2008
Its pretty lopsided in the AFL betting and no real stand out bets for me. For my four
pick I have gone WB-Kang-Geel-WC at $11.80 for $3 and WB-Kang-Geel-Syd at $3.30 for
$5 - hopefully if the first three can get in, then I have hedged my bets on the West
Coast game... Though I don't hold high hopes for the Coasters but with big odds I
have still put $5 on WCE at $4.35 as I still don't think Swans are that great either.
Finally I have put 2 bucks on Buddy to kick the most goals for the round (for a bit
of fun) as that is paying $6.
Updated: Have also decided to plunge a huge $3 on Essendon tonight
at $3.30 as I wouldn't make Friday nights viewing a little more exciting. And with
Embley out of the Eagles, I now regret any betting to do with the WCE, so I would
NOT recommend betting on them.
In the premier league Man United are back at home against Arsenal, though I can't
see them dropping another game so am backing $10 on them at $1.90. Chelsea are $1.25
against Wigan, but its still worth putting $10 on them as that should be a gimme.
Finally I think $3.45 isn't a bad price for Man City against an in form Sunderland,
so am putting $5 there.
Sportsbet Betting Results week 3
Thursday, April 10, 2008
Another week down and another week up in terms of betting.
I ended up topping up my bet on Melbourne to include another $5 on Geelong by 1-39
which was paying $4.25 and a $5 bet on Port Adelaide to win. With Melbourne losing
by less than 39 points, it meant I ended up getting over $60 back on this game, which
made up well and truly for my other AFL losses.
In terms of the premier league Chelsea brought me in some cash, and luckily I didn't
back Man United too strongly after they drew their game.
So at the end of the weekend I still ended about $20 up.
Bet: $50
Won: $70>
Net: +$20>
Total to date: +$100>
Predictions for weekend 5/6 April
Thursday, April 03, 2008
Well this week all the talk about betting should be around Melbourne Vs Geelong. Currently
they are giving 21/1 odds on Melbourne. For even money they are giving Geelong a 70
point head start. These odds are just too good to be true, so I have put a couple
of bucks on the win (cause this really isn't going to happen), but have put down $20
on the 70 point head start, as that is a BIG ask for Geelong.
In other footy betting I am backing $10 on West Coast at 2/1, while my 4 pick for
the week is for StK-Haw-Freo-Ess at $6.40.
Finally in the premier league I have put $7 on Chelsea for a win at a respectable
$1.75, and with my final $1 for the week have put it down for Man United to win 2-1
against Middlesborough at 8/1.
Now I'll wait and see on the early results to see if I back Chelsea in with some more
money...
SportsBet Week 2 results
Thursday, April 03, 2008
Week 2, and had some mixed fortunes. The Premier league was alot kinder than the AFL,
but still endup up. As all my betting was over by Sunday, I also ended up putting
on a few more bets, which more or less ended up cancelling each other out. I had a
double on Geelong and Richmond at $2.73 for $5 bet which didn't come in after a dissappointing
Richmond, though I did put $20 on Chelsea at $1.31 to win which covered the earlier
bet after they came in (just).
So in the end, I am now up a total of $79 with a summary of the weekends bets below...
Week 2 results
Bet: $115
Won: $130 (+$60 from Sportsbet loan)
Net result: +$15
Total to date: +$80
Predictions for weekend 29/30 March
Friday, March 28, 2008
With a tough week in the AFL, this week my attention turned to the premier league. I believe while Arsenal have been in a form slump, $1.73 for an Arsenal win is a good buy, so have wagered $15 on them for a win. From signing up to SportsBet, I also have a 'free' $60 bet to use, so have decided to use this to bet on Manchester United at home. They have been in sparkling touch, and whilst it is only paying $1.33, I'd say its pretty close to a sure thing.
In the AFL with my 'Pick 4' I have decided to wager it on Bris-WB-WC-StK. It is paying
$6.15 which isn't too bad, but as I'm not oozing confidence, I have decided to just
put the $5 on this bet. Finally I have put a few head to head bets - $5 on Hawks at
2/1 seemed a pretty good bet, as did 2/1 Line bet for Melbourne with a +14 point start
against the bulldogs. And finally I put a $5 on West Coast v Adelaide to be within
15 points of each other.
Fingers crossed for the weekend...
Summary
Arsenal to beat Bolton $15
Man U to beat Aston Villa $60FB
Bris-WB-WC-SK $5
Hawks to beat Dockers $5
Melbourne to win, or lose by less than 14 $5
WCE or Adelaide to win by 15 or less $5
Gamblor
Monday, March 24, 2008
Well after a huge hiatus from writing on this blog I have decided to post again. This
time its about my latest hobby... betting.
Judd
Last week I decided it was a smart move to bet $50 on Judd for the Brownlow at 13/1
- thinking he was fully fit and would romp it in (and also now that the Eagles have
lost him, the least I should be able to do is benefit financially be the loss). So
I managed to persuade Claire to go to the TAB for me and put the bet down. Having
watched him on Thursday night, I think he is miles away from the fitness levels I
expected from him, and as such he is probably already offering better odds this week.
That bet will also prove to be a waste of $50 one would think... HOWEVER what this
bet did to was give me the bug. The gambling bug.
Life as a gambler begins
Having enjoyed my little wager and the excitement of it all (even if that first bet
will take 22 rounds before I know any more) I decided why not spice up my life with
a bit of weekly gambling on all things sport. And so I decided to get an online account
with Sportsbet.
Week 1 bet
So for my first bet I decided to go on an AFL multi bet. What seemed like the best
combo to me was West Coast, Hawks, Bombers and Bulldogs. I thought the bulldogs should
fire for Brad Johnsons 300th, Bombers looked great in the preseason, Demons are woeful
so the Hawks had the bye, and I have to back the Eagles. The combo was paying 8.5/1
so I put $10 down and waited to see what would happen.
As it happened I was damn lucky with the Bulldogs, the Eagles weren't that convincing,
but the Hawks were great so coming into Monday I was sitting pretty with 3 out 3 to
that point. Getting a little nervous about the bombers I ended up hedging my bets
and placed $15 on the Kangaroos at $1.75. That way I couldn't lose on my first betting
weekend. In the end though I needn't have worried as Bombers won pretty comfortabley
in the end as did I on my first weekend.
The results
Bet $25
Won $85
Net +$65
So with a decent win on my first week, I'm already excited for next weeks bet... stay
tuned!
Clinton added some photos to Facebook on 11/21/2007
The Shiny Red Mustang
Tuesday, June 19, 2007
Well
it amazed me. I am sure it also amazed Claire. And I'm sure it amazes pretty much
everyone else, but the other day Claire and I reached 2 years in our relationship.
Pretty decent stint really. (It also amazes me that I am updating this web site again
- finally!)
So anyway for our anniversary Claire got me a fantastic ring. For her - I got totally
smashed the day before at a wine tasting event, starting at 10am, and almost didn't
get her a present. Lucky I had already organized another treat for her up my arm.
As a surprise, I managed to organize a full picnic to take Claire out (not bad
Clinton, not bad). Better still I arranged for a red
convertible Mustang to pick us up. 
And
somehow managed to keep it all a secret. (Though in retrospect this wasn't easy nor
was it overly fun, as Claire was pretty much ready to kill me up until midday - when
the Mustang finally arrived - as she thought I had all but forgot about the
anniversary).
So it was great to see the surprised look on Claire's face when we went downstairs
and the Mustang was finally there, waiting to take us out for the afternoon.
And I was able to avert major damage control. Michael, our chauffeur for the
afternoon, then took us off to the Swan Valley for an afternoon of wine tasting's.
It
was awesome fun to be out in a convertible again (I don't think I have been in one
since the good old days when I had my Suzuki Sierra), with the wind blowing through
my (well no) hair. We had some classic Dean Martin to set the mood, and the afternoon
flew by, with the help of some great wines.
At the end of the time in the Mustang, Michael dropped us off at Kings Park for our
picnic, though sadly the weather turned pretty average. So instead we opted for walking
home and having a picnic on the lounge floor, but at least we managed to have a great
arvo out in the Mustang.
Tuesday, December 07, 2004
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here
to view the article
Tuesday, June 19, 2007 8:37:21 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Well it amazed me. I am sure it also amazed Claire. And I'm sure it amazes pretty much everyone else, but the other day Claire and I reached 2 years in our relationship. Pretty decent stint really. (It also amazes me that I am updating this web site again - finally!)
So anyway for our anniversary Claire got me a fantastic ring. For her - I got totally smashed the day before at a wine tasting event, starting at 10am, and almost didn't get her a present. Lucky I had already organized another treat for her up my arm.
As a surprise, I managed to organize a full picnic to take Claire out (not bad Clinton, not bad). Better still I arranged for a red convertible Mustang to pick us up. And somehow managed to keep it all a secret. (Though in retrospect this wasn't easy nor was it overly fun, as Claire was pretty much ready to kill me up until midday - when the Mustang finally arrived - as she thought I had all but forgot about the anniversary).
So it was great to see the surprised look on Claire's face when we went downstairs and the Mustang was finally there, waiting to take us out for the afternoon. And I was able to avert major damage control. Michael, our chauffeur for the afternoon, then took us off to the Swan Valley for an afternoon of wine tasting's.
It was awesome fun to be out in a convertible again (I don't think I have been in one since the good old days when I had my Suzuki Sierra), with the wind blowing through my (well no) hair. We had some classic Dean Martin to set the mood, and the afternoon flew by, with the help of some great wines.
At the end of the time in the Mustang, Michael dropped us off at Kings Park for our picnic, though sadly the weather turned pretty average. So instead we opted for walking home and having a picnic on the lounge floor, but at least we managed to have a great arvo out in the Mustang.
Posted in Clintons Diary | General News
|
Monday, April 23, 2007 11:00:59 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
I hardly had a weekend last weekend, spending the full day on both Saturday and Sunday at an airbrush course. I received an airbrush from Claire's parents for my 30th birthday, and really haven't been able to use it very well, so I bit the bullet and decided to do a weekend workshop with an awesome airbrush artist from over east.
Our teacher Wayne, was a total bogan, along with most of the people at my class. I wasn't expecting this at first, but when I realised that most people into airbrushing these days are in it for spray painting skulls, lightning and bullets on cars I realised the interest. I probably should have guessed when the course was held at a smash repairs garage in Landsdale (with all the typical bogan cars sitting out the front). To make it even better Wayne sported a mullet and didn't look unlike Mel Gibson in Lethal Weapon. All this aside, he was awesome at what he did and made for some great lessons.
We covered all sorts of topics for the weekend, and while I thought it was going to be a breeze, I really struggled with the old airbrush. I managed to improve heaps over the weekend, and by Sunday I dressed down to fit in a little better (though I didn't wear tracky dacks and ugg boots like some of the class were), however I have got pretty good at flaming skulls and bullet holes that my transition into bogan hood has begun. Having said that, expert airbrushers can go on to doing body art on naked women for a decent sum of money, so I think I might take that path before I start spraying hotted up ute's with evil clown skulls.
By the end of the weekend, I didn't really feel like it was a weekend as I was working (in a sense) but it was well worth it. Throw in a drunken boozey night in town on Friday,a party at Gergs on Saturday night and a 50th on Sunday night, and I can't really complain that it was an uneventful 2 days...
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Wednesday, April 11, 2007 11:00:59 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
With work being so hectic of late I haven't had much time to hardly even think of late, so I was glad when the Easter Long Weekend finally came along and gave me a chance to get away. I really wanted to get out of the city, so luckily for Claire and I, a friend of the family offered up their house (shed) down south for us to use for the long weekend.
The drive down was probably the worst part of the whole weekend, with about an 8km traffic jam on Good Friday at the end of the Freeway which took about an hour to get through, but after that it was away from the troubles and we were on our way down south.
The shed they kept talking about turned out to be better than a shed, but not quite as good as a house. We had no tv, no phone reception, no couch, pretty much none of the basics you normally have. But we did have brick walls, a sink, a fridge, a toilet and a warm bed. And we also had lots of wine and food which we brought with us. Good enough for me.
The nights were cold. The days were nice. Sunday it poured all day. Friday was damn hot. It worked out pretty good in the end really. We spent Saturday day roaming wineries by day, and then by night at the pub watching the Eagles kick some black and white ass.
Sunday was just as lazy before heading to Caves for the (wet) Sunday Session where we met up with Harry, Lovey, Stuber, Beano, Tim and the girls for a great night out. There was the usual runniness and a few run ins with guys I hadn't seen for ages like Liwara Toopy. By the time we left I felt like a local as I seemed to know half the bar.
After Caves, my chauffeur for the weekend (Claire) took us back to Margaret River to Wino's which is a cool little wine bar as you drive into town. It had some awesome food, and when you bought your glass of wine, each glass came with it's own little carraffe which had the wine in it. Too cool.
Sadly Monday came around too quickly and the four day weekend was great, but as usual never enough.
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Sunday, March 11, 2007 8:57:24 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Claire and I had nothing planned for Friday night, and with the Western Force playing down the road at Subiaco oval, the opportunity was there to go to our first ever game. About 10 minutes into the game, still at home I suggested to Claire that we go and check out the Force. She said she'd come provided I'd "Promise that the Force would win". Boy did I not dissappoint.
While we did arrive about halfway through the first half it didn't really matter because all the action happened in the last 15 minutes. Getting late into the game the Force were just in the lead and defending grimly. Then with only a few minutes remaining the Hurricanes scored a controversial try to put them back in the lead. Devastation. It appeared that yet again the Force had thrown away a game at the last moment, leaving them winless in their 2 year history in WA.
But the Force weren't about to let me break that promise to Claire.
With the game in its final minute the Force pushed forward and tried and tried. And then with 9 seconds left on the clock they did try and got the touchdown - to put them 1 point behind. A conversion after the siren was the only way they could win.
The crowd stood as one - totally scared as Shepherd lined up to try and kick the goal to win the game, from the hardest possible angle and quite a fair way out. An almost impossible task for a bloke who couldn't kick earlier from point blank range, not to mention the howling win blowing accross the field.
And then he kicked the ball, and as if it was a movie storyline we stood and watched the ball float through the goals and the crowd broke into total rapture. We were all jumping and screaming with euphoria, it was so exciting I could have sworn I was at the AFL grand final watching the Eagles win. Absolutely brilliant.
So we partied into the night and were there the night the Force won their first ever game at home. We were there for one of the most amazing ever come back victories. What a way to start a weekend!
If you want to read more check out these other articles at news.com and at rugby heaven.
Posted in Clintons Diary | Sports
|
Thursday, March 01, 2007 8:44:03 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
On Saturday night I was lucky enough to be able to go along to Circus Oz, which is happening as a part of the Festival of Perth. Now I personally haven't been to a circus since I was about 10, so I was real excited to see what the circus is like these days, plus I had also heard some pretty good things about Circus Oz. It certainly did not disappoint.
Claire got the tickets for Christmas, and I was lucky enough to be on her invite list. We got there and the first thing we did was get some popcorn. I knew at this stage we were in for a fun night. Anything with popcorn always rocks.
Our seats turned out to be in the second row, which was awesome, as you really could watch the expression on the faces of the performers and carnies. The only catch was sometimes you had to crick your neck and stare up into the spotlights to watch the entertainment when it was up high.
The circus itself was full of great stunts and feats of strength, acrobats and daring, along with some great humour all the way. The 'Oz' in the circus also really came out through the show including a bogan on a bicycle (complete with mullet) who was dinkying about 7 other performers and later doing wheelie's on a bmx on fire. Everyone had real ochre voices everytime someone opened their mouth and of course each performer had a name like Sheila or Mick.
While there wasn't clowns or bearded ladies, there was no shortage of entertainment, they climbed vertical poles like monkeys, danced up high on the trapeze and light poles and contorted their bodies in all sorts of ways (including one girl putting herself into a small tank of water). The crowd screamed with fright, laughed in enjoyment and yelled with excitement through the whole show - it was an awesome atmosphere - making the time literally fly by.
I absolutely loved this show, and am definitely going to be going to the circus again next time it comes into town. If you get a chance to see a show like this, I wouldn't even hesitate.
Posted in CD/Concert reviews | Clintons Diary | Opinion
|
Tuesday, February 27, 2007 5:12:08 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
For those of you who don't really know me, (Lethal's brother, for example, thought for over 3 months that I was just a bum on the dole who frequented the pub that he worked at), by day I am a computer programmer, of which Microsoft .NET is the language we write code in. This makes me a certified nerd.
Over the past 12 months my nerd behaviours have become even more frequent, as I have become a regular participant in user groups (nerd gatherings) around Perth, where we meet on a regular basis to talk all things techie in the world of Microsoft. And man, do I love this stuff.
Well my descent into nerdem continued today, after I caught up with the local .NET nerds for coffee. Nick Randolph, one of the local IT boys around town, recently started up a weekly gathering, so we we could get together fellow nerds, once a week to discuss all things exciting in the world of IT. Awesome, I hear you say? Yes indeed.
The weekly coffee gathering is at Tiger Tiger (Tuesdays, 1:30pm), and as some of you are also quite aware I don't drink coffee. Not wanting to miss out on the weekly occasion, I decided I'd just buy some other type of cold drink. So I bought an OJ.
An OJ which cost $5.50.
Mind you it was freshly squeezed, but $5.50? Maybe its just me, but that just seemed like A LOT of money for a simple glass of squeezed oranges. Seriously, for that amount you must be able to buy a few kilo's of them. And the glass I got wasn't even that big. I think for next weeks meeting I might try one of their gourmet bottles of Coke. No guessing on how much that might be.
Oh yea, and the meeting was awesome. Come along next week if you are interested in coming deeper into the rabbit hole...
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Wednesday, February 21, 2007 10:28:38 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
I have just come back from an awesome 5 days and nights away in the Hunter Valley. It wasn't the longest holiday in the world, but it was my first since the I flew to Melbourne for Eagles Grand Final win last year (ah what a great memory), so it was great to just have a few days away from work.
The Hunter Valley is a wine region, not unlike the Swan Valley or Margaret River, about 2-3 hours outside Sydney. So this basically meant I spent the entire time drinking wine.
It was just Claire and I heading over there - for a friend of her's wedding. I have never been a huge fan of people getting married in far away lands, HOWEVER I am now changing my view on this, as it is an awesome excuse to go away some where, and in this case discover a great new place.
We stayed at the Hunter Valley resort, which while it was quite dated and not as flash as maybe I had hoped, it had it's own brewery (Blue Tongue brewery), had alot of vineyards shared by about 5 wine makers - meaning there were about 30 different wines on hand to drink and taste, had a pool, spa, tennis courts, resturaunt... well basically all the resort facilities anyone would need, which meant we didn't really have to go far and we had heaps to do. So we ended up drinking for the bulk of the time we were away and I sure got to taste a large amount of different beers and wines.
The only downside to the trip was probably the fact that transfer services only to Sydney and back once a day, so it really meant that Thursday when we arrived, and Monday when we returned were wasted in transit. Although after doing the midnight horror on Wednesday night, I don't think Thursday was ever going to amount to much...
The wedding took up most of the weekend, with the reception on Sunday. The venue for the ceremony was one of the best I have ever seen, with an awesome little chappel which was located on a hill at the top of vineyards. Both sides had French doors, which opened all the way along the chappel to let through the breeze (it averaged over 30 every day we were there), and to also let in the awesome views. We also got to soak this up with champagne straight after the ceremony, before heading back to the resort for the reception.
I promised Claire the worm would not be at the reception. Unfortunately those promises are never kept, and being a wedding, inevitabley the worm did come out after a number of wines. It of course as ever pleased the crowd, making sure it will not be the last time the world gets to see the worm...
So really it was a great trip that just wasn't long enough.
Wine. Weather. Worm. What a combo!
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Monday, February 12, 2007 6:04:05 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
On Saturday night it was Ethan's 15th birthday (Claire's brother). We were invited to go along, and as it was decided it was going to be a bowling night (of the ten pin variety) there was no way I was going to miss it.
Of recent times I have become a bit of a ten pin bowling junkie. I don't go that much at all - I would love to go every week - I just don't have the time. Also they have just closed down the only ten pin bowling alley in the city to build new apartments (grrrr :@), so there is no longer anywhere close to bowl. But none the less when I get an opportunity to bowl I take it.
I had never been to Rosemount bowl before, and was pretty impressed with the setup they have there. The place is pretty small, with only about 8 lanes, but it has a pretty cool retro feel about it, and is nice and intimate. In fact I wouldn't mind having my own party there sometime and booking the place out. Oh, and they sell beer so the place had to be good.
With most sports I do, I tend to be what most people would refer as overly competitive. Bowling is definitely no exception. On Saturday night the age ranged from a 5 year old girl to parents 2 generations older than her - however this did not stop me from being my usual obnoxious competitive self.
After bowling relatively well for the first game and leading all the way into the final round, I was feeling pretty good about myself. Clayton, who was unaware of the rules up until I told him about half way through the game, however, decided to hit a number of strikes on his final couple of goes and pipped me to the post. I didn't like this at all, giving me a serious dent in my ego, not to mention curbing the arrogance I was able to display up until then. Last time I ever help anyone else.
Luckily, like any champion, I was able to rebound for the next game, hitting a pretty reasonable 151 and demolishing my next opponent by over 25. It wasn't as good as the 186 odd that I got on some other freak night at the old Perth bowling alley (where I managed a turkey - but thats another story), but none the less I was impressed with my effort. Plus I got to rub it in the face of my younger opponents how much better I was, how many strikes I got and pretty much how I rule at bowling, for the rest of the night - which wasn't really that much longer because my younger opponents had to go to bed.
Ah, nothing like a ten pin bowling party on a Saturday night.
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Wednesday, February 07, 2007 6:44:23 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Many girls out in the world think I am a great surfer. I think many blokes out there think I am also. Truth be told though I am just a great liar. Up until Saturday I had never surfed - never even been in the water with a surfboard. Sure I used a body board for many years but never the standing up variety. But now, after years and years of spinning yarns about my surfing prowess I can now say I am a surfer.
On Friday night Claire and I headed up to Lancelin with Gerg and Kate for a weekend away, and come Saturday morning with a nice warm day ahead we headed down to the beach for a day of surfing. Gerg went over the basics with me (get on a wave then stand up) and we hit the water. It was pretty darn frustrating trying to stand up. The first 30 minutes was spent getting up to my knees - turns out I could be a great knee boarder - before Gerg gave me another piece of advice: don't use your knees, just stand straight up.
And so after about an hour of trying I was able to catch a wave, stand up on the board, and cruise on the wave for a good few seconds standing up. It was awesome. I felt like a God. My New Years resolution of 2004 was achieved. My ambition to be a surfer was achieved. In fact it was one of my proudest moments...
I spent the next few hours mastering the sport. I probably managed to catch about 10 waves in total standing up. By my final wave I was standing there saluting the crowd that had gathered watching me from the beach (Claire). Plus I had realised how addictive catching waves is. Sure I was using an oversize 7'10 board which was pretty buoyant - but hey, I reckon it was pretty darn good.
So now that I have the bug, look out for me at your local beach. And I mean look out for me because I probably will run you over. I have several bruises and cuts and bumps from where I ran myself over...
Posted in Clintons Diary | General News
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Monday, July 17, 2006 4:34:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
No I am not dead. Nor am I missing. Or even wanted by the Police. I have just been, well, away from the web. But I am back now and back for good. So get ready for things to really start ramping back up again on clintoncherry.com.
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Wednesday, January 18, 2006 11:13:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
New Years eve. Its over rated. But everyone still gets so excited about it. This year I had a wedding to go to, so wasn't so excited about it. And it still didn't really deliver. I don't know. New Years just isn't as great in Australia as been drunk in some foreign country with dudes who you can't even understand.
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Wednesday, January 18, 2006 8:45:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Xmas 2005. Boozing. Presents. Drinking. Eating. Alcohol. Catching up with friends. Oh and booze. Hey everyone knows what xmas is all about. Happy Birthday Jesus and Merry Xmas to everyone!!
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Wednesday, January 18, 2006 8:08:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Xmas is about joy. Joy is about drinking. And this weekend was about lots of drinking, joy and xmas parties. Oh and an engagement party thrown in for good measure.
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Wednesday, January 18, 2006 7:54:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Alright the title sort of sounds like it was a crazy xmas party weekend - but really it wasn't. We had a kids xmas party, which is still a xmas party, but I guess just not a big drinking xmas party. Other than that it was a pretty relaxing weekend. Oh yea, this was about a month or so ago by the way.
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Tuesday, January 10, 2006 1:01:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Rocking at Rockit. Boozing at Xmas parties. Two of the great things you get in December. And two of the great things I did this weekend.
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Tuesday, January 10, 2006 12:59:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
It was Kevin's going away weekend. It was Kevin's baby shower weekend. It was Kevin's house warming party weekend. It was Kevin's 30th birthday weekend. Anyway you look at it, it was all about getting drunk at Kev's house. And I reckon we did a decent job about it.
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Tuesday, December 27, 2005 11:02:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Well it's taken forever for me to finally find a spare minute to update my website, and more importantly get an account of PC and Erica's wedding. I have probably missed half of the detail cause it was so long ago now. But the important thing is that it went really well, and more importantly I got to make a total full of myself doing the worm and leturgical dances when I was really drunk.
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Thursday, December 08, 2005 3:29:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
This article happened yonks ago, so don't really care if you are interested or night. Basically cast your mind back about 5 weeks to the week before PC's wedding - nothing extremely exciting, though we did go to a karoake bar when we were all pretty drunk, so that can be interesting...
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Tuesday, November 22, 2005 1:32:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
It was PC's bucks weekend. And bucks weekends mean only one thing - booze and boys, and lots of it. Perfect ingredients for one hell of a bucking good time.
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Sunday, November 20, 2005 10:04:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Shit. I am totally useless. Yet again I have managed to fall three or four weeks behind updating the ol’ cc.com. So I think to speed things up I’ll keep the post from weeks back pretty short, sharp and sweet. So read on if you want to find out more about the Ministry of Sound weekend, along with Jessica’s engagement party.
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Wednesday, November 02, 2005 4:09:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
The other weekend I headed down to Dunsborough to get away from the city, to enjoy Spring and to have a break. So I guess that makes it Spring Break. I also managed to hang out with girls (well a girl) the whole weekend, which is what I assume you would also do at Spring Break. And of course I got drunk...
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Wednesday, October 19, 2005 11:55:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Nothing overly exciting about last weekend (though I did crash my car last week). Boozey on Friday in Subi. Games night on Saturday. You can read about my weekend if you want, though personally I would read about the Grand Final weekend or Spring in the Valley if you want some exciting drinking stories...
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Wednesday, October 19, 2005 11:52:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Spring in the Valley - the wine festival in the Swan Valley, designed to give everyone an opportunity to taste all the great wines offered in this region. What it really is is an excuse for 250 buses of young people to spend a day in the valley, get totally hammered drinking red wine, then make absolute asses of themselves. Gold.
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Tuesday, October 18, 2005 9:47:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
The other week wasn't the biggest weekend as far as booze goes,. To tell you the truth, the weekend after the GF getting totally boozed was probably the last thing on my mind. But what I didn't down in beer I made up for with wine and popcorn and chocolate and all the other indulgences one would expect for a weekend of indulgence. Well a Saturday of it anyway.
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Wednesday, September 21, 2005 4:22:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
I well and truly got back on the turps this week. The Eagles got into the Grand Final and you know me - I have to celebrate. And I'm sure I'll keep on celebrating or comisserating next weekend as I'm off to watch the Big Boys play the Big Game. But in the mean time if you want to read about my alcoholism...
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Wednesday, September 21, 2005 4:06:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Just a regular weekend really. Except for my nightmare house mate. Except for the party he threw at 5am on Sunday morning. Except for the complete random 4 football teams wandering around my house at 5am on Sunday morning. Why can't I just live a normal life like everyone else...
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Tuesday, September 13, 2005 3:13:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Eagles v Sydney. A big weekend. Well a big Friday. A big blockbuster. One of the best games I have been to. Ever. I chewed nails, I screamed in anguish and I sighed with relief. Then I cheered. Then I booed. Then I cheered. But the whole time I drank. What a night.
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Tuesday, September 13, 2005 3:11:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Get out the rocky music. Play a bit of chariots of fire also for good measure. Ok now that you have set the atmosphere, you can read about my epic run in the city to surf, which essentially means I have done the City to Rotto marathon this year.
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Thursday, August 18, 2005 6:43:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Sorry, again I have neglected to update the website for a few weeks. Maybe it’s the recent lack of excitement happening in Perth. Maybe it’s the weather. Whatever it is, I haven’t recently had so much motivation to update my site, but as two weeks or so have passed, I will bore you with my recent activities anyway. Actually to make it even easier for me I think I might break my last few weeks of my life down into 3 weeks as chapters. These may not be in chronological order as I can’t exactly remember that well for what I have done for the past 3 weeks, but it does give a close enough representation of my more recent life… (albiet quite a boring one)
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Wednesday, July 27, 2005 11:23:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Well as you can see nothing much has been posted on my website in the past couple of weeks. But just to make sure you don’t feel like you have missed out on anything, I thought I’d post a quick little update to let you know that I have succumbed to Perth ‘little town’ pressure, and have gone into hibernation mode. Yes, its true, your party boy Clinton has been very quiet for the past couple of weeks, hanging out with young Claire, and not really getting out on the sauce much at all.
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Tuesday, July 05, 2005 12:32:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Bear (noun) 1. Large furry Animal: zoology a large strong omnivorous four-legged mammal that has thick shaggy fur and sharp claws and walks on the flat of its paws. Family: Ursidae
2. Bad-tempered person: somebody who is surly or ill-tempered
3. Somebody who anticipates falling prices: stock exchange, somebody who sells stocks or commodities in anticipation of falling prices.
4. Boof: Bloke who never seems to come out and get hammered with the boys. Hence why a pub crawl was named after him in an attempt to get him to come out and get totally loaded with everyone else on a Saturday night
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Tuesday, June 28, 2005 3:47:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Damn missed my update again. So while you might have come here to read about last weekend's runny pub crawl what your finding here is my update from a week before. Still its not all bad. Got drunk on wine on Friday then hammered on Saturday on Tequila.
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Thursday, June 16, 2005 1:02:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Nys was back in town from Sydney for the first time so she led from the front on a weekend which started big and ended small for me, while my sister proved that she is a true Cherry, drinking up all day every day for the entire weekend. Oh yea, and it just kept on raining...
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Monday, June 13, 2005 7:18:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Well I have fallen behind in my weekly updates for about the 11th time this year, so have decided to combine the last 2 weeks into one - which is a pretty fair call from my perspective anyway because all my memories seem to have combined into about one of what has happened. Nothing out of the usual though - a party with bankers, a few dozen spa's and of course beer.
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Wednesday, June 01, 2005 4:13:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Last week was my Birthday. This week was the party. I might be getting on at 29, but that sure didn't stop me from getting on it for another couple of big, long nights of celebrating and boozing.
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Tuesday, May 03, 2005 6:00:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
In what would seem like a totally unprecedented start to the week, I have actually just finished a double update of this site. What this basically means is that FINALLY I am back up to date, and the following report actually happened only days ago, rather than weeks, as recent updates have. Anyway, the weekend was spent in Sydney again, with tequila and beer seeming to dominate proceedings...
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Tuesday, May 03, 2005 5:55:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Well its midweek in Canberra, and the weather is getting colder by the day. I think it hit minus four or so the other night. Two weekends ago I spent my first full weekend (in fact long weekend) in Canberra, to celebrate our Anzacs. And I spent the whole weekend with hairdressers...
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Tuesday, April 05, 2005 2:51:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Well it was Nyssa's last week in Perth (2 weeks ago) and didn't it end up being a big weekend? Boozey Friday. Even bigger and boozier on Saturday. Out again on Sunday... hmmmm... but then isn't this just too often the norm Mr. Cherry?
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Wednesday, March 30, 2005 8:04:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Back to Rotto for the Bucks, for the long weekend and for general boozing. Yes it was a boozey weekend. Yes, this did happen 3 weeks ago. And yes, I have been to Rotto again since!
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Monday, March 14, 2005 7:07:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Well the weekend between Rotto swim and Rotto bucks was relatively quiet. It also led to discovery of perhaps the greatest untapped sport in the young market - lawn bowls. More importantly it led to the discovery of the cheapest beer in the world.
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Friday, February 18, 2005 2:46:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
19 days alcohol free. Thats my current state, and my new world non-drinking record. As a result the last 2 weeks haven't been completely filled with alcohol fueled mayhem. Read on if you dare. I wouldn't. Its pretty boring.
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Thursday, February 10, 2005 3:35:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
It was a quiet weekend. It was a quiet weekend until Sunday anyway. Then I decided to make up for a real quiet weekend by going completely insane, drinking for about 18 hours and completely neglecting the fact that it was Sunday. Ouch.
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Wednesday, February 02, 2005 3:08:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
With Australia day falling midweek on a Wednesday this year, it basically meant a short week for all. With that in mind I thought why not throw in an extra weekly report for Oz day itself because you'd never guess, but there was alcohol involved.
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Friday, January 28, 2005 3:10:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Lethal turned thirty something old and with another perfect weekend of sun, what better way to use it then spending the entire week boozing. Yes, I saw the sun rise both mornings. Yes I went out on huge binge fests all 3 nights. And yes, I was sick on Monday. Very sick. But it was one heck of a birthday weekend.
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Wednesday, January 19, 2005 3:17:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
After spending all my money in the awesome trip that was my Christmas/New Years holiday to Europe (updates of this will happen over the next few weeks – but I will also endeavour to keep up to date generally of my Perth going on’s in the mean time), I thought it would be wise to make it a quiet weekend back in Perth, with not much money in my pocket. Sadly for my wallet (and liver) this didn’t happen. So this is my first weekend in Perth for 2005...
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Wednesday, January 19, 2005 3:17:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
As the jouney continues we head off to Switzerland. Probably not the most exciting part of my holiday as most of getting to Switzerland was spent sitting on planes, trains and putting up with dirty, stinky Italians. But at least you get the next installment of Euro 04/05.
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Friday, January 14, 2005 2:28:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
The journey begins. The trip to Europe for the Summer 2005 break. My final Friday in Perth, the trip to London, the reunion with the London crew and of course London. This is only the beginning so don't expect greatness - however it is also the beginning of my 22 day booze slash holiday fest in the Northern Hemisphere.
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Monday, January 10, 2005 7:20:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Yes, I realise I haven't updated this website for 3 weeks. But I been boozing and playing in Europe for 3 weeks, so got a lot to write and tell, and just need to find the time to do it - so stay tuned... Euro 04/05 stories will be getting published on this site soon. Very soon...
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Friday, December 17, 2004 2:32:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
My bloody car got stolen this week. Or did it? And I went to Rotto. Or did I? As per usual my damn brain kept deciding to discard certain valuable bits of information after drinking, causing my life to have that extra bit of fun that I don't really need.
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Friday, December 10, 2004 2:30:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
There is only one thing to say about last weekend - there was a hot, naked Scandanavian chick walking around my house on Saturday night. And she came from the Farm. Shame she wasn't visiting me though
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Friday, November 26, 2004 2:05:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Well another Movember weekend sweeps by with the usual crazy antics one could only expect from a Movembee. Managed to get to the Cott, South Perth, the city, Subi, Scarbs and out to the sticks (Sorrento) for a weekend involving as always, alcohol, but more importantly more dodgey mo antics as we build up to the Movember climax next weekend.
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Friday, November 19, 2004 1:20:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
PC kegger's party was the main drinking event for the weekend, and there was no shortage of drinking games, or drunkeness amongst the boys. Pegging and the Price is Right were amongst a menagerie (however the hell you spell that) of games that ensured we all could barely talk by the end of the night.
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Monday, November 01, 2004 11:11:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
The second half of last weekend (following my Friday update 'Invinsible') kicked on in pretty much the same invinsible style. Melis had his farewell, the tunes were spinning at Hod's place and Sunday was a day out drinking to celebrate Sparks and Jen getting engaged, before heading to the pub to keep on charging
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Friday, October 29, 2004 3:52:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Last Friday I swam laps before work, and headed off to work feeling totally invinsible. I was on top of the world. Of course throw alcohol in the mix and you get an interesting night. This is Fridays report. Ill throw another article for the rest of the weekend real soon...
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Wednesday, October 20, 2004 11:04:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Friday night the boys and I headed out to drink some beer, watch some bands and of course have a few laughs. The gravity games delivered with some great acts and a kick ass start to the weekend. Saturday and Sunday weren't too bad either, but as I didn't drink on those nights, I decided to not even bother including them in the update.
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Tuesday, October 12, 2004 11:00:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Last weekend gave me my first opportunity to experience Spring in the Valley. Nys had talked it up heaps in the past to me, so I was expecting Perth Cup in colder weather in a different location. In the end it was a fun day, tainted only by a little rain and getting stranded in the middle of no where.
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Sunday, October 10, 2004 10:08:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Well the long weekend was a mixed event. Started off with drinking, ended up with drinking, and had some sober moments in between where I managed to move house, away from the lures of Subi, and back to the probably more dangerous (drinking wise) area of Doubleview, with the Farm within crawling distance.
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Tuesday, September 14, 2004 9:15:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Thursday night down at the Vic. Friday night and back to the Vic. Saturday - you wouldn't guess - at the Vic. Sunday I somehow managed to get to 4 pubs and not one of them was the Vic. Still expect to read alot about the Vic if you read about this weekend.
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Monday, September 13, 2004 8:01:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
This story is about the underdog winning. The story of glory and triumph. Of winners and losers. Of champions. Of those who dare to win. The story of one boy defying all odds and becoming the prince of pool balls, the king of the pool table and a warrior amongst the pigeons (?)
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Wednesday, July 28, 2004 9:26:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Well you wouldn't read about. After a few weeks of really falling behind on doing my weekly review of the week, I have finally got everything back up to date and online. So now sit back, relax and enjoy another weekend of CC partying on in Subi!
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Thursday, July 01, 2004 12:50:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
I moved to Subi, and spent most of the weekend drunk. Thats about the best summary I can give. Read on for the gory details.
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Wednesday, June 23, 2004 9:45:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Pretty stock standard weekend. First boozey Friday night in the city and a typical Saturday in Subi meant for a fun weekend out. Oh yea, and managed to get through my first week of my new job unscathed.
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Thursday, June 03, 2004 10:42:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
The update is late. Again! The stories are about me getting drunk at the Farm. Again! So why even read the post. Well mainly cause you haven't got anything better to do with your time...
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Thursday, May 27, 2004 8:21:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Yes! This weeks report is really really late. Yes! I am now a bum! Is there a correlation? Of course there is - I am just a lazy old slob now. Do you want to read about last weekend? Of course you do - so don't read this dribble click on and read my dribble from last weekend...
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Tuesday, April 13, 2004 10:33:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
I planned to have a relaxing 5 days break over Easter to rest, revive and recover. I planned well. After my plans to go away for the weekend fell through, I thought I’d have to definitely go out after work on Friday night. Nys, Kendra, Sue and I got dressed up and headed into the Saphire bar, where there was a members only party with a Bond theme. Was a pretty good turn out there, though Sue and I didn’t stay too long and ended up kicking on at the Red Sea. Drank way too much wine, and so the night is quite blurry (I’m sure I made some enemies), though at the end of the night I got bundled into a taxi by a group of blokes I don’t think I know, and wound up with a real bad hang over the next morning – though at least I ended up at home.
Friday was basically a write off. I was way too hung over to do anything, so spent the entire of Good Friday feeling sorry for myself.
Feeling way better on Saturday, by lunchtime PC and DC had picked me up and we headed down the Greenwood to watch the afternoon footy game. Munno’s identical twin sat in front of us in his Kangaroo’s shirt and annoyed the hell out of us, so by half time we’d picked up a carton and returned to my house to watch the remainder of the game. With an evening Eagles game scheduled in, I headed off to Boxalotti’s house to watch the big game. Was spewing the Eagles lost marginally, but at the same time was feeling good from the beers, so when home time came around at about 11, I was getting quite antsy, and wanted to kick on. Still I got a lift home, and then spent about an hour on the phone trying to wind up some crew to go out with. Luckily I was able to convince Jem to kick on, so went round to his place, and then we stumbled down to the Farm (Stamford Arms), which had a pretty good crowd, including some hot little English girl, Katie who I met down there. Needless to say I had an awesome night (though didn’t end up staying as long as expected at the Farm), and ended up waking up at Jem’s house on Sunday morning for the Easter egg hunt.
Wasn’t feeling the greatest, but Sparks call to action mid afternoon soon had my ass back in gear, and knocking back wine over at his house. Jen, Kiera and Lisa joined us as we trekked down to Contacios for the massive Sunday Sess. I think everyone had a blinder down there (as seems to be the case always on long weekends), and before long the place was pumping with massive lines outside. The 6 hours or so we were there flew by, and I headed back to Jem’s house to crash out after another big night out.
On Monday arvo Hod’s had a party at his house, so went round there for a bbq and to force a few beers down. While they initially went down like needles, I managed to push through, as well as making it to an Easter Bash later in the night at my cousins. Finally ended the weekend up with Tuesday off, and watching movies at Jeans.
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Tuesday, April 06, 2004 9:39:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
With not too much on offer Friday night, I ended up heading into town with Tracey, Annalise, Jemma and Troy to Karoake at Ferrera's. We were pretty much the first people there, though once we started singing, the place quickly filled up. While I didn't manage to nominate a single song for myself, I somehow still ended up singing at least 4 songs, with 'Sweet Child of Mine' probably my stand out for the night. Also got convinced to fire up flaming Sambuca's again (you know when you light up a shot in your mouth), which I haven't done since my old glory days in London.
After waiting almost 3 years for my first full length, live, AFL premiership game, my wish was finally granted on Saturday night, as I was able to score my parents tickets to watch the Eagles take on Port in an absolute thriller. No thanks to 3 posters in the last quarter the Eagles ended up losing, but none the less the game provided a platform to start knocking back some beers with Jean, Ben and Jem. After the game I met up with Boxalotti and headed back to his house to catch up and hit the scotch. Got interviewed by some crazy drunk chick in the park on the way there, who was asking totally trippy stuff about muppets, but none the less was very amusing. As the night wore on I ended up heading to the Red Sea for the usual craziness, meeting up with Sue and the girls, and had a fun night out.
Finished the weekend off in the spa all day on Sunday. Ended up dragging the TV outside and all, whilst I sat and cheered the Glory onto their fantastic Golden Goal Grand Final win.
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Tuesday, March 30, 2004 8:27:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
I can’t really be bothered to write much this week so will keep the weekly report sharp and sweet. Thanks mainly to Lee, I did nothing Friday night (was left with no one to go crazy with. Feeling top of the world on Saturday I then did my best to get totally hammered, and achieved this in fine fashion, and really felt it on Sunday.
Before we got to Contacio’s to get totally smashed, Rhett, Harry, Block Rock and Matty Connell (and of course myself) went to Challenge stadium to watch the Counting Crows. The show was real cool, with the Crows playing all their classics, from Mr Jones through to Colour blind, with the only real notable omission being Anna Begins. Duritz didn’t really speak to the crowd at all, bar one 15 minute monologue, but still put on a great and decent length show – and possibly their last in Oz, as they had to head home and miss the Eastern States after his Gran carked it. The rest of the night was a typical drunk night.
That’s all. Oh yea, and drunk beers and watched the Eagles put on a magnificent display on Sunday arvo, crushing those stupid bulldogs.
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Monday, March 22, 2004 11:27:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
In the past, the Curtin Tav bashes have always been crazy affairs – lots of crazy uni students getting drunk, so with the Beach Bash on on Friday night, which is arguably the best of the year, it was easy to twist Lee’s arm to go along to it with me. Sadly, the night was a real let down, and the turn out was far from a full house, meaning the bash was generally, well, crap. Still they served alcohol so I managed to get drunk, before about 10:30 when Lee and I had definitely had enough so we headed off to Northbridge (what was I thinking???). We ended up at the Elephant and Wheelbarrow to meet up with Bridgette and her friend, and a little later on Todd, Boof and Kelly joined us. The place itself was pretty crap (to stay with the theme of the night) but at least they served snakebites, which ensured I was pretty hammered by the time we drove home (past my Restaurant Rules) at some early hour of the morning.
I was feeling pretty hung over on Saturday, and while I attempted a few alcoholic beverages before heading out, they were going down like lead, so at dinner with the folks I made a decision to forgo the booze and be the designated driver for the night. I picked up Sue and Martine and we headed into Subi for a night on the town. We managed to go to the Subi Hotel and Llama (where I ran into the hens night that Nys was on) before we put Martine to bed on the backseat of my car, and we headed to the Red Sea to meet up with the bossman and the gang who were already in the line there. Was a pretty good night in the end, with the Red Sea renewing my faith in it, with a pretty good crowd and music and dancing for the night.
Feeling a million dollars on Sunday I was actually able to achieve stuff, and got down the beach to enjoy the temperature in the high 30s. By mid afternoon Lee and I were at the pub watching the Green fight, before returning to my place to make slushy cocktails. We ended up heading down to Scarbs pretty late, though didn’t last too long at Contactio’s as half of WA’s mafia was hanging out there, and pretty much trying to fight anyone. So we ended up finishing the night up at Stamford Arms (and again I was smashed – there must be something in the air there which for some reason just means I am hammered whenever I leave the place). Lucky for me I had Monday off to recover and enjoy the 40 degree at the beach surfing.
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Tuesday, March 09, 2004 12:33:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
On Friday night I headed into town to meet up with Sue for her post work drinks. This worked out damn well, as this meant I was able to knock off a couple of beers, some slushy cocktail drinks and a bottle of white wine in about 1 hour – meaning I was nice and trolleyed by the time we headed out. We stopped by the Spirit Soundbar on the way there, before meeting up with Harry (and his new Mrs.) at some random karaoke bar near the Entertainment centre. Thanks to alcohol we managed to make complete fools of ourselves at the bar. I reckon I sung about 6 songs in the end (everything from Dirty Dancing through to Bon Jovi), and also managed to sing for other people who were too shy. The whole place pretty much cringed the whole time, and I’m not surprised that a number of people left when I started running around the room like a rockstar, jumping around, swinging my arms and sliding on me knees as only a true rocker can. Hopefully though I set a good example to Joey Joe Joe (Harrys new girl) as to just a little of what the boys are like. We rolled into a taxi and went home, though this week I got further than the past few weeks, making it to the neighbours letterbox, before getting pulled up by Glenno and Mark, who were on their way to the Stamford to meet Lee… which meant yet again I never got my early Friday night. Ended up finishing the night off down there downing vodka and oranges with Lauren, before stumbling home in the early hours of the morning.
On Saturday night, Nys, Kendra and I headed off to Point Resolution in Dalkeith for a big party in the park. Some dude the girls new was holding a combined party their, and had managed to get a liquor license, along with a few djs to provide the evening’s entertainment. We rocked up looking real classy with our UDL’s in green plastic bags, and enjoyed the night, highlighted by a live dj set complete with bongo drums and trumpet player. Around 11ish we got booted from the park, as the license expired, so after a bit of mucking around, we got in a taxi and headed to Under the Sea in Subi. Not a bad place, though you only get in if you are with hot chicks, but overall finished off a pretty cool night.
Got up bright and early on Sunday to head over to Begucki’s house to watch the Formula One. Was a pretty boring race in the end, but still delivered an excuse to drink beers, before heading off to Cookie’s house later in the evening, where a stack of the boys were having a party to celebrate Hales and Odie been temporarily back in town (minus Cookie). Was only there for a while, before his sister went ape droppings at everyone, and we were all ejected from the house. We all piled into Begucki’s car and headed off to Contacio’s, picking up Lee along the way (and dumping him in the boot for the journey). The night was pretty cool down there, and was way more bearable than the week before. Closing time seemed to come around real quick and I soon found myself walking down Scarborough Beach road with Lee and some of his work mates for more drinks at a house opposite Scarborough pizza. Enjoyed a few more bevvies and of course Scarborough pizza, and before I knew it I was waking up on the couch on Monday morning, at some random house. Lee and I stumbled back to Peter’s by the Sea, to get picked up by Mark to end another pretty boozey weekend.
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Monday, March 01, 2004 7:59:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
In a bid to curb my ever increasing beer belly, this weekend I thought I would make a concerted effort to drink less beer (though this did not necessarily mean less alcohol!). And so I started my weekend off by polishing off a bottle of wine on Friday night, at home, by myself, before heading down to the Carine to meet up with the rest of the gang. In between getting called gay for wondering around the pub with a glass of wine, I did manage to prove my part manliness by knocking back a couple of Tequilas. No doubt the combination of wine, which I am not as adept at drinking as beer, coupled with the Tequila, ensured that at pub closing time, instead of heading home, I jumped in a taxi, solo, and headed down to the notorious Stamford Arms (I think this place has very quickly become my Slug in Perth). Finished the night off here totally smashed and stumbled home at an early hour of the morning, after no doubt pissing a few people off.
I didn’t really manage to achieve much on Saturday (or the whole weekend in fact) and before I knew it, it was Saturday night, and Nyssa had a few friends over downing cocktails – which were too irresistible to miss out on. As the evening wore on I grew restless, so luckily by about 10pm Sue came around and picked me up, and I went along with her to meet Martine at a lesbian party. The party wasn’t as exciting as one hopes when told they are going to a lesbian party, with a handful of chicks sitting around, and another handful of guys checking out my ass as I walk in the door. Even the make out bed they had in the backyard was vacant, though everyone there was overly friendly. We didn’t stick around too long, and managed to sneak out, heading into Leederville for a couple of drinks. Midnight came around real quick, so we ended up back at my place. Martine was pretty upset, so while Sue slept on the couch, the two of us ploughed through drinks, knocking off a bottle of Bailey’s and a fair bit of CC, not to mention a bottle of passion pop.
On Sunday arvo, Jeans picked me up and we headed over to Jem’s house for a bbq. Still on my anti beer weekend I managed to knock back a bottle of white and a few UDL’s before heading down to Contacio’s later in the arvo. The place was an absolute sauna, with most of the packed crowd inside absolutely sweating like pigs all night. After loving the Strawberry Daiquiri cocktails the other night, I was stoked to see the pub was serving them up, so enjoyed them for most of the night. Wasn’t a bad night in the end, though I reckon the heat inside the place really wore most people down, as everyone seemed totally stuffed.
Feeling pretty hung over on Monday, I didn’t totally want to waste the day, so Lee and I ended up heading down to the OBH for a few beers to end off the weekend. Wasn’t a bad call in the end, with heaps of hotties around, thanks to some modelling auditions going on in the nearby function room.
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Monday, February 16, 2004 11:39:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Well its been a while, quite a while in fact, since I have been able to say that I have been out on a Thursday night (oh, how I reminisce about those great old Slug days), but as it happens, after hitting the beach after a hot Thursday, Lee managed to persuade me to going to the Slug for a ‘quiet’ beer after. 2 bottles of wine and about 5 pints later I stumbled out and headed home, looking forward to the good ol’ Friday hang over.
Straight after work on Friday I was due to head down south, and bar waiting about an extra hour for Begucki to pick me up (he was running on Ben time) we managed to soon be on our way down to Margaret River for the weekend – Ben driving and me happily knocking back cold beers in the passenger’s seat. By the time we got down there I was pretty hammered and it was well dark outside. We met up with Andre, Jeans and Jem who were also down for the weekend and headed down the Margaret River hotel until midnight for a few drinks with the locals – Andre seemed to know most of the them, before heading to Settlers (aka Fight Club) after it closed. With the clock ticking over the 14th Feb while we were at Settlers, some desperate 35 year old thought it would be fun to get herself a Valentine, and jumped me on the dance floor. Around 1am we were booted from there and headed over to the food store to buy some tasty burgers. As per clock work (according to the locals) a fight broke out outside the pub, which we enjoyed from the safety of the other side of the road Begucki spoke to some guy spitting blood, though I think he was more proud of discovering some real gay alley, where I was sure we were going to get raped, on the way back home.
On Saturday Begucki and I cruised around Margs, checking out the beach and the local forest. Around 3pm we were due to be picked up by our bus to the Leeuwin concert so we gathered with the crew heading in there (all old) and got there before the gates opened – giving us a window to start the day’s drinking. Once we were in and settled in a good viewing point we met up with Tim, Paz jnr, B Mac, John Howard and the girls and we all started getting stuck into the wine. With most of the crowd doing the same, we were pretty stoked to probably have the closest bunch to yobbo’s sitting behind us, who were content to yell out at the crowd and hold up signs – probably the highlight being John Hughes wife, who was dolled up and looking something like Janet Jackson, prompting some topical taunts at her. Mr Mitsubishi himself though didn’t seem to be overly impressed by the whole event.
The main event of the afternoon/evening was pretty impressive, with Anthony Warlow (the Phantom) and Lesley Garret (some over excited English opera singer) churning out some entertaining songs in front of the great back drop that Leeuwin offers. By the time they finished, the sun was down, and the evening was in full swing. I guess because we were basically the only youngish people there we attracted attention, but again we ended up dancing with middle age women, while the husbands sat back on the hill and watched. Begucki and I ended up sneaking into the VIP tent where all the suites were hanging out, and got stuck into the real expensive bottles of wine at the end of the night. As we were leaving Begucki, Jim Kidd and I tried to steal some $150 bottles of wine, and were only thwarted by Begucki’s pommy brother in law who was quite pompous about us not being ‘fair game’, prompting Jim to get quite p*ssed at him (and he still somehow still managed to steal a bottle out!). Still by the time we got to bed I was well and truly toasted, ending a great day out.
I was pretty much hung over for the drive home on Sunday, though after a few Gatorade’s I was able to get back on the beers again – which inevitably just forced me into having a late afternoon nap when I got home, before heading up to Jeans in the evening to say goodbye to Andre and watch frogs jump off his roof.
PS. This is a warning to all travellers, especially those to London. A new strain of the deadly Age virus is rumoured to have broken out again. This could be potentially dangerous if it goes crazy, as expected.
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Sunday, November 30, 2003 9:28:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
I awoke early Friday morning, to head out to the airport with dad to get to the first rubber of the Davis Cup final. With our flight due to land about an hour after the first game had begun between Lleyton and Juan Carlos, we really needed a close affair so we could get to the game. Luckily Hewitt decided to put up a huge showing, and pushed the game to a magnificent five setter.
By the time I arrived at the Rod Laver arena in Melbourne the game score was one set all, and poised for an epic match. The crowd at the stadium was nuts, with thousands of Fanatics leading the place with chants to drown out the exciting Spanish cheer squad.
Hewitt won through in the end, which was followed by the almost as dramatic match between the poo and Moya, which Moya won in four. The lady behind me obviously should have been out on court though, because besides the fact she was about 19 stone, she managed to have comments, answers and suggestions as to what Australia and the poo should do better. Man I hate idiots who know absolutely nothing about a sport and yet continue to babble shit about what the pro’s should be doing better. By the time the day was over, dad and I had seen some awesome tennis, drowned a stack of beers, and surrended to bed pretty early.
Saturday we were able to sleep in with a later start to the days play. Woodbridge and Arthurs started their show, after an awards presentation to Pat Cash. Their game was way too classy and perfected for the Spanish doubles team, giving the aussies an overall lead of 2-1 after the second days play.
In the evening we headed over to the swimming centre to watch the FINA Championships. There was a great bill on, with the likes of the new Thorpe Michael Phelps from America, Heugill, Welsh, Pearson, and a stack more, plus young Liesel Jones broke a world record on the night which added quite a bit of excitement. They managed to cram in a stackload of events for the night though so made for a cool night. After the events, my old man and I ended up at the Crown for a few drinks, before he retired for the night and I kicked on to Fitzroy to meet up with Ben. Wasn’t bad to go out for a drink, and still managed to get back to bed by around 2am.
Well Sunday delivered the final epic match for the weekend to finish off the Davis cup weekend. The poo came up against Ferrero in the reverse rubber, which went to a brilliant five sets. After the Poo led early and won the first 2 sets he looked set to lead Oz to an easy victory, but then Ferrero turned things around, and dominated the next 2 sets, making it look as if the Poo was gone for all money. But after an injury time out, and the support of 10 000 absolutely berserk, screaming fans, the poo somehow came out in the final set and put on a spectacle, winning the Davis cup back for Australia in an amazing game. After the game the Fanatics continued their chants in the outside bar, with the Spanish cheer squad mingling amongst them, to create an awesome post match atmosphere, before we had to head off to the air port to come home. My voice is still a little sore today, but the weekend delivered in the end some absolutely amazing tennis, and proved to be an awesome weekend to go to Melbourne. Rock on Australia!
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Monday, November 24, 2003 6:00:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Well my final day of freedom was spent having lunch at Curtin Tav with Jeans. Nothing overly exciting, though it was the last day of exams, which meant the tav was a little busier than usual. In the evening I headed off to the Mt Henry to meet up with Carly (who id met the week before at Zap's bash) for a couple of quiet drinks. Was a pretty cool night, which was made all the more entertaining by her friend Rachel who went ballistic at her boyfriend Mark because he opted to go to the pub in the car rather than walk. The fireworks really went off at the pub before she took off fully fired up to get revenge on both Carly and Mark. Nuts.
Saturday I headed off to Jeans house to watch the rugby. He had the big screen setup, and before not too long we had the keg flowing well before match time. About 10 or so of the boys rocked up to watch the epic, tight match, though in the end we were all destroyed when fad boy Wilkinson kicked the winning goal at the death of extra time. Night was further high lighted by guest star Scott Walker rocking up to cop a serving of shit from Greg (the boss) and I. That guy is still so much fun to stir up. Still we all kicked on drinking until everyone gradually passed out asleep.
We finished the weekend, and my long absence from work by heading to the Rock-it festival up at Joondalup. With a great line up including the likes of Powderfinger, Jack Johnson, Living End, John Butler Trio and Magic Dirt the day was always going to be heaps of fun. The weather wasn’t too bad and there was more than enough talent out and about to warrant wearing a pair of sunglasses. Although I missed the school reunion the other week, there was enough of Sacred Heart around to make up for it, so caught up with heaps more crew. But by the time Powderfinger ended the night off, we were all ready to go home and it was time for me to face the reality that it was time to head back to the real world of work back at Curtin.
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Monday, November 17, 2003 10:37:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Well I have returned and survived my first week back in Perth and at the same time managed to catch up with quite a few people.
Got a game of golf in on Friday with Greg, before hitting the 19th hole at the Wembly for substantially more time than was spent on the course. Friday night we went out for Zaps birthday, starting at the Moon and Sixpence in town (I think the idea was to ease me slowly back into the Perth surroundings by taking me to an English pub – which was good in a way as they served pints). Someone along the way decided this was boring so ended up heading back North of the river, to the recently refurbished (I believe) Carine tav, which was absolutely cranking. I was quite shocked as to the revamp this place has had, but none the less seems like it’s a popular nightspot these days. By this stage I was pretty much hammered, so after jumping on about a million of the boys, Glenno and I stumbled out of the pub and I crashed back at his house.
Saturday was a big day with the big rugby game between the chokers from Australia jnr (NZ) and the big boys of the big game from Oz. As would normally result from a game such as this, I ended up drunk and Oz ended up winning – giving the big Three-0 celebrations for Plugger at his house that night an even bigger reason for everyone to cheer.
Pluggers party was brilliant, with just about everybody present at the show hammered. The dance floor was lit up with all types of moves, including the return of my worm, and the all new ‘Stop, drop and roll’ dance, which involved you ended up being rolled up in the mat.
Sunday we kicked off drinking again rather early and soon Scott, Lethal and I were downing icey pole snakebites at Scott’s house (they had no grendine so we just dropped red funny faces into a mix of cider and beer – classy). By mid afternoon Suze had us back at the good ol’ Cott to finish the weekend off. I think my brain left me about 24 hours prior to this, as I also ran into my cuz Tris, who I did not recognize or work out who it was, even after about 10 minutes of guessing, much to his amusement.
Oh well, at least I have one full final week of nothing before I return back to work, and will no doubt try and relocate it.
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Wednesday, November 12, 2003 2:44:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Ok, it seems like an absolute eternity since I last was on the web, and so as such I cant really be bothered writing about (or you reading about everything I have done in the last couple of weeks), therefore I am going to try and summarise some of it, and the rest of it you can ask me yourself (if you are in Perth, as that is where I now am back as of yesterday) or can email me.
Spent a few more days after the last report in Sydney, where I met some cool English crew in the backpackers and went out with on the Saturday night. As of the Sunday I stayed at Nyssa's really cool friend Alison's house, which was right near town on Oxford street. This also was a great chance to meet ups with some more people, catch up with Rob (from Perth) for a great beer, see AnneMaree again (and get drunk at some crazy bar on a Monday night called Scruffy Jacks where some crazy Irish guy was doing crazy Irish jigs, there was a nuts greasy Italian stallian and a mixed up crew which kicked on until well past 4am on a Monday night when I decided to go home), got asked for change by a camp gay beggar and rescued a 4 year old kid from a rubbish bin - how he fell in in the first place I don't know, how his parents still hadn't even realised I still don't know, all I know is 2 arms where sticking out from a bin in some random park.
So in a nutshell that was Sydney.
Then I hit Melbourne where I was reunited with Nys (my sister), King Danny (her man), Andy ( I think he has a crush on me, and insisted on sharing a room with me) and their mate Peter from uni, where the 5 of us stayed in a cool little apartment in central Melbourne. Caught up with Benny Schwabe (pilot friend from London), Lethal Lee, Scotty 2 hotty, Senzy and Beaver and met a tonne of really cool people including the Irish girls Cat and Radha, and an English girl Beth, all of who meant the Melbourne was non stop.
This topped with the fact we managed to squeeze in about 21 pubs, the Ireland v Oz International rules game at the G, Derby day (where I got a photo with Kefu from the Wallabies and met Sheeds), Oz v Ireland in the Rugby - a totally awesome night of singing and screaming, as well as a tram ride of drunk aussies singing 'waltzing matilda' and of course the Melbourne Cup. So many stories, no time to tell them, but lets just say it was a ripper weekend.
The holiday culminated with a brief trip to Singapore where Nys and I met up with Mum and Dad for a great short getaway in humid Singapore, which was also great fun with shopping, Jurong bird park and an awesome night zoo safari. Andy also stopped by for a couple of nights and hung out with us, and got on the piss a few nights at the ever cheap place singapore is (some places offered bargains like 2 jugs of beer for $50...), but alas the holiday ended, I have returned home, this website does not have nearly enough space for my million stories, and Perth currently feels like I am living in an oven on high.
But its great to be home.
So give me a yell, catch up(0404398505), and star on my next report on .com, which should be more concise.
Until then
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Saturday, October 25, 2003 12:26:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Well it seems like an eternity since I last did an update and had extended access to the web, and since I can't really be bothered with a long update, I will try and keep this as short and sweet as possible.
After returning briefly to London I headed up to Leeds, from where Sarah and I headed up to the much prettier Scotland. We stayed in Glasgow for a couple of nights, at a huge old house (B & B) while we explored Scotlands second largest city. For the most part it wasn't a bad place, bar the knob at this trendy bar we went to who tried to start a fight with me because he reckoned we were laughing at his mate, while we talked amongst ourselves on a couch. Paranoia? Not much. Also went to a couple of dance clubs which played some cool (cheesey) music, and had a boogie, as well as I swear I saw all three girls from Atomic Kitten at one of the clubs... or maybe had a beer too many.
After a couple of days there we headed off to Fort William, which is where Ben Nevis is - the highest mountain in the UK. The weather was considerably colder here than Glasgow, though on arrival on the first day we took a chair lift up to barren (ie no snow) snowfields for a nice view of the town and surrounding areas. Didn't have too late a night as the next day we set off earlyish to climb the 1400m high mountain.
Having not climbed a mountain before I was expecting the worst, so I was somewhat surprised after a little over 3 hours when we reached the top and I was hardly exhausted at all. As we got towards the top there was snow on alot of the mountain, and while we were at the top there was a mild snow storm also which was quite nice. While the view up the top was awesome, the -2 degree temperature was freezing, so after about an hour at the top my lips had turned blue and I could hardly talk, let alone move, especially considering I was a little under dressed for the conditions. The decent was a heck of a lot worse than the rise, and far more rugged on the legs, not to mention having to carry a heavy backpack the majority of the way down. By the time we reached the pub at the bottom I thought my legs were going to break off, but the sense of conquering the mountain was pretty cool so I just tried to ignore my knees.
Later on we headed out for a few drinks at a local bar in the quiet town, which felt like a pub from Northern Exposure (or Blue Healers) with its array of interesting local characters. A drunk local Scottish woman amused us when asking to play 'Spirit in the Sky', which the 2 man band did not really want to do. After a fair bit of persuasion they made up some words and kept her happy, while her (I assume) husband and her danced around before he took over on the mike. Before we knew it, it was closing time, and having had a few other laughs at the country pub behaviour we headed home.
For the final night of the holiday up North we swung by Sarah's parents town which was on the way back to Leeds and spent a night there. It was nice little seaside town where I met a few of the family and friends (and numerous pets) to end the holiday in a more homely way.
Finally I headed back to London for one final night, saw Kill Bill with Age, before boarding my plane to head on the 24 hour flight home (well actually to Sydney) where I am safely now writing this email, with 2 massive bulging eyes thanks to some ridiculous alergic reaction to something here (maybe its the far better weather in this country). Anyway, after a relatively quiet night last night, and getting to catch up with AnneMaree yesterday, I am sure that I will enjoy a few more beers tonight.
If anyone wants to contact me I now have an aussie mobile number which is 0404398505 (or for those overseas +61404398505).
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Wednesday, October 15, 2003 5:33:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Last time I think I left you Age and I were leaving crabby Frankfurt, where the only thing worth remembering was the cool projectors mounted on all the tubes, so that while you are enjoying your train ride, you can look out the window and watch movies and adverts projected on the tube walls. Berlin, however, had far more to offer, and was heaps more fun.
Age and I ended up spending three nights in Berlin, which was longer than we expected, but still not enough, as it turned out to be a real cool city. During our time there we managed to check out what is left of the Berlin wall, where Hitler committed hari kari, and about a dozen other famous historical sites while on our tour of Berlin. This even included the hotel where Wacko Jacko cleverly hung his baby out of the hotel window, much to the amusement of the crowd. Also saw quite a few cool museums, including one with dinosaurs (hooray! I have been hanging to see dinosaurs for soooo long) and some art and historical musuems too. The Berlin zoo was pretty impressive - some real cool exhibits which enabled the animals to live in a nice environment, and still enabled the viewers to watch the animals feed and hang out. Age still reckons the bear that ate its own poo was his highlight though! Must also mention the Sony head quarters which are located in Berlin, where there is four levels of the latest Sony gear - cool for techy nerds like myself, and also the game testing centre next door, where the latest games in Beta stage are actively tested by local kids in the area.
We headed up to Denmark after Berlin, to catch up with Kyla, who is now living there with Mick (her Danish man). On our first night there we hung out in Kyla's trendy little studio apartment, before Age, Morton (Micks bro) and I headed out on into Copenhagen down for a Thursday night out. It was pretty dead, but still gave us a first look at Danish nightlife, and the beautiful blondes the city has to offer.
The next day Daygo and Rach arrived, plus a couple of their other friends from Sweden so we had no choice but to have a big house party at the house, with Mick keeping us all entertained on his decks. Rachel's friend Peter was also over from Serbia, who was real interesting and gave us an insight into life in his country. When everyone was pretty drunk we then headed out for a Friday out in town, which ended up pretty runny for us all. Got to also watch a live Danish band (singing Danish songs only), which was pretty trippy but entertaining at the same time.
Early on Saturday we headed to Christiana, a small little community located in the heart of Copenhagen, which is entirely self sufficient bunch of hippies, where you can also buy marijuana. Interesting. Later on Denmark was playing in the Euro 2004 football qualifiers, so we headed to the pub Kyla works at for a few drinks and to watch the game. By the time the game was on, the crowd had built right up, and created a great atmosphere, which was awesome for when Denmark scored a goal. After a few drinks later on at Kyla's house, we all headed out again, back to the place from Thursday night, which was way better on the Saturday, as well as playing a great selection of music (including good ol' cheesey stuff to keep me happy!)
By Sunday we were all pretty hung over but not enough to stop the boys heading out in the 4 wheel drive and carving up some danish mud and bush. This was pretty fun, before heading back to the house for a quiet few (well lot) of wine, beers, spirits and movies at Kyla's house to finish the weekend off.
By Monday we were all hung over and also managed only about an hour of sleep, so Age and I spent the day wandering around Copenhagen, checking out the shops, site, and some round tour which gave us a view of the city. By evening Age and I were well and truly ready for our flight back to London, which got us home after midnight sometime to end an awesome tour. I am now getting ready to hit Scotland and my final week in the Northern hemisphere, while Age looks for a job.
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Monday, October 06, 2003 5:56:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
We always thought that when we got to beerfest there was going to be runny stories. What Age and I didn´t realise was that as soon as we got off the subway in Munich we were going to get see runniness - as we went up the escalator from the tube, the lady in front decided she wasn´t going to wait for the ladies room, and promptly starting having a pee in front of us, which age and I had to move out of the way of as it trickled down the escalator!
We stayed in the tent site for the 4 days we were at beerfest, which wasn´t too bad, though it did rain a fair bit over the time, and luckily our tents held off the rain. Octoberfest itself was way different, and in almost every way I can think of, better than I expected. When you first rock up there is a giant rollercoaster in front of you with the Olympic rings for 5 loops, which beyond it is a massive fairground/showground setup with thousands of rides and massive beer halls housing thousands of drunks. Awesome! Basically the entire place is a massive playground for adults where they serve beer by the stien.
The beer tent we spent the four days in was the Hofpra House (or something like that) which basically was the loudest and craziest. The other tents we briefly checked out pretty much just had people quietly sitting around drinking beer, where as ours was packed to the rafters with Germans, Aussies, Eyetalians (italians - who often like to remove shirts, act like total f-wits and generally start fights and grope girls) and Yankees, plus a few others in the mix standing on benches (and tables) and singing along to the band and the various drinking beer songs - with the main one, which sounded something like "I´m roasting" being about drinking, and basically meant put your glass in the air, toast the others, and then have a drink.
We stayed in the same spot in the tent most days, arriving around 11 and leaving around 12 hours later, basically surviving on a meal a day (like half a chicken) and beer. We managed to meet some cool girls who served us every day - Dana (from Austria) and Marianne (from Norway) and became good friends with us. Day 2 had Wolverine, Bandy, Charlotte and her brother join us for a couple, while we also ran into various crew such as Jane Clively, Hunter, B Mac, and Mary (from G-bones crew). Also met some other top blokes, from the aussie boys in the flouro yellow work jackets (Abo, Ado, Robbo and Keith) who we hung out with the whole time, through to blokes like Campo "up to my nuts in the guts", who Abo and I met on the bus, who was as Aussie as the get (from Queensland) and kept the two of us in stitches with his absolute ocher-ness (which I dont think he realised we were laughing at rather than with him!!).
All in all it was awesome. We spent an absolute packet (not to mention Age spending 10.50 euro at one stage on a pack of nuts) but it was so worth it. I am sure there is a high chance I may return next year when my liver and kidney return to normal!!
As well as beer fest was, things turned to crap though when we left on the Sunday. We were supposed to fly out of Frankfurt, but after catching the worlds slowest train from Munich, and then catching about 4 other wrong trains, we managed to get ourselves to the (wrong) airport, and missed our flight. The positive is Age is now kicking on longer for our trip. The shit thing meant a night in Frankfurt and a complete reworking of plans. Age and I are now skipping Sweden, and hitting Berlin then Denmark instead. Besides that Frankfurt is a shithole, and we are glad to be leaving here real soon. We did almost cop a massive fine for not buying a ticket on the tube, but somehow using confused English, we managed to persuade security we weren´t supposed to be on the tube (we were lost!!!).
Until next time...
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Tuesday, September 30, 2003 4:22:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Well since I last was online Age and I have done a fair bit more travelling, drinking and lazying around Europe in general. So lets take this story from when I last left you (drinking at a pub in Debrovnik Croatia)...
In the end that night was pretty dead with next to nobody choosing to show up at the pub, so Age and I just amused ourselves with beer. The next morning we headed off on an all day fishing trip around the islands of Croatia. It was awesome to hit the high seas (well calm seas) of what I believe is the Adriatic Ocean (no relation to Age). Checked out a few cool relatively remote islands (with the local pasttime being bocce) before hitting a nice little spot for some fresh fish for lunch. While we downed the tasty fish, a three some of local Croatian drunks sung Croatian tunes along with their crazy Croatian guitars, while the rest of us got drunk on crazy (free) Croatian wine, straight from the keg.A drunken boat ride took us along the coast back to Debrovnik, where Age and I spent the night wandering the nice ancient back streets of old town.
We were up pretty early the next morning to head off to Hvar on the ferry - a popular but small Croatian island where we could stay a couple of nights. Along the way Age and I invented the worlds greatest card game, which has been played and refined about a million times since on this holiday. Our house ended up being in the heart of the old town, on the very pretty coastal village town that is Hvar. We met an American couple who watched the sunset with us, before watching enjoying a nice meal. While they retired for the night, Age and I kicked on at a few local bars, where we got to enjoy the Croatian beer and the complete lack of Croatian service (I think at one stage I stood at an empty bar for about 25 minutes while not getting served, but the bar man just standing, talking to one of his mates, serving girls and pretty much completely ignoring me).
The next full day was spent lazying around the island, which in the warm weather pretty much meant swimming and throwing the ball around. The night life again was pretty dead, meaning we wrapped the night up pretty early for an early morning start on the Saturday.
Our ferry off to Split left around 7:30 but was quite a nice journey into the relatively large port city of Split. With a full day ahead of us, and quite a bit of sleep under the belt, we were able to fit quite a bit into the day, including markets, a quick squiz around the city and of course some more swimming at the local beach. After some drinking (and cards) we hit the town in Split for what we thought was going to be (another) quiet night out. Were we wrong. On the coast they had this three tiered night club strip with about 20 or so bars, pubs and clubs, which was absolutley teaming with the most beautiful Croatian girls (and guys) from about the age of 16 to 30. Age and I drunk there amazed at the amount of people going absolutely nuts. We ended up meeting a few of the locals, though most chose to ignore us English folk, and found out pretty much Saturday was the only night out. It was absolutely well worth it though, if only for the talent watch alone as I have never seen so many gorgeous people in one spot before.
On Sunday the weather turned to crap, which didn't bother us too much as we were hung over and off up North anyway, with probably the highlight of the morning getting to watch old Croatian men in speedo's play beach soccer in 2 inch deep water. Our completely Croatian coach which was to take us to Austria in the arvo had only Croatian speaking people, so when we got told at one stage of the mammoth 12 hour bus ride 'couple minutes' break, Age and I chose to stay on the bus, rather than risk miss it. 50 minutes later everyone else joined us.
We arrived in Graz at 3am on Monday morning where the highly intelligent Clinton discovered he had lost his bank card in Croatia. After a few frantic phone calls, a run in with a bum, an interesting conversation with some limited (English) speaking Austrian girls and a train ride the next morning, we arrived in Salzberg around lunch and thinks were calmed down a little. We spent some time checking out what is a pretty nice city before a couple of drinks an early night.
Today was spent atop of the castle which over looks Salzberg, which is probably one of the coolest castles I have been in. That will do for now for this update as I am now bored of writing (and you are no doubt bored of reading if you have made it this far).
Until next time, which will no doubt be after the craziness of the Octoberfest - keep it real!
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Tuesday, September 23, 2003 12:39:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
CC is now on tour so this weeks report is going to be short and sweet. Age and I are sitting in some crazy aussie bar in Debrovnik drinking beers, and enjoying awesome weather so wasting time writing about crap doesnt really interest me right now.
But all the same, here are the events that have shaped Clinton Cherry's world for the last 10 days or so. Spent a tonne of time in the pubs catching up with nearly everyone I have come to know in London, well actually not quite, but have been attempting to. To those who I didnt say goodbye to, sorry, and goodbye, I'm sure we'll catch up some other time. To everyone else, its been great. SO now down to the business, caught up with during the week with Clively (JC), Verity, and of course all the boys. Was meant to do a big final hoorar at the Slug, my local for the past 18 months, but somehow amid the craziness, and the catching up (plus the total overcrowding that bar now promotes) I managed to miss the chance to say goodbye to my old drinking hole.
And so as my final day at work came and went, I found myself on Friday heading up to Leeds for Reiner's birthday weekend (old school friend). Caught up with Sarah on Friday, and she took me to see the beautiful old city that is York on the Saturday. Also managed to squeeze in a movie and a house party on Friday night, which was made all the more better by the fact that aussies are complete novelties in Leeds. Saturday night about 10 of us hit the town in Leeds for Reiners birthday, which was heaps of fun. If you are a guy and are single in England, I highly recommend going out here. IF you aren't, go anyway cause its still heaps of fun and a good change of pace from London.
Sunday I caught a absolutely shit of a bus ride home from London which got stuck in peak hour (on a Sunday!!) for about 7 hours ruining my final hoorar party. By the time I finally got down to the Wimbledon Walkabout the boys were all totally trashed, but all the same had a great turn out down there, with the likes of Sam, Verena, Julie, Smithy, Age, Wolverine, Linda and so on and so on all coming out. Wolverine provided the entertainment for the evening, pulling off an awesome forward roll onto Age and Amanda, and in the process knocking over about a dozen drinks. Kicked on for a bit before eventually retiring for my early morning exit from London.
Age and I almost missed our plane from Stanstead, but thanks to a bit of crafty talking and running managed to get on and over to Italy. Met a top Scottish woman on the plane on the way over, who besides absolutley chatting my ear off, gave me a pair of 125 pound DKNY sun glasses because her son didn't want them. Stoked. Age and I then battled traffic, crazy Italian driving and a total language barrier to get ourselves on the ferry over to Debrovnik in Croatia. This went through the night, giving us a nice sleep under the stars on the deck of the Love boat - no one told us that there is a crap load of dew in the early morning which probably explained why we were the only people sleeping outside, and also the wettest when we departed the boat.
Got to Croatia with a million crazy croatians trying to get us to stay in their houses. We eventually picked some nice woman, and not having a clue what was going on, soon found ourselves sharing a house with some croatian family in some massive double beds (each - not together so don't start rumours). Spent the day checking out this awesome little port city, with the old town definitely being a highlight (not to mention the stunning European women that hang out in the area). The weather is awesome so ended up of course swimming at the beach (which again is covered in rocks). Though the rocks provided endless entertainment as Age proceeded to throw rocks as high as he could and let them land on his chest (about the size of golf balls). OK, this is getting boring now so this is the end, and besides which I need to go drink.
Until next time, which shouldn't be too long, go Brisbane...
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Tuesday, September 16, 2003 9:48:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Daygo’s Swedish friends Jenny and Beatrice, were in town until Wednesday, so Monday and Tuesday night were spent going out for beers and dinner and the like with the girls. I cant remember what I did the Wednesday night, but by Thursday we were hard at again playing drinking games before heading down to the Slug. Steve aka the Shermanator joined Wolverine, Age and I down there for yet another completely overcrowded evening. We ended upstairs drinking with Kevin and the Saffers, though probably the highlight of the night was watching Sherman try to take on two blokes outside the burger shop. In a gallant effort to thwart the Shermantor from causing further trouble, and with him bearing down them at full pace down the road (after we had dragged him away earlier), I put in one of my greatest ever tackles, bringing him to a grinding halt, and with it the end of a boozey night.
Final Friday (yes, my final Friday in London for ’03) meant there was no time to go home after work, so I instead cruised straight into town to meet up with quite a sizeable gang. Heaps of crew were in attendance (it will take forever to list everyone – you know who you are) to celebrate both CC finally getting the hell out of the country and for big bad Woags turning the big 24. Ended up pretty runny, but was a great night out and real cool to see everyone come along.
There is no rest for the wicked so after sending home a couple of boxes of crap (and the ridiculous cost of £218) Wolverine and I proceeded to get back on the bad stuff again. Mixed up all sorts of concoctions, including Age’s great idea of red wine and coke. By night fall most of the Greyhound road house, which has swelled in numbers now with Age, Wolverine, Blaggers, Daygo, Rach, Paul, Jenny, Alice and myself all living there (Alice being the odd one out who didn’t come out) – so it wasn’t hard to muster a decent party without having to leave home. Anyway as Saturday had it we did in fact leave home and all headed off to Herbal in East London, for something different. Was a pretty cool place in the other side of town, and ended up pretty drunk again. In the end I managed to annoy Wolverine for the majority of the journey with my constant paranoia that we were going to miss the stop to get off.
Age started the day early with me on Sunday, again with the red wine and coke (maybe we should call it wike or coine) to watch the Grand Prix before heading down to the pub with the boys. It was quite cool to catch up with a number of crew down there also to say goodbye, and once again Clinton didn’t know when to stop which meant by Monday I was really struggling.
Well this is my final week in the big smoke so for the few left who didn’t catch me on the weekend time is running out to say goodbye. For everyone else, the party is just beginning and I look forward to you all visiting me at Perth Hospital when I no doubt arrive home in time for a liver replacement. Oh yea, and one final bit of house keeping, these posts may become more or less frequent as from now on they will be coming from various parts of the world, starting with Croatia next week… Bring it on!
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Monday, September 08, 2003 10:38:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Having moved to back into my old house in Hammersmith, where the likes of Wolverine, Age, Daygo and Blaggers reside, I always knew there was going to be no let up in the general drinking stakes. And so with Tuesday night we were down the puzzle (pub) for a quiz night, which we were duly robbed of, after doing really well, but somehow getting duped of our win, so left empty handed.
Age called me up after work on Wednesday, and quickly convinced me to join him for a beer in Covent Garden at the Porterhouse where we joined Bins and Channelle who are in town for a bit over from Perth. It was great to catch up again, though coming home after wards and continuing to drink probably wasn’t the best idea.
Thursday I kept it quiet.
Straight after work on Friday Sarah drove down from Leeds, picked me up from Hammersmith and we headed off to Brighton for the weekend – one of England’s main seaside towns which is about an hour and a half south of London. By the time we got there it was well dark, though our hotel was right on the seafront, where the giant pier is, so it wasn’t too hard to find. The room was awesome, complete with ocean views, stairs to a loft and its own Jacuzzi bath (note:// Do not put bubble bath in one of these – legend has it that this can cause an entire bathroom, and the adjoining room to become completely engulfed in bubbles). The Brighton pier reminded me of the movie Big, with its bright lights, fairground attractions and wooden 50s architecture, but was really nice at night with the lights and Friday night atmosphere for an evening stroll.
After having a rare sober Friday night in England, we were able to get heaps done on Saturday including a drive down the coast, a wander through the attractive coastal town, a ride on the world’s oldest electric railway, checked out some crazy Indian looking building which was completely out of place in the guts of town and a wander along the beach covered in rocks – and I am not talking about pebbles, the rocks completely covering the beach are all at least an inch in diameter, though they do make for alright skimming. After finding a hotel for the Saturday night we cruised into town for some al fresco dining before hitting a cool little pub (as well as seeing about 7 hens nights). Finished the night off dancing away at Creation, a huge night club with differently themed rooms, with the cheese room easily been the best.
Sunday was pretty lazy, with the drive home around midday singing along to Busted. I had best intentions of having a quiet night, though with Daygo’s Swedish friends Beatrice and Jenny needing someone to take them to the pub, I reluctantly (well not really) volunteered and we headed off to the Pitcher and Piano for the Sunday session. Not content with calling it a night when it closed (as I never seem to be able to do), we ended up back at the flat drinking CC and coke until about 2am, making Monday morning a damn hard rise.
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Tuesday, August 26, 2003 7:58:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Well after getting absolutely no time to recover after a huge last weekend it was straight back into the festival swing of things for part 2 this weekend at Leeds. Thursday night and straight after work I met up with Nugs, Smithy and Age at Kings Cross to catch the train up to Leeds for the aptly named Leeds festival. By the time we arrived at the camping ground of the festival it was well dark, and we had quite a few drinks under our belt, so it wasn't surprising that Smithy and I managed to put our tent up inside out. None the less it still provided a roof over our heads so we stayed with this setup anyway. We spent the evening checking the place out and wandering around having a few drinks. Ran into Reiner and Chantelle (who we knew we going to be there) and organised to meet up the next day. The place itself was way bigger than V2003, and so too was the crowd and amount of tents, though at the same time it was already apparent there was going to be a lot of rednecks around and teenage dickheads (like the one who fell on our tent and spilled a bottle of vodka into it).
Friday was the first day of the bands, so we started drinking pretty early and got stuck into the drinking games. I managed to get the ass end of the stick and by the time we arrived inside the park at the main arena I was well on my way. I managed to find Reiner for a while before checking out a great set from Good Charlotte. Quite exhausted from lack of sleep from the last week (and also quite drunk) I thought I would have a quick lie down back at the tent (not to mention the fact that by now I had well and truly lost everyone and my phone had decided to no longer work).
The next thing I knew it was 11:30pm, and the boys were waking me up to tell me how good Sum 41, System of a Down and Metallica all were (while I had meanwhile just slept for about 6 hours). Totally gutted that my stupidity had led me to miss out on most of day one of the festival I then proceeded to start drinking again until about 4am with some of the other locals near our campsite, while the other boys went to bed.
I woke up Saturday determined to make the most of the now 2 remaining day festival, and with Bowling for Soup on at the early time of 12:30pm Age and I (after a few red bull and vodkas) headed off to check them out. They put on a brilliant show, and turned out to be the surprise pack for the weekend, while Less than Jake, who played not longer after, were real average and were one of the lemons of the weekend. We found Reiner and Chantelle, and were joined up with Smithy and Nugs not long after for a great afternoon sitting near the main stage. Reiner was hanging out with a few other crew, including some little brat (we named Serande) who spent most of the afternoon trying to dose us with water. I managed to team up with the kid and got most of the other guys pretty wet. The beers kept going for the arvo, while rednecks nearby built a giant tunnel from paper cups, and the likes of Staind (crap) and Placebo (good) continued to rock out the tunes in the background.
As Blink approached later in the day, everyone was quite runny, and I met one of Chantelle's mates Sarah, who seemed to enjoy my stupidity (and singing busted songs) so ended up hanging out with her for the rest of the night. Blink played a pretty decent set with the standard toilet humour, though their new songs sounded pretty crap before we raced over to another tent to catch the end of Sparta, who totally rocked again (for the last few songs we saw of them). Finally Linkin park ended the evening with an awesome display, which was unanimously the best band of the weekend, cranking out every classic from the repertoire of songs.
While most of the gang checked out Matrix 2 in one of the tents after the show, Sarah and I found a sweet little juice tent cranking out awesome classic songs, which had the crowd of about 300 juiced up mental people absolutely rocking, not to mention the pole in the middle of the circle, which one by one every person went into and put on awesome pole dancing routines. After some bumper car action and some busted routines with some of the young crew around the place, the place started to wind down so we headed back to the tents, finally hitting the sack around 3ish.
I woke up Sunday morning feeling like total crap at about 6am and spent most of the morning whinging, spewing and at the toilets (mainly, I believe, from the really old sausage some guy sold me the night before for a pound when I was starving hungry). With a pretty average line up on the Sunday, Smithy went home and the rest of us hung out in around the tents until late afternoon. For the Sunday they had set up a skate ramp near the punk tent, so this proved to be the best way to spend the arvo – chilling out and watching the skating along with meeting back up again with Reiner, Sarah and Chantelle. Left the skating at one stage to check out Mars Volta, who sucked and spent most of their set screaming or jumping off speaker stacks. Finally around 9ish Pennywise came on in the Punk set, and really turned it on, making the rest of the pretty shit day seem alright. With covers of stand by me and Come as you are, along with all their classics, the set was an absolute blast and full of fun, culminating with the whole crowd singing along at the end. We raced to the dance tent after this to finish the festival with too many djs, who put on an awesome show also playing all the classics, and leaving us all happy for a great weekend.
Absolutely shattered by the final night, Sarah drove me to Reiners so that I could sleep in a decent bed, while hardcore Age and Nugs kicked on for the partying on the final night. Spent Monday checking out some of Leeds with Reiner, before catching a nightmare 6 hour train ride home on the screwed up rail service.
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Tuesday, August 19, 2003 8:03:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
With round one of the festival weekends just complete, my intentions last Thursday night were to keep it low key so that I would be fully energised for the weekend ahead. Stupidly, as seems to be the case with me most weeks, I was not able to with stand the pressure of Thursday night entertainment, so Woags and I joined Sav for a few quiet beers at the So Bar. What was going to be a quiet few, turned into a few more, as it turned out A-Level results had just come out that day, so the pubs were overflowing with excited 19 year olds celebrating their results. Woags and I quickly found a large party to tag along behind, and following the So Bar closing, headed off to Purple which was absolutely full to the rafters – like I have never seen it before and especially on a Thursday. Ended up staying there until close (around 2 sometime) so by Friday morning was absolutely tired as, which made packing for V2003 all the more harder before a long day at work.
Got through Friday somehow and raced to the train station to meet the boys to head off to V2003 at Staffordshire – the festival for the weekend. After a shitty mix up, Age managed to get to the train on time, and an angry Woags missed it, leaving the boys separated for the journey there. Luckily Woags was able to get another train not long after, so about 2 hours later we were reunited at Stafford and filling up waterbottles with Vodka to take into the camping ground. It was pitch black by the time we found a camping spot amongst the hundreds and hundreds of tents already setup there, so setting up the tent wasn’t easy. Within about 15 minutes of making up our pre mixes was Woags absolutely carted (I shared with Age, while Woags made an absolute hell mix for himself). This put us both on dual Woags duty, while we wandered around checking out the rides and stalls around the place. Highlight of the night was no doubt Age and I hiring out the entire bumper car track to ourselves though, and going one-on-one in a demolition derby on the cars. Awesome. Also met some pretty young crew who we hung out with and scored free beers off before eventually retiring to our tents at some late hour.
The sun had us up pretty early on the Saturday, so following a bite to eat, we thought we might as well start getting stuck into the drinks again. By midday the park was open so we headed in to start checking out the bands, tents, skating and whatever else was on offer inside the festival. After a few more drinks and a few more bands, I think I was ahead for the Saturday in the drunk stakes, and met up with a hens night (well really what you would call a Hens day) – keeping up my regular pattern of joining in on Hens festivities. Around about this time I lost the boys, leaving me solo for about the next 6 hours. Didn’t stop me though from checking out a whole stack of cool bands including Queens of the Stone Age, Dave Grey (who was definitely the stand out surprise act for the weekend for me- I never really heard of before, but absolutely loved him/them), the Chili Peppers who put on a great show, and Underworld with Born Slippy being a great stand out number on their set. Ended up meeting up again with a couple of young English girls and after the festival shut up went back to wandering the campsite. Finally remet Age and Woags, who had retired for the night, but I managed to get Woags back up (who had by this stage left about 17 messages on my now dead phone trying to find me) and we found a cool tent near by with some young guys rocking away with an acoustic guitar. Had an absolute blast with their crew, killing out some great numbers included Busted’s ‘year 3000’ (yes, the boy band) and a top cover of the Chili Pepper’s dosed, which I have never heard before, but became the anthem for the weekend.
Sunday morning I was hurting a bit but we didn’t let this stop us, and soon had the vodka going again. We met a group of cool English chicks who we then proceeded to hang out with for most of the day. Age and I got tattoo’s saying ‘dude’ and ‘sweet’, which seemed quite funny at the time and again got to see a whole heap of skating and bands for the day. Ash put on a much better set than last time I saw them and The Cardigans weren’t too bad either. Got to check out Killing joke, which is Dave Grohl’s original band which he sadly didn’t play drums for, but watched on and enjoyed with the rest of us before he impressed us with a great Foo Fighter set later in the day. Managed to lose the girls at some stage before getting to watch a wrist slitting depressing end to the concert with Coldplay, who, for some unknown reason, the English really seem to love. We returned to the campsite for some more drinking with our tenting neighbours before finishing off a great festival weekend back at the singalong boys tent nearby with some more acoustic numbers.
Brilliant weekend which meant Monday was spent recovering, especially with Leeds festival this weekend which is sure going to be a great way to back up the V2003 festival.
(and no doubt I have missed half of the weekends events off here because I am still to buggered to bother remembering or typing up every detail)
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Monday, June 16, 2003 8:18:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Didn't finish work until real late Thursday night, meaning the usual drinking session at the Slug wasn't going to happen -though with Verena and the Germans (Verana's friends) in town, along with Woags, Dagyo (back from Greece), Hales and a few others down there, it would of been rude not to show up. Slipped in about 45 minutes at the pub, before a few of us inevitably ended up back at mine for some wine.
Thanks to working late Thursday I was able to knock off early Friday, and with that bonus, headed off to the Queen's tennis tournament for some play before the day was over. Smithy, Age and Wolverine met up with me, and we managed to get in and see the poo and the hew play in a doubles match which was fantastic, especially as we could sit real close to the action because it was on an outside court. The boys didn't win, but none the less provided and excellent spectacle against Malisse and Sa. With the night almost upon us, we regathered, got a few drinks under the belt, and headed off to Brixton, to spend the night at the last ever Fevah. The event was hosted at Mass, and wasn't a bad night, though I was pretty tired, so stoked when we finally got a taxi home, and I could get some much needed sleep.
London delivered some more great weather on Saturday, and there was no better way to spend it than over at Kyla's house for her going away bbq. I pretty decent crowd showed up to bid her farewell to Denmark, and get us started on the drinks. Age and I ended up heading into town after to the Walkabout in Leicster square, to meet up with ze Germans again. It was pretty much my first time at this walkabout, and the place wasn't too bad (less seedy than Sherperds Bush thank God), more decked out like a giant ballroom with balconys over looking the dance floor. Still wasn't a bad night, but still not overly early either, leaving me still no chance to gain back lost sleep.
Finally Sunday was spent recovering, and doing next to nothing. It was also ze Germans last night in town, which meant forcing ourselves to head back out again. The slug was chosen to wind the weekend down, and make sure that we didn't get an early night so that I could catch up on sleep.
Now I am still real tired (probably why this post is quite boring too..!) - if I think of something funny I'll add it later.
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Monday, June 09, 2003 7:50:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
With Harry and Turkey gracing the shores on London, it meant we had an even larger pack of boys to hit the slug on Thursday. The new boys loved the Northern Hemisphere 'Lookout', with Harry loving the fact that Bon Jovi got played too. While I decided to go home when the pub shut, the rest of the boys gallantly played on at Havana for a big night out.
Friday evening was spent down at the classier Kings Road hitting Babushka's and then Embargo's. Again there was a good crew out, and a pretty good night seemed to be had by all.
Age and I were up early Saturday to make the treck up to Newcastle. After about a 6 or so hour drive we arrived in the dive that is Newcastle. The place itself is bigger than I expected, though not really the most appealing city in the world - having said that the new area down on the river seemed real nice, and is obviously still in development, in the hope to 'grow' Newcastle. Probably what lets the place down the most though is the abundance and over population of bogans and rednecks all over the town. By night wearing a black t-shirt, sporting a gay haircut or talking in a annoying 'Geordie' accent, I was really out of place, and a little surprised I didn't get bashed.
After an eye opening wander around the city, Age and I still had a little time before the wrestling began (yes, that is why we were in town!) and so found a nice little bar and bought a pint. Our view of the bar considerably changed when we noticed there wasn't something quite right about the bar (no it didn't have an emergency exit) - there was somewhat more males than females, and the males seemed to sport mainly sleeveless, muscle-tight tops, 3-quarter length pants and were generally more friendly to each other than one might expect. The sign sporting the slogan "Gay and proud of it" pretty much triggered off to age that they weren't talking about being real happy so we promptly skulled our drinks and moved onto another bar, this time looking around first. Happy that the cliental included a couple of girls, and even a family, Age and I felt safe we were back to your standard local pub. It wasn't until about half way through our drink that Age realised the short-haired head 'guy' serving us was in fact the girl. The 2 blokes in the corner pashing, only fueled what was totally apparent - not only had Age and I screwed up our choice of pub once in this city, but somehow we had managed to land ourselves in a gay bar 2 times running.
Returning to the arena, where a throng of bogans was pouring into the stadium, Age and I once again felt comfortable hanging out with each other and regained our excitement for 'Insurrection' - a pay per view feast of WWE wrestling. The evening boasted the talents of Stone Cold Steve Austin, HHH, Kevin Nash, Rick Flair, Booker T, Jericho and a host of other big name players. What wasn't written on our tickets thought was that the evening was also to contain a crap load of red necks with shabbily written signs, which they would constantly hold up and block your view of anything, bar the back of some crap piece of crap cardboard from craptown. About an hour into the fight, and obviously quite frustrated Age and I picked up our bags from we were seated and went in search of someone elses seat which might have a better view. After one red neck bouncer got angry at me for standing in a public walkway, I eventually found us some decent seats, which I am sure some punter paid more for than our original seats, and Age and I subsequently watched the rest of the evening from there. Bar the rednecks, the evening was lots of fun, and it was great to see some big names talk it up, get bloody and basically beat the shit out of each other.
After a few beers following the fight at a non gay pub (Age and I thoroughly inspected about 5 different pubs, and in the end chose one full of punks and bikers, and this was probably the safest option - though I am surprised we weren't bashed there either as niether of us had any facial rings, tattoes or overly offense shirts on) we headed back to the bus for our trip home through the night.
Sunday night was our final night with Harry and Turkey, so it was spent having a few 'quiet' snakebites down at the Wimbledon walkabout.
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Thursday, June 05, 2003 8:00:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
If you have missed part 1 and 2, check them out here and here, otherwise read on for the final saga in the trilogy that was my weekend in Monaco!!
After a big night out Friday, and not having set my alarm to French time, Blaggers and I managed to miss the bus to Monaco on Saturday morning. Luckily for us there was a different coach going there, which we managed to blag our way onto. Saturday ended up being another great day trackside, with the final time trials taking place for the big race. This was really quite tight and exciting, as on such a tight circuit like Monaco pole makes a big difference - with that in mind we were totally stoked when Schumarker (or however it is spelt) only game in with the 5th best time - setting our hopes high for a good race on Sunday.
The afternoon was spent having beers on the streets of Monaco, and we met some cool (dare I use that word in the same sentence) Saffers. Also got to know a cute young french girl working in one of the food stalls, who I think was impressed by my Aussie flag and t-shirt. Blaggers on the other hand was in all sorts of trouble as he decided to don his t-shirt with a british flag on it. Evidently no one would serve him at any shops, people continually gave him evil glares, and even the pamphlett girl wouldn't give him a pamphlett. Man, those Brits must have really pissed off the French in a different lifetime.
By dusk the track was open, and so we briefly checked out the circuit, before heading onto a bar called stars and bars, which was supposed to be a good hangout, but pretty much ended up being a bit of a dive. It wasn't long before we were totally bored there, and in a bid to find something better we ran into a few young dudes from Holland. Tagging along with them we headed accross town, past the harbour, which definitly hosts the absolute largest personal yachts and boats you could ever dream of, and up to the famous Monaco Casino. Somehow in our drunken state, we managed to find our selves walking down the red carpet to some glitz festival that was on that night. It was quite amusing to be on the other side of the fence, especially when a decent sized crowd was located behind barriers taking photos and the like (I assume the Prince must have been coming to this function). Sadly though, the bouncers spotted that we should not have been on the carpet, and briskly escorted us off the area and back with the plebs.
We continued to drink with the Holland lads in some cool Monaco pubs, meeting a few French girls along the way - who again hated the British, but loved the aussie flag, although one half highlight for the evening was meeting a couple of British lads who were part of the pit crew. Eventually though the night had to come to an end, so we stumbled back to the train to catch the last train back to Canne. Some crazy gay guy with a dog tried to pick me up on the way home, but other than that no further excitement graced us for the journey.
Sunday was the big day. The day we were there for, so following a half decent sleep Blaggers and I were up and ready and keen for the big race. Again brilliant weather greeted the morning, and the bus took us into Monaco.
The main highlight for the morning probably came about while Blaggers and I rested in the shade. Sitting there minding our own business, but who should walk past but Mark Webber (aussie F1 driver) himself! The crowd around town was buzzing, and even more glamorous and gorgeous French girls strolled the sunny streets of Monaco.
By early afternoon when the big race started the entire town was absolutely flooded with people. The stands were packed, and any roof, building or wall which had a glimpse of the circuit was teaming with onlookers. As the cars pulled up onto the starting grid and started the engines, the crowd roared, and the excitement level was like a Grand final, sending goosebumps down the arms.
By the time the cars reached our spot by the pool we were in a frenzy with excitement, and then just to make it even better, one of the cars crashed right in front of us - making our spot the ultimate seats. It was awesome!!! The race itself continued on, and made for quite a close spectacle, with Montoya the ultimate winner, which was great to see.
More beers followed to celebrate the end of the Grand Prix, and the end of a brilliant weekend. We even stumbled accross another pits area, where more work was done on the cars, which was great to watch at the end of the weekend. By the time we got on the bus, Blaggers and I were quite exhausted (and drunk), leaving us to fall asleep for the first half of the long journey home.
What an absolute cracker of a weekend! For anyone who wants to join me, I'll be there for sure again next year!!!
Brilliant. (photos up here real soon - I promise!)
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Wednesday, June 04, 2003 8:01:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Part 2 (if you missed part 1, then click here to read it NOW!!!)
Friday was to be our day away from the races, and out in the sunshine of Southern France, so after a good sleep in, Blaggers and I ventured into town (of course missing breakfast), to catch the bus into Canne. Blaggers, being the smart little cookie that he is, managed to only pack jeans and winter clothes (someone forgot to tell him that outside of London it actually gets warm), so after a quick duck into some local shops to get him a towel and some shorts (well actually 2 pairs - the first were considerably gay in his opinion, so we ended up getting him a second pair), before we headed down to the Mediteranean Sea for a swim.
As per usual with European beaches, the majority of the punters prefer to go topless, and also are obviously quite used to the sun, as we stood out like 2 little white rabbits with our blinding London tanned skin. Still the sun was out in force, so we were able to bask in glory and work on our tan, in between swimming and observing the local talent.
As we grew hungry for lunch, we thought we would venture into Canne to get some food, though only metres off the beach we were distracted by about twenty or so hot, hot chicks in bikini's, dancing among the palm trees. Intrigued (and quite excited), we went to check out what all the excitement was about, and found that a French video clip was getting made, complete with about six seedy directors, lots of girls in bikini's, one buff male model, some really cheesey European pop dance music and a 50 strong male crowd of onlookers. Not wanting to miss out on the action, we hung around for over an hour, taking about thirty roles of film and enjoying the local 'film' industry production - I mean it is Canne after all, home of the Canne film festival, so we had to watch a film getting made...
Lunch was spent at the finest French Cuisine, gorging our stomachs with Le Big Mac, Fries and the standard (Pulp Fiction) Beer with the meal (and not bad I might add - Kronenberg). The remainder of the afternoon consisted of some more tanning, swimming, (perving) and just generally soaking up the French summer atmosphere. By late afternoon we had also checked out some class shops, had a few more beers and generally made the most of our day off.
Not content with finishing early, we quickly made a detour past home to freshen up and smichkin up, before coming back into Canne for the Friday night life. It was heaps of fun checking out the local bars, getting complete contradicting advice from locals about what was good, and just generally enjoying the place by night. We found a couple of hip bars, some pretty average places, and even managed to nip into the casino for a quick gamble (Blaggers doubled is money inside a minute before leaving in as quick a time).
Eventually we thought we should find a good club to hang out in, so exhausted from walking all over town, we stumbled into a place called Jane's. A pretty young crowd was out in force, which seemed to be teeming with hot girls, plus the bar guys were pouring drinks with a 'splash' of mixer and the rest alcohol. After a few drinks, we hit the dance floor in the hope to meet some French. Alas the word hope is probably the truest part of the night. No sooner would you move near a French girl then would they flee away to the far corners of the room. Even a polite 'Bonjour' towards them, would be fiercely replied with a shaking a finger and 'No!, No!, No!, No!'. As we would later discover, it seems the British who have come before us have made a 'fantastic' impression on the locals to the point that if they think you are English they are almost ready to kill you. Still a good, and at times mildly amusing night was had by us, before stumbling into a taxi home and some early hour of the morning.
Part 3 to come... stay tuned!!!
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Tuesday, June 03, 2003 7:56:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
After a totally exhausting one day week at work, Wednesday came quite quickly, and it was off to Victoria Station for Blaggers and I, to begin our 6 day whirlwind Monaco Grand Prix holiday. Everything begun well enough, though we had a little trouble finding the coach, and managed to be pretty much the last people to board the coach. In retrospect, this pretty much set the tone for the whole weekend, as pretty much every other time we boarded the coach, Blaggers and I were the last ones on.
The coach itself was a complete F1 nerd convention. Besides Blaggers and I, at least everyone on the coach was wearing some type of F1 paraphanalia, from Ferrari hats, to BMW jackets, to glaringly horrible Minardi T-shirts - this lot wore it all, and quite proudly. Blaggers and I in our casual summer gear must therefore have looked quite out of place, and obviously were complete rookies when it came to Grand Prix's.
The trip to the French Riveria took forever, but after a decent coach ride, a ferry trip accross to France, and then a real long coach ride, some 18 hours and a bottle of vodka later we arrived in Monaco, for Thursday morning, and the first morning of the Grand Prix time trials. After dealing with 24 service stations which served absolute shit food, it was actually quite pleasant to find that the hosh posh town of Monaco actually boasted a McDonald's (which probably has one of the best views of any Maccas I have been to, looking over the harbour), where we ordered our breakfast. Though, for what was not the first, and by no means the last time, we misread the French menu, and ended up with a pretty crap breakfast - for those of you soon to be in France, the McBrunch is not a brunch, but yoghurt, cake and pancakes. Damn French.
It was quite exciting to wander down through the quaint town of Monaco, towards the harbour (where the race track is) and begin to hear the roaring of engines along the track. As soon as we heard the noise, us 2 little boys where over whelmed with excitement and headed straight down to our grand stand to check out the excitingly loud F1 cars. Being only the Thursday also meant we could sit anywhere in our grandstand, so for the remainder of the morning we sat in various positions of the stand to check out the cars doing their warm uplaps, in the very pleasant 30 degree weather which Monaco offered us.
With the heat starting to get the better of us by the afternoon, and my head turning to about the same colour as my surname, we thought it would be best to have a few beers to break up the time before the time trials started. The beers were absolutely fantastic, and unlike miserable London, were served real cold and with a head. Refreshingly brilliant. What made them even better was that we got to enjoy the exquisitely hot chicks which southern France boasts (and my God, there are a lot of them) while listening to the sounds of the formula one in the background.
By the evening we had witnessed our first brilliant day of racing, and as it began to get dark we were able to finally access our luggage (and a much needed hat and shorts - though a little late), and checked into our hotel about an hours drive away in Canne La Bocca. Not content with staying confined to the boringness of the hotel, Blaggers and I ventured into the city for some French dinner. In the end we found a place humming with activity, and boasting a giant kangaroo as its logo - we are still trying to work out the signifigance of this, as the place served Pizza and Italian dishes only. None the less we enjoyed a tasty dinner, before an evening stroll through the quiet streets in search of a buzzing bar. Alas, Canne La Bocca was not Ibiza, so, quite exhausted, we returned to our hotel room for a much deserved sleep.
End of Part 1. Part 2 (and probably 3 also) will come as soon as I write them, and there are a lot of stories and pictures to come - you have now read the intro!!
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Tuesday, May 27, 2003 7:51:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
With the Monaco Grand Prix only a week away, I thought this week would be a great opportunity to keep things a little quiet, and perhaps avoid going to the Thursday local that is the Slug. Sadly though, the temptations proved too great, and alas at the eleventh hour I was persuaded into going to the Thursday slug session. Not a bad night was had by Woags, Daygo, Age and I, meeting up with Mark and Kelly and their gang, for what was to be their final night at our local.
Friday I really should have also had a quiet night. Especially with the giant homelands festival on the next day. But as things have a way of working, much like Thursday night, my quiet ambitions were soon squashed. Straight after work I headed to the Puzzle to meet up with the gang, for more farewell drinks with Mark and Kelly, where Age and I demolished everyone at foozeball, while I also remained totally undefeatable on Point Blank. With winning aspirations on my mind, we gathered the gang up, and headed off to the Slug to continue the evenings antics. Smithy, Kelda, Wolverine and co headed off to the Cook not long after, while Age, Woags and I kicked on with Kate Fisher and her friends at the Slug and then Charingtons accross the road. As always we couldn't put a stop to the night early, so ended up bringing the party back to Fulham, kicking on with heaps of action into the night back at our place.
Saturday I was absolutely buggered and hurting, and the very idea of going to Homelands, a giant dance festival in Winchester, seemed like too much. Things did not get a scrap better, when after heading down to pick up my £50 ticket for the show off Pete Maccora, I cleverly left it on the tube. Clearly frustrated and screaming profanities which should be left for French classes, I almost gave up on the whole festival thing. Somehow I convinced myself it was worth buying another ticket, so jumped on a train with Age and headed off to the sticks for the show. Luckily it was quite easy to pick up a ticket off scalpers, and before long we were inside the 35 000 capacity festival for the show.
The afternoon started off with catching the end of De La Soul before meeting up with Odie, Taryn, Hales and the gang. The rest of the day then proceeded with great acts including an impressive Grand Master Flash, thanks to a tip off from Jeans, playing old skool tunes, Oakenfold, Chemical Brothers, Jon Carter, and probably my highlight for the day was 2 Many DJs. All in all we had an excellent time, and though I had to have twice as much fun as everyone else because I paid twice as much, I think I managed to scrape in my moneys worth, before the sun came up and the slow treck home began.
Been a long weekend in London meant that Kyla, Debs and co could have their giant birthday party/celebrations on a Sunday night, without having to be concerned over work the next today. The Shermanator did an awesome job kitting his house up for the party, creating several different themed rooms with music and djs, and even a class bar with a giant mirror. A large contingent of us rocked up around 8, and the party was into full swing. Any thoughts of an early night never eventuated as the party absolutely rocked all night. Everyone seemed to have an absolute ball, Wolverine and Age fired up the bar for half the night (we need more bar staff like these guys), Daygo and Munno went AWOL, the dance floor went nuts, the DJs fired off some awesome tunes and I got to spend alot of the night catching up with heaps of the crew, including Sam, an English friend of mine.
Sadly all good nights have to come to an end, meaning a sleepy Monday for most of us. To finish off the weekend a few of us met up with Mark and headed to catch the Matrix Reloaded, which contrary to some other people's opinions (Jean) absolutely rocks. A few beers after at the pub finished off yet another memorable weekend amongst the mayhem that is London. Now its time to go cause some chaos in Monaco for the Grand Prix...
(If I get a chance before I hit Monaco, I will put photos up. If not, you will have to wait a week...)
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Monday, May 19, 2003 7:57:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Lets start this week's review with arguably the greatest day on the annual calendar - my birthday - Thursday the 15th of May. While the majority of the day didn't reveal any major excitement, the evening more than made up for it. After a few drinks at home with the 2 Adrians, the three of us headed down to another pub celebrating its 10th birthday. Yes, regular readers of cc.com would surely be aware of a close bond between myself and the Slug in Fulham, but this bond is unbelievably extended to the fact that we even share the same birthday! So the Slug put on a massive party for the 2 of us, plus even later than usual trading hours, meaning a real good dig at the night could be had. Smithy retired before close, but Age and I managed to kick on quite late for a 'school night', getting to enjoy the snakebites on offer.
Friday was a bit of a stuggle, but managed to get through the day training some clients at their workplace, which also presented itself a new group of people of hanging out with on Friday night. Not one to shy away from complete strangers, it wasn't long into their post work drinks at a local pub in Camden that I became well acquainted with most of their staff. Hung around for quite a number of beers, before myself and four girls (yes, count that four - all of them met that night!) headed off to a resturant for a later than usual dinner. I ended up getting on one of the last tubes home, and while I hadn't planned on having a big night (what with my party the next day and all), I still managed to have a good night out.
Saturday was party day. So the boys were up and at it pretty early on, moving furniture and getting the house ready for the party in the afternoon. Didn't take nearly as long as anticipated to set up, which meant drinks could be cracked earlier than expected. By early afternoon, we all had a few beers under the belt and the guests started arriving. Smithy started the music going quite early, spinning up the tunes on his decks, while the crowd arrived in antipation of three o'clock kick off for the FA cup final. While back in Oz I managed to uphold my reputation for holding huge AFL grand final parties, I didn't let myself down, by (quite coindently) been able to hold a grand final party in London, for perhaps an event of equal signifigance to the culture. While the boys early on got quite involved with the game, we soon had the music playing again, and the building crowd became less involved with the football and more on the party.
By games end, the party was in full swing, Glenn had moved into position on the decks and the party was well and truly swinging. Smithy evidently never got to return to playing again (with girlfriend issues), but Glenn on debut put in a sterling effort, keeping the crowd happy right up until around 9:30. It was great to see a cool group of friends there, both from the large Sacred Heart contigent, and also heaps of the London crew I have met over here. But with the sun now well set, it was time to start getting changed and ready to go to school disco. Alot of the crew were obviously quite hammered by now (Sarah wins the award, for not even making to School disco - passing out first, with woags a close second stumbling all over the shop), and so with school clothes on we made the trek to the disco.
After a few early issues with the disco (CC managed to lose the tickets, and plead his way in) and a longer than expected walk, we were all soon inside and having a great evening. Munno was totally out of control running around kissing half of the girls in school disco (from every ethnic region possible) while Lovey and Nugs both managed to get kicked off the stage about nine times between them, including managing to get their shirts off up there in front of the 800 strong crowd. Meanwhile I entertained Sam, Davida, Sparks and Jen, with the rest of the crew scattered around the huge dance floor dancing away to all the classic tunes one would expect from our old school era. If you have been reading this column for some time now, you may recall Boxalotti and I came to this same night some time ago last year. As it happens, we have now been immortalised in School Disco folklore, as during the night giant images are projected up on the wall behind the stage, and whose faces should appear up there, but Box and myself in all our school disco glory! In the end, I can't think of anyone who didn't enjoy the night, except maybe the person who lift the 'spew' gift for us to clean up on our stairs back at home.
Sunday was quiet. Though come late afternoon we decided to head over to the Cock to grab a roast for dinner. Anna and Kirsty (former school mates) happened to be hanging out there also, so managed to have a pretyt cool night in the end and a few beers, catching up with them to finish the weekend off.
A special thanks to everyone who helped me have an awesome birthday weekend, sorry I can't list you all here, though I have to pay tribute to Sparks and Jen who ventured all the way down from Scotland to take part in the festivities. Cheers guys!
This week I promise to put up photos from the party and disco, so sit tight and they will be here soon!
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Tuesday, May 13, 2003 7:38:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
With birthday festivities and May madness beginning next week, this week was always planned to be a quiet weekend by general standards. And so it began quietly enough with the regular Thursday trip down to the Slug. I held back on the drinks, only downing a couple of snakebites, for an unusually quiet evening, even leaving before close. Still we had a pretty decent crew in attendance, though I think the fact there was about 12 guys, and only 2 girls, made our gang a little lopsided.
Straight after work on Friday I headed to Canary Wharf to meet up with Age for a night of fun WWE style - which for any one not up to the minute in wrestling is the new name for the WWF. With fantastic tickets at London Arena, Age and I were able to watch the wrestling extravaganza from only about 30 metres away. While this was mainly just a touring 'Smackdown' tour, we still got to see some big names such as Brock Lesnar, Rikishi, Ben wa (or however you spell it), Mysterio, Tori, The Big Show and Team Angle. The wrestling had all the usual excitement, from refs getting knocked out, to chair fights through to just pure brilliant wrestling and flying moves. It had all the fireworks one would have hoped and expected, and finished with a great all in fight in the ring at the end.
By Saturday I was beginning to get alcohol withdrawl symptons, so after a quick call from Perth friend Mark, who was coincidently in town for the day, I was off into town to enjoy some beers in Covent Garden. Started at the Punch and Judy with Mark, and some token guy from Australia he'd met at the backpackers, before we headed on to Belushi's to meet up with Woags, Lovey and Munno. As per usual, eating was forgotten about, and consequently we were all feeling a little light headed, as the boys headed home, and I parted company with Mark and co (though not before Lovey did a little street busking himself in Covent Garden, much to the disamusement of fellow buskers). After making home grown snakebites back at our place, Woags, Lovey, Munno and I headed in to Crazy Larry's in Chelsea later in the evening. The place didn't quite live up to expectations, so soft serve icecream Age Ryan didn't end up missing out by staying at home and being a little pussy cat.
Sure enough, with us boys feeling sorry for ourselves on Sunday, and Soft Serve full of energy, trying to stay out of going down to the Wimbledon Walkabout that afternoon was completely out of the question. Age and I met up with Pete Macca at his house for a nice crownie before heading down the pub. We met up with a decent crew down there, to end the weekend off in decent fashion with good ol' cheap snakebites.
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Tuesday, April 08, 2003 8:23:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
For no reason what so ever, except for the fact that it was a Thursday, we decided by freak chance to go to the Slug and Lettuce. Smithy, Age and I went down and had a pretty fun night kicking back with Felicity, Kylie and the gang, and also met up by freak chance, with Wothers, a guy I met back in California.
Friday night I rounded up Rach, Age, Blaggers and Daygo to head into the Saint in town, to meet up with Hiten and the boys. Not your greatest club to go to in the world, which was probably why everyone went home before midnight, except of course 'never know when enough is enough' Clinton, who kicked on there until about 3am with Hiten's mates. Was pretty good night though in the end, with a few body shots thrown in for good measure, but also darn more expensive than planned.
With Man united playing at lunch time, it was too good a opportunity for Age and I not to start the afternoon off with a couple of drinks. A group of us headed down the park after, and along with about twenty other random dudes, spent a great 'summers' day in the sun playing football. I was quite knackered come darkness, but Age and I still thought it would be cool to have a few quiet drinks over at Kate Fisher's house party. Got there and had a pretty laid back night, and only just managed to see Kate, who didn't bother rocking up at her own party until about midnight - which was about when we were leaving!
Sunday was always going to be the big day of the weekend, with a pre booked spot on a boat for Age, Wolverine, Woags and I (and about 200 other punters), to watch the Cambridge v. Oxford boat race on the Thames. The afternoon was absolutely awesome, with the boat having an on board dj and almost everyone in attendence getting into the theme for the afternoon "Institutionally Uniform". This meant an abundance of hot school girls, nurses and just about everything else occupied the boat with us. Once the afternoon got going, the snake bites were flowing and the music was cranking, the boat was absolutely out of control. The rowing race itself zoomed past in about 10 seconds, and was apparently the closest ever - though at the end of the day I wasn't really fazed by the result (an Oxford win), with the day reminding me in many ways of Perth Cup (who goes for the horses?). We danced on the boat until dark with the mainly South African contigent, and then courtesy buses after took us to none other than our local - The Slug. Finished off around midnight after one of the best days to date yet in London.
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Monday, March 10, 2003 11:49:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Week wasn't so easy to get into, as after my monster flight back from Perth, I had time only for a quick shower
before embarking on an entire day's work. As such Monday through Wednesday were relatively quiet, though it gave me a great chance to get up to speed on the newly arrived Age, Lovey and Munno's travels to date (3 more members of the brat pack from Perth).
So with Thursday came my first big night out with the new boys (minus Fanta Pants - Munno), plus Woags, Smithy and Wolverine. After pre drinks and table tennis at our place, we headed down to the Slug (after a well needed 3 week lay off from the place by myself), for an absolutely huge night out. We all managed to get pretty hammered, and made for a darn good start to the weekend.
Friday night meant following up the previous night with the same boys and more drinking, this time down at Purple - with Fantapants and Daygo substituting in for Smithy. Fantapants managed to get kicked out and get back in well, Age used his greek charm to good effect, and Lovey got myself and a whole host of geezers into a great breakdancing session on the floor. Everyone seemed to have a good night, except some turkey who was trying to bottle Daygo and fight the rest of us.
Saturday Age, Wolverine and I headed into Oxford street for a while, met up with Blaggers, before Wolverine and I headed to the 'Southern Cross' - a local pub in Fulham, to meet up with Glenn. Watched the kiwi's win in the cricket, and then celebrated with a whole herd of them, with a mandatory celebration cigar. The evening brought with it a huge crew heading into Camden Palace for a big night out clubbing. Age joined all the regulars on the circuit for a great night out in yet another of London's shit hole neighbourhoods - Camden - and before we knew it, the sun was coming up and we were only just getting home.
Got a few z's in Sunday morning before Age and I met up with Alen (Jeans snr.) and Jo for a few beers at the Larrick in Putney. Finished the weekend up with dinner at the Wishing Well on King st (number 180 as opposed to the resturaunt of the exact same name on the exact same street at number 160 - not related though - work that out??). Kelda decided to film us all eating as part of her latest London idea of filming 'cheap' London, while Age, Debs, Rach and I kept the ourselves amused with the usual stupid antics. After a brief post dinner party at Rach's we all retired for the night around 11:30.
Photo/s to come as soon as I get my ass into gear, or actually find any worthy of actually displaying on a website.
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Wednesday, February 26, 2003 1:51:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Well the weekly report is late again - though in my opinion I have good reason, what with been on holiday and all, not to mention that most of the time I have been here has been either at the beach or in the pub, neither of which have internet connections of any form.
The week began as most weeks do, with a Monday. Monday wasn't overly exciting, though having said that in the evening it was great to go out for beer and a meal with Mark, a friend of mine I met over in New York.
Tuesday Plugger and Lee came around and picked me up to go and check out the brilliant flick '8 Mile'. This was promptly followed by some beers down at the Standford arms on the coast in Scarborough. After a few there, Plugger headed home, leaving Lee and I in North Beach, a little drunk and a little bored. We decided to take and esky, and some cheese and biscuits down to the walkway at the beach, not only to watch the sunset in the tranquility, but to also catch all the late afternoon joggers, riders and walkers who traffic down the coast every night. With the sun set, and a night of drinking well on the cards, we managed to persuade Susie, Lee's flatmate, to take us back to the Standford arms, where we met up with Jeans and Nys. Still not content with calling it a night here, we headed into Leederville to attend backpackers night at the Hip-e-Club. This turned out to be heaps of fun, with a real international (London) feel about, where we met English, Belgium, French, American, Canadian and of course Aussies, in a real multi-cultural (and for Perth quite surreal) environment. The night ended sometime in the early hours of Wednesday with us all quite drunk.
Wednesday took me back to my glory days of Perth, with the good old Wednesday local the Breakwater entertaining the boys for the night. The place was overflowing with the usual abundance of hot girls, young surf punks, and beer. Probably the highlight of the night belonged to running into Johno Cooper - a great - and typical aussie bloke who I hadn't seen in a long time (for regular readers you might remember AFL grand final day I got totally slaughtered with his brother Lozza).
Thursday night and it was time to catch up with the Box again. We headed down to the more cultural Fremantle for a few beers starting at the Norfolk, where we totally dominated the pool table, before heading down to Benny's - a much more trendy bar where I had never been before. Scotch and Drys where much more in order there (and besides I was starting to grow tired of beer), and Box's mate also met up with us. Closing time was 12, but this only pushed us in the direction of the Zanzi Bar, down on the Harbour in Freo. The place was quite busy, though very bogan, but wasn't too bad for a Thursday I guess and we finished the night off there.
Friday brought for most people the weekend (though as you can see I was well in the middle of holiday mode so it didn't make any difference). My drinking day began out at Curtin - my old work - at the Tav around lunch time. Caught up with all the old work crew, before getting home in time for Nys to take me down to Subiaco oval to catch a fantastic game of Aussie rules football between local rivals Fremantle and West Coast Eagles. King Danny joined me for the spectacle which saw the far too strong Eagle boys account for a very competitive Fremantle team. Headed into the popular Subiaco district afterwards - starting at the Red Sea, another of my old drinking holes. Managed to run into Harry the beefcake there - and also House and Mads joined up with us a bit later for a beer. Farewelled King Danny and the crew home then headed to Llama bar to meet up with Jem, Jeans, Horgan, Box, Hods and about half a dozen others who had been out at dinner. Things by this stage were starting to get messy, but we still managed to push on and after getting bored there moved down the road to the Saphire bar for more dancing, drinking and fun. By around 4am I was stuffed so ended up jumping in a taxi and heading home.
By Saturday my body was well and truly feeling the holiday effect, and for anyone who has got this far reading and are not asleep I will try not to bore you any further. Took it relatively easier heading over to Greg's house, who threw a party to get a small crew together for some beers, a spa and watch the Man United game.
Finished the weekend with another blinder, this time at the Australian domestic Cricket One Day Final at the WACA. WA was playing the NSW boys, highlighted by the fact the Waugh brothers were both playing. The boys got a big crew together in the outer at the WACA, and it wasn't long before PC was leading the boozy lot, including Plugga, Stone, Fletch, Jem, DC, Thorpe, Aker and crew in chants on the hill. Managed to get the whole crowd loving us, and joining in the chants, though ex-Perth NSW player Katich wasn't overly impressed by our taunts, none the less the Waugh brothers who also gave us responses and reactions to us yobbo's on the hill. When the game was over, which we ineviditably lost, us drunks were the real winners, and celebrated with a jump on the kid's bouncy castle, which we were some how allowed on. Got a lift to Steve's and the Cott after, but was so exhausted by this stage, that the evening sort of fizzled out a bit.
I think thats enough for one week. Missed out a shed load in the report, but my fingers are sore, and you are no doubt totally bored so I will leave there...
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Thursday, February 20, 2003 9:00:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Yes the report is late this week, I guess my excuse can be the time difference due to the fact I am now in Australia. Australia? One might ask, and yes CC is back down under for 2 weeks, but lets take a step back a few days to last Monday when the week actually began. Monday night I headed out after to work to met up with Glenn, to go see Polyphonic Spree. Polyphonic Spree (for those who don't know - which included me before this night) are a 22 piece band, led by the former Flaming Lips singer, which sing fantastic 'happy' type 70s music meets alternative rock, to produce an awesome display of entertainment. Mind you, the fact that there is 22 people on stage (all wearing white robes) and jumping around, balloons falling from the sky, and a choir like epic sound coming through, one can't help but smile and be happy through the entire performance. Almost more a stage show than a live act, but in the end a great night.
Stepping forward to Wednesday, and headed down to the Puzzle, for what we all know now was a fantastic game of Football with Australia taking on the mighty Poms in England, at the game they apparently know best. As Australia went on to take the emphatic victory the packed crowd went nuts for all of Aussie's three goals, with almost equal roars every time a replay was shown of any of the magical feats of talent. What was even better was to hear the crowd cheer for Englands solitary goal, as it proved there was quite a few English fans present in the pub to really stick it to once the game was over, not to mention everyone at work the next day who hated the site of any Australian.
Finished my final night off in London on a Thursday, and not at the usual Slug, but for a beer at the more quiet, but trendy So bar.
Friday was supposed to be a fairly casual and easy flight to Australia but some turkey decided to make this more difficult for me, by getting of the tube (when I was half way to the airport) and going for a stroll down the tube tunnel. This inevitably led to the entire tube system shutting down, and the police been called in to catch the moron, while the rest of London was left stranded. About two and half hours later, and a few bus and train rides, I finally made it to Heathrow, though this wasn't the end of my troubles, as it turns out I didn't have an e-ticket, and the ticket I needed to board the plane was back at my house. Running extremely late, I pilaged through my entire backpack to discover a photo copy of my ticket, which somehow, through a lot of sweet talking, managed to allow me to have a ticket reissued in time for me to run through fort knox security and onto my waiting plane.
Finally touched down in Perth in the early hours of Sunday, and after a few hours sleep it was time to start catching up with the gang. Slightly disappointing weather meant the Cott wasn't entirely up to scratch, though this didn't stop Hods, Boxalotti, Jeans, Jem and the Coffey girls from coming out to welcome CC back home. As the night passed and the beer flowed, the crowd dwindled, though not ready for bed, Hods, Box and myself then decided to head on to 'Club' to kick on some more. Good way to end the night, with even more hot chicks out and about, and of course even more beer. Headed back to Hods after that for a few more drinks, and the Boxalotti show. In a bid to catch up in the drunken department, Box challenged Hods to skull half a bottle of dodgy whisky. After downing almost half himself, in a mean skulling display, Hods declined the challenge, leaving Box the undisputed winner. Ten minutes later though, I think Hods was glad he didn't take the challenge as the spirits caught up with our man Box, leaving him face down in the garden, and giving a great start to the tour down under.
(the rest of the weeks report to come real soon when I get time...)
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Thursday, February 13, 2003 3:30:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Might as well start this weeks report with the same old repititive story - headed down to the Slug on Thursday night, along with Smithy and Woags, though not before a few shots of tequila at home before we left. Celebrations for the night were supposed to be for the New Zealand "Waitangi day", which failed to draw a massive crowd (contrary to the aussies for their celebrations), but none the less, us non-kiwi's still shone through with flying colours, and made sure a good night was had by all. Some geezer on the way home wanted to think otherwise, trying to start a fight with us, but after a few heated words, he was on his way, albiet with a few less posessions, as the moron decided to throw his food, necklace, rings, and whatever else he had on, on to the ground to try and look tough.
Friday night Woags and I headed back down the Slug, for a couple of drinks, before heading on to Purple, under Chelsea football stadium. Full of a much more English crowd, the night was quite a bit of fun, with the boys dancing up a storm, and also managed to meet a few of the local English crew that frequent the club.
After a relatively quiet day on Saturday, I headed over to Wolverine's house in the evening to begin the gathering of the gang to head off for big celebrations at the Cook in Acton (Crapton). We met up with Bandy and gang, before catching the world's gayest, and definitely slowest train to Kyla's house - why we didn't walk baffles me, as catching the tube managed to take about 3 hours longer. Still, the crowd continued to build at Kyla's, until around 9pm we all piled into the back of The Shermanators car and headed down to the club. The wait in line to get in was highlighted by insane peg games and watching a car blow a tyre and almost spin out of control (followed by Sherman impressing the onlooking queue with his tyre changing abilities). Wolverine headed home before we even got home (suffering from chronic fatigue gayness), but the rest of us were soon in before 10. Phil and Tara Reynolds played back to back to make for a great night of music, though the completely over-crowded and over-heated venue was a bit of a downer, not to mention the lack of plumbing in the facility. Still, managed to have a great night dancing with peg pal Rachel, and was good to also see Blaggers rock up later in the night. For some post party VB's we headed back to Kyla's, where Rach and I turned on the bread roll hacky sack, before most of the gang got bored and went to sleep. The final four of us took the cue to go home, and had a pleasant walk home along the Thames.
Sunday I was damn tired, but still managed to drag my sorry ass out of bed to head off to the library with fellow geek Rachel. An excellent children's book illustration exhibition was on, with the likes of Quentin Blake and Raymond Briggs on display, making for a cool cultural afternoon. Met up with Smithy later on at the 3 Kings to watch the Saffers go down to the Windies in the opening game of the World cup, which was made all the more sweeter by the fact that Smithy had brought down quite a gang of Saffers to watch the game. Nothing tops a weekend off better then watching Saffers choke and cry.
(Photo to come)
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Wednesday, February 05, 2003 8:24:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
With the upcoming clintoncherry.com downunder tour coming up in mid February, I thought it wouldn't be a bad idea to lay a little low in the upcoming weeks. A change of weather to the colder definitely helped with my cause, and no doubt alot of other peoples as we found out on Thursday night. After a freezing day with snow, sleet and storms, of course the fourth 's' was going to come into play - The Slug - though, due to half of London getting closed down, the turnout there was possibly the smallest I have ever seen. Still the Walham Grove boys didn't let this get in the way of a few drinks and a fun, though quietish night was had.
Friday, headed to Scotia bar after work with the boys (from work) for a few beers.Spent most of the night trying to convince Hiten that I did not have any nuclear weapons. Still managed to get home and into bed well before midnight.
Saturday pretty much sucked during the day as I had to go into work. Swung by Wolverine's house on the way home, before the 2 of us walked back to my place so I could get ready for the evening's entertainment. Wolverine decked himself out with portable speakers for the walk home, with real scratch dodgy dance beats eminating from his piss weak speakers. The gang all met up at Kyla's place in Acton (crapton), before about 15 of us walked to Sheperds Bush for Hemisphere, a clubbing night at Sheperds Bush Empire. A pretty fun night was had by all, which was great with a big crew together with Blaggers, Wolverine, Bundy, Daygo, Rach, Kyla, Hannah, Dick... to name but a few who managed to make the night out.
Sunday I got home around 11, after crashing for a while at Wolverines. Went and saw Gangs of New York in the arvo, which wasn't a bad flick at all, before everyone in the Gangs of Fulham crashed early on Sunday.
Monday night Daygo and I went out with Sarah and Emma (from Paris) for dinner in the city. Not a bad way to finish the weekend, and continue the countdown until the tour begins in Perth.
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Monday, January 06, 2003 1:15:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
With the festive season roaring along at an alarming speed with Christmas, Boxing day and every other conceivable celebration behind us, it was time to get on a bus and head on to the Big Bang of the festive season, the Grand Finale, the last hoorah – New Years in Edinburgh. Late Saturday evening (after quite a few drinks to make sure we had a bit of an edge when we got on the bus), Nyssa, Burge, Kendra and I arrived at Paddington station to meet our tour group and board the bus to head up to the colder country. The great thing about PP travel (our tour company) is that they let you drink on the bus, and actually what is even better than that is that they sell alcohol on the bus at dirt cheap prices (just to encourage you that little bit more!). So after a few beers down on the back seat (as always the bogans at the back) and quite a bit of noise, I managed to doze off for a while, making the 9 hour journey seem like somewhat less.
We arrived in beautiful (but bloody cold) Edinburgh early the next morning, and got told to waste some time before we embarked on a city tour. The city itself is quite a pretty place, and holds its own much better than dirty London. It is also made all the more pretty with a castle located in the middle of the city, which itself is split across 2 giant rocks. Our hotel was also brilliantly located close to the heart of the city, so was only a stones throw from all the pubs, and the famous mile where New Years was to be spent. Luckily when the tour returned we were able to check into our room and get a few z’s for the arvo, while most of the rest of the crew were left to spend the afternoon waiting in the foyer for a room. Suckers. The evening brought with it a pub crawl along Rose St. with anyone from the 600 strong tour who was keen. About 60 odd came along to visit about 5 or so pubs along the street, to get into the Scottish and New Years spirit. Also managed to collect Tyson, Odie, Mcgrab and Paz along the way to join in the fun, and make sure that the holiday away started with a bit of a bang.
We started Monday with a trip off to Sterling castle. With about 12 tour buses arriving at the same time, the line to get in was enormous, so Burge and I almost gave in on getting in, until we discovered a secret ticket shop, which was our ticket into the castle. Meanwhile Daygo and Stu had already given up on the idea and decided to use the time more usefully drinking at the local pub. The castle was pretty cool, but with constant drizzle, and only so much to see in a pub, by the end of about an hour the castle had run its race, and we were ready to return back to Edinburgh to begin the afternoon/evenings drinking. Luckily the bus ride helped us get a head start, ahead of the pre New Years Eve party at Espionage. The night out was organised for the 600 or so on tour, and so it wasn’t long into the evening before we had occupied most of the four levels of the night club, all located underground, in Edinburgh. It was quite cool to drink and dance the night away deep beneath the ground, and the fact that the next day was going to be a big one didn’t stop anyone from holding back on the drinking stakes.
New Years Eve meant an early start as we had to be out at the Corn Halls in time for the New Zealand New Years (which meant being on the buses by 9:30). Still, by 10am 598 of us where in the darkened rooms of a giant hall, downing beers, and beginning the 60 minute countdown until NZ hit New Years (Nys and Kendra instead opted to gain some beauty sleep so didn’t come to the party). And so it wasn't long till we were bringing in our first New Years celebrations, and at the same time it wasn't long until all 598 people were drunk. Also being Burge's 21st birthday, the celebrations had to be even bigger, and so PP managed to bring out a massive funnel for Burge to do in front of the packed crowd. He downed it pretty well (all 3 pints worth!) and had the whole place cheering. The day went on bringing in several more antipedeon New Years, plus a whole host of dancing and craziness, including one of the tour guides attempting to breakdance and knocking himself unconcious in the process. By around 4ish it was time to head back into the city to begin preperations for the evening and the real New Years, and it came as quite a shock that although drunk, it was still daylight. None the less we headed home, and met up with Nys and Kendra who were only just beginning to get ready (though had already managed to run around the hotel in their pyjama's). Headed into a bar on Rose street with Daygo, Burge and Stu for some more drinks, before heading down to the mile around 10 for the big celebrations - the mile being Princes street which was totally packed. By this stage I had lost everyone but Daygo (in between running into Sparks and Jen), so saw the New year and fireworks in with him. Managed to remeet up with Nys, Kendra and PP travel gang again soon after, lost them again, and ended up heading off with some Scott's to some random house party. Wasn't too bad (though I was pretty smashed), until I got thrown out in the early hours of the morning to stumble back home to the hotel.
3 hours later I was up and on the bus for the long bus ride home. And man, did I feel like shit.
(Weekend report to come real soon when I catch a moment, along with a whole stack of photos).
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Tuesday, September 17, 2002 4:32:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Not a hell of a lot of exciting news this week so I'll keep it short and sweet.
Friday night I spent at the Elusive Camel, a pub near work, with the lads from work. What started as a couple of Friday evening beers, soon had the work crew on the floor, dribbling the usual drunken garbage. I stumbled home after closing time, to find the Ade and Hods up at home. They helped me totally right the night off, and ensure I had a hang over the next day, with some more late night drinking.
Saturday didn't bring too much, and a relatively queit night was spent down at Babushkas not too far away.
Jeans was back in town on Sunday so we caught up in the evening for a mini beer crawl across London, while we killed time in the wake of the evening's entertainment. Jean had discovered Dick Dale, famous surf guitarist (including playing the infamous Pulp Fiction tune) was playing at Garage, up in Islington. So we spent the day travelling from bar to bar, before getting up to dodgey town for the gig. An awesome night was had, with the gig being far beyond expectation, and putting a nice end to the weekend. Drinking about 10 pints for the afternoon/evening though had its usual negative effects on Monday morning.
Finally Monday night about 25 of the gang headed out to dinner at Nirvana (an indian curry house) for Glenn's birthday (former roommate), in Southfields. The night was heaps of fun, with everyone having a good ol' night on a Monday, though I am now totally in need of some good sleep...
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Wednesday, September 04, 2002 3:42:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
The come down from the weekends fantastic celebration at Leeds was made a little easier when I was able to have my first EB in almost 5 months, which Jean had brought over from Perth for me. Its distinct bitter taste certainly was enjoyable, if not unique, although the beers here are all still great in their own special way.
Early in the week Adrian and Paul (the SAFers) and myself (aussie) continued looking at houses and finally managed to find an absolute gem in Fulham (home of my English football team - funnily enough - Fulham). Our house is an absolute ripper, located only seconds from my local "The Slug and Lettuce", opposite another pub "The Cock", and literally amongst resturaunts, pubs and shops, as well as only a 2 minute walk to the tube stop. To top it off it is in great nick on the inside, with each of us getting our own large room with a double bed, and a large balcony to boot, which is fantastic to sit out on with a quiet beer, watching the many throngs of passers by (and gorgeous girls).
On Wednesday evening, I headed to Oxford Street (with Daygo and Paul tagging along) to meet up with Jean and Alen at the Guinness pub opposite Jo's (Alen's wife) work (funnily enough - Guinness). It was nice to kick back for some beers and chill out, before the weekend began again (as usual on Thursday as far as big nights go).
Thursday brought with it my first encounter with Sparks, Wogan and Mez (more of the Perth boys from the Brat Pack), along with now fellow Londoners stubes (also a former Brat Pack member), Jeans, Daygo and Paul. Once we had a stack of roadies with us, our newly formed 'street gang' headed off towards the Thursday local "the slug and lettuce" aka "the slut and legless". Instead of taking the easy way in the bus, we walked their on foot, which was more fun, and gave us more time for our roadies. We got there (after an accidental large detour) and upon arrival the place was already pumping, and chock to the rims with people. The boys all had a great night, and we even had a run in with another former Sacred Heart Girl (Kate Fisher), bringing a great start for the new boys in London (well their first night with me anyway - Wogan and Sparks still hadn't been home from Wednesday night).
After Thursday, always comes Friday, and never one to turn down a drink, I was soon back in town again after work to meet up with Jean in Covent Garden. After a pint at the "Punch and Judy", we headed off to another pub down the road. Whilst enjoying a few pints on the pavement outside the pub (as usual in London there really is no start or end to the pub so you basically drink anywhere - we just found a suitable piece of pavement), anyway, who should bump straight past me in a rush to the toilet, but Verena, so she and her German friend joined us for the rest of the evening. We ended up going to some bar in Leicester Square, but I was getting quite drunk by then so have no idea of the name, but it was downstairs.
Saturday involved getting some bed linen, a duvea (its called a doona in Australia), pillows and also getting over my hangover. An afternoon nap helped a little, with the planned evening to be to go to the club "The End", as Norman Cook (aka Fat Boy Slim - FBS) was playing his first club gig in almost 2 years - quite exciting really, bringing the weekend almost back on par with last week at Leeds. Come night fall Marcus and I headed into Holborn near the club to line up for about an hour and a half so as we would be sure to get in, and surely enough when we arrived a fair queue had already begun. Pete Mac (another from the Perth/SHC mob) and a few of his crew (including the pony tailed monster who stole all our chewies) arrived and joined us a little later (all of them quite well on their way, after spending an afternoon at the 'classy' Walkabout in Sheperds Bush).
We finally got in and what a night it was! Pete unfortunately had to leave before FBS's 3am start, as his GF was totalled and really had to go home, which was quite a shame as he was dying to see the band. Marcus and I stayed on though, and quickly got away from the pony tailed monster and her kiwi BF, and had a fantastic night. About 2 hours before show time I happened to be getting a drink from the fountain, when who should come to the fountain but FBS (Mr. Cook) himself and promptly started a conversation with me. After discussing how my night was going well, he soon spotted my Aussie accent and noted that "Yea, you guys really know how to party", and as he parted off his own way, I stood there wondering if I had in fact spoken to the man himself. Sure enough, 2 hours later when he began his set, he was wearing the same blue hawiaan (however you spell it) shirt, that the bloke who spoke to me earlier was wearing - confirming that this in fact was my best run in with a celebrity considering he came to me (probably so he'd get a mention on cc.com). He played a brilliant set and had the crowd cheering in with his every move. The 2 hours of his show was fantastic, seeing that you could go and watch him doing his stuff, from virtually an arm's length of touching him, and even more amazing was the fact we were just in a club. I guess thats what makes London so unbelievable.
Around 7am the club closed up shop, and Marcus and I ventured out into the bright lights of daytime. After visiting his GF Kelda at work, we headed home. I packed my shit up and moved house (very gingerly) for the rest of the day - totally exhausted. The gayest highlight for the day was definitely the worlds shittest ever parade to mark the Fulham carnival. Finally by 10pm I hit the sack, but man was it worth it for a fantastic weekend.
(Sorry guys, photo to come, but because the lack of phone line at my house till Friday internet access is hard)
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Wednesday, August 14, 2002 5:58:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Well what was meant to be a weekend where I achieved alot, was instead once again spent drinking pints of beer, and also never really gave me a chance at all to catch up on sleep.
Friday night I went straight out with the boys after work to Angel for a boys night on the turps. Nothing overly exciting to report for the night, but for the fact we hit All Bar One first, then headed off to some other bar (which I can't remember the name of) which had awesome couches to sink into and get drunk, amongst a really smokey room.
Saturday and struggled out of bed relatively early to meet up with Hods and Adrian to look at more houses (FYI: both of them are SAFers who I am no doubt moving out with, Hods being Paul Hodder AKA my neighbour back home). House hunt wasn't anything impressive, but going to the pub after to watch SA v NZ in the rugby was. Somehow forgot to eat and got really drunk, which wasn't aided by the fact Adrian and I were doing pint skulls. Ran into a shit load of people at this unknown pub we where at including Mel and Dan Hazebrooke, Glenn, Laura and even my room mate Hannah. Went home after, which is quite blurry, but amused the house with my drunken antics, before Verena came over. Daygo and the recently arrived back Paul, headed out, for a night where Daygo almost scored, but didn't, clutching defeat in the jaws of victory...
Sunday arvo and back down the pub on the river (Blue Anchor) with Paul for some pints. Quite a nice arvo, which then moved on to Barnes, for Pret A Manger (a large sandwiche bar company) annual Party, which I was invited to through work. Continued getting drunk there with the work boys and had a grand ol' afternoon/evening. The party was spectacular, which included marques on a large oval, with a huge one going off as a dance tent at night, and food and drinks put on for free in the others (beer, wine, vodka... it was all good!). Out danced Hiten (work boy) with a girl we met Sarah, who also managed to split her pants with the crazy moves we were all pulling on the dance floor. The night culminated with a fireworks display (man I can not believe the extent to which the company goes with their staff parties - awesome!), before heading to the coach for a ride home. This is also where the fun started, with Sarah's crazy gay friend Paul hitting on Ben (a bloke from work). The rest of us were in tears as Ben tried to fend him off, but still got quite a few kisses and gropes snuck in by this crazy gay man, while Ben tried his darndest to hit on Sarah at the same time! A great night (which no doubt sounds completely weird by the way I have written this!)
Monday could be described with one word. Long.
Tuesday and off to Notting Hill to meet up with South Perth crew Amber, Luke, Travis, Shane and Alex (for his birthday) plus about 20 others for a celebratory night at the Portobello Gold pub. Not a bad night, but I swear I am so keen to get a night free from the drink. I need a holiday...
...and in other unrelated news Stuber was last heard to have gone to France without any plans, stood lost with his bags on the side of the road for about an hour, before heading into a pub. No doubt he is now drunk somewhere in a country where he will have no idea of how to speak living on the streets. Good work Aussie.
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Thursday, July 18, 2002 6:43:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Well I have lasted more than my first week at work and I am still alive. In fact I am actually still really enjoying the job and (stupidly enough) look forward to going to work for new challenges. Tomorrow my challenge will be the tube strike London has decided to put on to make things totally difficult for any of the majority of the population who use public transport and don't have a car.
Last weekend was another jam packed weekend, more so out of my wanting to do stuff after working all week, and also because London put on the finest weather I have seen in some time with blue skies, sun and shirts off all weekend. Friday night I headed into town to meet up with Verena (German law student I met the week before) and go out on the town for a few drinks. Ended up being quite a good night, with Daygo showing up out of no where at one stage as well for a bit of a dance at the Zoo Bar with us.
Saturday and I was up quite early (8am) to head down the pub for NZ v. Australia in the Bledisloe Cup. Wearing an aussie top into a pub full of Kiwi's isn't always the brightest idea, especially when NZ pull off a win, leaving me quite quiet, and also trying to slip out the backdoor unnoticed by the loud crowd. The afternoon was spent throwing the frisbee and having a few beers down the park, before coming home to go out for Marcus's birthday (does that make sense?). We headed off to the Cook for the night (a dance club in Acton) which was full of even more Kiwi's, which wasn't a bad night, but man I was sick of damn New Zealanders by the time I caught a taxi home for a good sleep.
Sunday I met up with Alen and Jo (Jean's bro and wife) and headed to the Ship (a pub on the river with large beer garden - when the river is the equivilant of the beach back home I guess you could call this pub the equivilant of the Cott... well sort of), anyway it was great to catch up and another nice arvo lazing in the sun. After a few more beers Daygo and I headed down to the Slug and Lettuce for a few more, and to meet up with the German girls again to polish up our German - (Prost means cheers is about all I know, and the girls weren't really impressed about me knowing ofladen -means reload- which I learnt by playing Time Crisis on the Playstation in German).
Since the weekend I managed to get a game of tennis in, which was great having becoming unfit again in my London laziness, plus tomorrow should give more exercise with the damn tube strike probably going to be the cause of quite a bit of walking... (sorry no photo again this week due to lack of me using my camera!)
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Wednesday, July 17, 2002 5:43:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Well I have lasted more than my first week at work and I am still alive. In fact I am actually still really enjoying the job and (stupidly enough) look forward to going to work for new challenges. Tomorrow my challenge will be the tube strike London has decided to put on to make things totally difficult for any of the majority of the population who use public transport and don't have a car.
Last weekend was another jam packed weekend, more so out of my wanting to do stuff after working all week, and also because London put on the finest weather I have seen in some time with blue skies, sun and shirts off all weekend. Friday night I headed into town to meet up with Verena (German law student I met the week before) and go out on the town for a few drinks. Ended up being quite a good night, with Daygo showing up out of no where at one stage as well for a bit of a dance at the Zoo Bar with us.
Saturday and I was up quite early (8am) to head down the pub for NZ v. Australia in the Bledisloe Cup. Wearing an aussie top into a pub full of Kiwi's isn't always the brightest idea, especially when NZ pull off a win, leaving me quite quiet, and also trying to slip out the backdoor unnoticed by the loud crowd. The afternoon was spent throwing the frisbee and having a few beers down the park, before coming home to go out for Marcus's birthday (does that make sense?). We headed off to the Cook for the night (a dance club in Acton) which was full of even more Kiwi's, which wasn't a bad night, but man I was sick of damn New Zealanders by the time I caught a taxi home for a good sleep.
Sunday I met up with Alen and Jo (Jean's bro and wife) and headed to the Ship (a pub on the river with large beer garden - when the river is the equivilant of the beach back home I guess you could call this pub the equivilant of the Cott... well sort of), anyway it was great to catch up and another nice arvo lazing in the sun. After a few more beers Daygo and I headed down to the Slug and Lettuce for a few more, and to meet up with the German girls again to polish up our German - (Prost means cheers is about all I know, and the girls weren't really impressed about me knowing ofladen -means reload- which I learnt by playing Time Crisis on the Playstation in German).
Since the weekend I managed to get a game of tennis in, which was great having becoming unfit again in my London laziness, plus tomorrow should give more exercise with the damn tube strike probably going to be the cause of quite a bit of walking... (sorry no photo again this week due to lack of me using my camera!)
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Thursday, July 11, 2002 7:38:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Well its been since before Easter, but folks, Clinton is finally back in the ratrace again and back working. I have landed myself quite a good job working just near Tower Bridge (you know that big famous London Bridge) as a Technical Consultant for a web development company. I started on Monday and have fitted in real well, and am having a great time there, though it is bloody hard, especially compared to sitting on the couch with Marcus (who also got a job the same day as me at the Puzzle). Also now getting used to catching the hot, sweaty tube every morning with a million others, which while work is only a stones throw away, still takes up to an hour on the packed trains.
Last weekend was therefore quite a big weekend of celebrating (me having a job that is) starting Friday night at Revolution bar, and then onto Zoo bar which were 2 pretty hip bars that I hadn't yet been to, which was for Kyla's going away party (who I had met once before). Saturday had me out clothe shopping for the first time in London, which was great, and also an excellent way to spend lots of money real fast. After the shop fest Daygo and I headed off to the Slug and Lettuce (pub), although managed to get quite lost along the way, so we kept stopping at off-license bottleo's for roadies, which got us quite drunk along the way. Had a great night there, with the highlight meeting some Germans, before we got totally lost again coming home, and ended up giving up and just catching public transport.
Sunday was suppossed to be a quiet day, with my new job starting the next day, however with Lleyton playing in a ripper Wimbledon final (well maybe it wasn't that good, but him winning was) so with the beer flowing during the game, it was enivitable that we headed to the (dodgey) Walkabout (Aussie pub) for a few more after the game. Wore out my Aussie shirt (and Wimbledon sweatband) so got a bit of attention, for a fun night, leaving me quite bleary eyed the next morning at my first day of my new job.
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Wednesday, July 10, 2002 6:38:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Well its been since before Easter, but folks, Clinton is finally back in the ratrace again and back working. I have landed myself quite a good job working just near Tower Bridge (you know that big famous London Bridge) as a Technical Consultant for a web development company. I started on Monday and have fitted in real well, and am having a great time there, though it is bloody hard, especially compared to sitting on the couch with Marcus (who also got a job the same day as me at the Puzzle). Also now getting used to catching the hot, sweaty tube every morning with a million others, which while work is only a stones throw away, still takes up to an hour on the packed trains.
Last weekend was therefore quite a big weekend of celebrating (me having a job that is) starting Friday night at Revolution bar, and then onto Zoo bar which were 2 pretty hip bars that I hadn't yet been to, which was for Kyla's going away party (who I had met once before). Saturday had me out clothe shopping for the first time in London, which was great, and also an excellent way to spend lots of money real fast. After the shop fest Daygo and I headed off to the Slug and Lettuce (pub), although managed to get quite lost along the way, so we kept stopping at off-license bottleo's for roadies, which got us quite drunk along the way. Had a great night there, with the highlight meeting some Germans, before we got totally lost again coming home, and ended up giving up and just catching public transport.
Sunday was suppossed to be a quiet day, with my new job starting the next day, however with Lleyton playing in a ripper Wimbledon final (well maybe it wasn't that good, but him winning was) so with the beer flowing during the game, it was enivitable that we headed to the (dodgey) Walkabout (Aussie pub) for a few more after the game. Wore out my Aussie shirt (and Wimbledon sweatband) so got a bit of attention, for a fun night, leaving me quite bleary eyed the next morning at my first day of my new job.
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Tuesday, May 21, 2002 12:55:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Week two in London down, as well as weekend number three, plus a birthday, and I am well and truly getting settled in to the whole English lifestyle. The job hunting has pretty much got into full swing now, with funds starting to run out, and unfortunately doesn't look like it is going to be easy to find a job so CC may have to head behind a bar or the like in the interim to get some well needed pounds.
On the partying front though, things have been much more exciting. I spent my birthday drinking beers with the crew at home, before heading off to the midnight premiere of Star Wars. Also sweet of them to surprise me with a birthday cake.
From there things just continued to warm up for the weekend. Friday night I met up with Paz, Hales and Jonesy for one pound pints, which is always going to be bad news. Managed to fall asleep (as you would call it after drinking...) on the train on the way home, and travelled almost to Heathrow airport (which is a long way) before waking up a million miles away from home. Luckily I managed to grab the last train home straight after, and forced my eyes to stay open.
Feeling a little worse for wear on Saturday, it wasn't long before Glen, Laura, Daygo and some other crew were on our way to Heat, and afternoon dance party starting at 2pm. This was an excellent, fun way to spend the afternoon, made funnier by Daygo rocking up later in the arvo totally smashed. Cruised home with Glen around eleven, but didn't stay home for long, with Daygo swinging by in a cab and picking me up to head into Central London to hit a few more bars.
Sunday and things didn't slow down with the first meeting up with Stuber, Bomber and Nugs. Hit the Punch and Judy bar first in Covent Garden, before heading off to Sherperds Bush after a few rounds for even more at the Walkabout (Lookout of London) Pub. This was a pretty fun arvo/evening with all the fellas getting stuck into it, along to the familiar sounds of Oz. On the walk home Bomber fell asleep on the sidewalk while we waited for Stuber, which didn't impress a cop driving past, who promptly threatened to throw me in the lock up as I was "responsible" for my drunk friend. Talked my way out of that and the 2 of us stumbled home with out Stuber, who had no idea where my house. But low and behold, let the dog off the leash and it will always find its way home, cause when we woke up the next morning there was Stuber asleep on the carpet in the living room. We are still in amazement how he managed to find my house in London, quite a way from the pub, and where I still get lost looking for. Good work Stuber. The stories are definitely starting...
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Monday, April 29, 2002 1:39:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
We headed out to Kevin’s work to pick up his cheque and have some lunch, so it was cool to meet some more of his mates from work. For the afternoon we visited his grandparents who lived in the real “burbs” of America in a huge American house with an American Pool in an American suburb. We then cruised to his parents house on the way to Casey’s house, one of his real close mates (who is also a cowboy!), where we were warmly greeted by his family with some freshly cooked ribs off the barbie and a beer. Their house was also totally cool, with big game hanging off the walls (including a giant moosehead) and out the back they had a giant fan (for cooling) and this jet engine looking device which heated up the entire backyard when the weather was a bit cooler!
Once night fell (and the weekend begun) we headed off to a party around the corner. It was cool fun hanging out at a small garage party, playing pool, getting drunk and kicking back with some of the California crew. Ended up getting pretty drunk and in the end we all went back to Casey’s for the night, were I pulled up a piece of carpet for a nights sleep on the floor.
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Monday, April 29, 2002 1:35:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
After another comfortable night crashed on the couch Kevin and I cruised around and had a pretty easy day. Checked out a couple of malls and had lunch at Baja Fresh (Mexican). Watched the normal shit on TV like the Osbournes (totally huge here – sort of like Sylvania Waters but with Ozzy Osbournes family) and Crocodile Hunter. While Kevin spent the evening at work I just hung out on the couch drinking Samuel Adams. Then in the evening we headed out to a relatively local club for a few more drinks, meeting up with some of Kev’s friends as well.
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Thursday, April 25, 2002 10:48:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Morning in the valley was quite overcast, which was what we (Stacey, Kevin and I) wanted for our shortish journey out to the normally hot Magic Mountain theme park. While not on the map like Disneyland, six flags is in fact “Wally World”, which is a theme park full of roller coasters.
The day was heaps of fun and full of non stop roller coaster rides. These ranged from the old rickety rack wooden coasters from the seventies through to extreme, turning and tumbling speeding coasters of the new millennium. The best ones were great thrills (though often making you giddy as you got off) and included Goliath (which had a 280 foot drop) and was a great thrill at the start, “X” which was a brand new coaster that rotated on its axis as well as twisting and turning, so on some drops you were dropping head first towards the ground or through a loop, and “De Ja Vu” which went through vertical drops and loops, then straight back again in reverse (and backwards).
Lunch was spent at Wally the moose’s restaurant which was a burger place complete with singing moose and was a bit of a hoot, much like the whole day. Totally stuffed we headed home just before close, all ready to pass out from the fun, terror and thrills of the day.
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Thursday, April 25, 2002 10:46:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Packed up my gear and headed off to LAX after a quick call to Kevin. He kindly picked me up from there and we headed back to his place in San Fernando Valley, were he is putting me up for the next couple of days on his couch. On the way home we grabbed ‘in and out’, a burger joint he recommended, which was great.
Once my gear was dumped we headed to his local bar, full of students, as he lives right next to a Uni and so the whole area is total student populated. Stacey met us in there after work and after another beer went back to Kevs for a bit of a stuff around. I had a great time playing Grand Theft Auto 3 on the PS 2, and later we headed off to see The Scorpion King at the movies. Finally fell asleep, after an easy but enjoyable day, on a fantastic comfortable couch.
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Wednesday, April 17, 2002 5:52:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Today was always going to be a lazy day with the Lakers in the evening, so with my bags packed and organised for my trip out tomorrow I decided to head into Downtown LA on the local bus. The bus ride itself was very interesting taking about 80 minutes, and with all types of weird and interesting people getting on and off the bus the whole way in. When we finally got to downtown I went and picked up my ticket then wandered around the areas. Not really much worth looking at bar the main downtown strip which was like a market place with cheap electronics stuff, cd’s, fake id’s and merchandise – basically the whole dodgy Bali kind of scene.
As the time ticked on closer to the game, I stopped by the central library and for dinner at Denny’s (where I had a giant breakfast – I was so dying for a good meal of bacon and eggs). Then I headed to Staples arena. After a nice (and expensive) beer in the Lakers bar underneath I proceeded into the stadium (past the totally overpriced merchandise) and into the ‘premium’ seating where I was located.
The stadium from the inside was amazing, so much bigger than almost any arena I had seen, with giant electronic scoreboards everywhere, a live trumpet band, music pumping around the arena and just general excitement everywhere. In my area we had a hostess who used a wireless handheld computer to order anything you wanted and saved you from ever having to leave your comfy seat.
The stadium soon filled out (along with locals such as Jack Nicholson and Charlotte from ‘Sex and The City’) and before we knew it the boys were all out and court for the big match up between Seattle and the Lakers. The game was terrific, with the crowd really getting involved and the Lakers cheerleaders putting on a great show, although the Lakers blew them away in the second half with Shaq totally dominant under the ring, and Kobe Bryant turning up in the second half to put the game away. Gary Payton put up a bit of a fight for Seattle, but inevitably the game was over with still a few minutes left and the crowd started streaming out.
During the game I met the Eric and Seth, a couple of semi-retired dot-com millionaires (who used to work for Sun) sitting next to me. They happily bought me beers and gave me popcorn during the game, inviting me into their “Lakers” family. They were great blokes and topped my night off with Eric giving me a ride home in his flash car to Santa Monica.
I ran into Stuart, and since it wasn’t too late we headed down to Britannia for a couple of final beers at the local before we were both to head out the following morning.
Finally, I am sorry there has not been an update for a while, but if you enjoyed this then click below for all my recent stories of the last week which I have also uploaded today! Clint.
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Wednesday, April 17, 2002 5:51:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Got a pretty good sleep in and farewelled Michael off as he decided to go check out San Fran. I decided to give Stacey a call (local girl who I met at Club 217 the other night) and see what she was up to. After she’d done her chores she came around and picked me up from the hostel in her little ’67 bug. We decided to head up to the Getty museum for a look around.
The afternoon flew by as we perused the galleries of sculptures, artefacts and paintings which were all quite interesting, especially seeing that I hadn’t been to a museum in quite a long time. The place was great highlighted by some famous works such as Van Gogh’s Blue Lilly’s plus other works by Monet, Michelangelo, Cezanne and all the big names in art. The building itself was also a very nice place, architecturally original, and located in a beautiful position atop the mountains, and also surrounded by very pretty gardens.
After the museum we swung by Stacey’s sisters house, who was not home, so decided to go out for dinner (via Kevin’s house). Kevin is her (ex) boyfriend who was a cool bloke fitting the College bloke image beautifully. We took his truck (pick-up) to BJ’s (pizza restaurant they recommended) and had a great meal and a few pitchers of beer (that’s what they call a big jug!)
After that we headed down to another bar called Friday’s which was also a nice place for a beer. Stacey was totally exhausted so headed home after this but now I was in the mood, Kevin and I decided to keep charging down to Santa Monica, and as usual hit the local (Britannia). Karaoke was playing yet again, and although I didn’t sing I met some great girls from Boston (Kerri, Casey and friend no.3 who I can’t remember the name of!). Anyway I then hung out with them, as Kevin grew tired and left, and finally the night drew to a close, with the option now added to stay in Boston with a place to stay.
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Wednesday, April 17, 2002 5:49:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Bright and early start (again!) as Michael and I decided to go check out Universal Studios. The weather there fined up real well by mid morning, and I would have to say it was the hottest day that I have had so far since I have been away. Universal wasn’t a bad park but it really showed how unbelievably professional Disney is in comparison. Everything just didn’t quite match up, not quite as much fun, not as well organised, the staff not as friendly or cheerful and its all a lot smaller. But having said that it was still an excellent day.
The highlights included a back-lot studio tour checking out sets and shit, Jurassic Park ride (which was quite boring but for an awesome splash down drop bit at the end), the T2 3D show which was an awesome experience which also included live actors and the surprise for me for the day was the Water World show, which was a tonne of fun with explosions and stunts in a giant arena. Plus after the show we got to meet some of the stars which included a bloke from ‘The Fast and the Furious’, Stone Cold Steve Austin’s stunt double and one of the chicks from ‘Angel’. Oh yeah and we also watched a totally cool orang u tan in the animal show.
With the closing of the park the evening brought even more fun, as Michael and I had bought tickets for the 2nd Annual ESPN sport and music awards at Universal Amphitheatre. This was a fantastic show which was like any American awards show, but this time for the extreme athletes and associated music. The arrival of stars had us excited early, as I managed to speak to “Pink” and grab an autograph, along with spotting a few other big names.
Before we knew it we were watching the show, and enjoying watching live performances by the likes of Unwritten Law and the Chilli Peppers, as well as watching stars like Mini me, Carmen Electra, Rachael Hunter, Tony Hawk, Lead actresses from upcoming ‘Scorpion King’ and ‘Austin Powers 3’, and so on, plus every big name extreme athlete from skating, bmx, snow boarding and surfing, about a million awesome glamour chicks (I reckon the most I have seen anywhere) and the reunion of the Bones Brigade Skate team for the first time in about a decade.
It was really amazing watching a show like this get put together (including prompts for the audience to cheer) and as the show came to a close I also managed to meet Tom Green and then after with my aussie shirt in full view we met up with Layne Beachley (female surf champ) and hung out with her for a while talking up oz. My only disappointment coming from the night had been the banning of digital cameras in the joint so I was unable to take photos.
The trip home was also a little interesting as Michael and I battled the subway and then finding a bus in the early hours of Saturday morning in downtown LA. But after avoiding quite a few drunk ‘coloureds’ and street tramps we made it home on local transport!
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Wednesday, April 17, 2002 5:47:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Had quite an enjoyable sleep with the intention of a relatively easy and relaxing day today. Met up with a couple of new friends Michael (good bloke from Sydney who like me is doing America then London) and Judith (friendly girl from London) and we decided to go down to the pier and hire some bikes for a casual ride along the coast.
After getting some Pizza Hut off the pier into me for breakfast we went to the bike shops to hire the bikes. I eyed out a low rider (kick ass bike!) while the rest of the gang opted for the more traditional bikes. We headed off in the Malibu direction but soon discovered that was too far, so turned around and rode to Venice Beach instead. It was quite an enjoyable and fun ride, with some great stuff to check out along the way, including the basketball down at Venice, street markets, a host of weirdo’s and general beachside living. The only down side was the usual grey blanket covered the LA area yet again so the sun only peeped its eyes out briefly.
On return back to base we met up with AnneMaree again and went for a wander down at the mall. A pretty easy arvo was had by all, and goodbyes were made with both the girls heading off their own way. With night soon approaching I organised a new posse for going out with including Michael, Sarah (kiwi also on her way to London) and Stuart (my English photographer room mate). After a “fast food” dinner on the promenade we decided to hit a few pubs around the traps. We started at good ol’ Britannia then made our way down to the Ol’ Kings Head, which Stuart quite liked due to the fact it had soccer going (and also good for me later with AFL highlights!).
As the night wore on Michael turned in and the rest of us went to try out a Santa Monica club (Club 217). The place we went to was quite small, but Kylie was going as we walked in (“Can’t get you out of my head” seems to be played everywhere here!) so I knew it was going to be ok! Met a real friendly American chick Judith, who gave me her details so hopefully some time soon she’ll be able to give me a tour of LA from a local perspective, although she is only new here and was quick to warn me of how many bitches there were in the place, and how unfriendly it was.
As always everything shuts in California at 2 so we headed home (via a shop which was still open at that unbelievable time!).
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Wednesday, April 17, 2002 5:46:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Another crazy early start (although with a somewhat better sleep!) had me down at 8:30 again to board the shuttle out to Anaheim and the childhood dream of Disneyland. After about an hour drive we finally arrived there and the place didn’t fail to let me down.
I expected the park to not be as big as what it seemed, and I believed this at first, but once I started walking around I realised it was in fact totally massive. My first impressions made me think it was totally geared for kids but as the day wore on I realised this was fun for anyone and I had a total blast!
I just about managed to hit every ride (albeit about one – the line was too big and I was too tired by 7pm) and so finished the day off watching the Disney parade of stars. Some of the more spectacular rides included Indiana Jones ride, a Star Wars trip which was a bit of fun and the best was Space Mountain which was a totally crazy rollercoaster in a pitch black room, with only stars and planets visible, which you thunder past at break neck speeds. I swear half the rides scared the shit out of me so I don’t know how the kids can handle it – or maybe I’m just getting old! Plus there were some good special effects on some rides (such as ghosts sitting next to you on the Haunted House) and of course there was some crap stuff as well! (Plus the standard 3d show included at all theme parks.
Food was a small fortune I have to mention, because I managed to pay $5.75us for a bottle of coke, so I tried to keep eating and drinking to a minimum. But I couldn’t help but smile all day with the kids rubbing off there excitement all day and of course the happy tunes blurting out off the speakers all day, not to mention all the overly friendly staff just making sure your having a good time!
So the fun finally ended at 8 and we begun the quiet ride home (which included the driver getting totally lost in West LA). Been AnneMaree’s last night we had to then go out and have a few drinks, so back to Britannia for some more brews (and more karaoke!). The place was definitely the busiest I have seen it and a packed house rocked out until 2am (when California shuts down). We managed to get quite drunk again and stumbled home (along with a few more friends – plus more we left go there own way) to look forward to a good sleep.
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Wednesday, April 17, 2002 5:44:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Had to get up bright and early for the LA tour and hurting quite a bit from the night before, but AnneMaree and I had already decided we had to go on a tour so went out to see the sights of LA.
This included the famous Rodeo drive (which wasn’t anything that flash) from Pretty Woman, although there was some hot model chicks working in Christian Dior that I got to have my photo with! We also hit Venice beach which was dead early at around 10am, and got to see the ‘canals’ of LA’s own Venice while been enlightened by a tour guide from Croatia who liked to make silly, interesting and often funny comments about everything (and in a crazy accent!). Then we went into Beverly Hills (past the high school from Grease), the Beverly Hills Cop station and past all the famous Hollywood homes from Mel Gibson, Leonardo DiCrapio through to Mike Tyson and Hugh Heffner’s spectacular hidden mansions.
Also managed to go down the strip with clubs like the Viper room, the Gunners old hang out, and onto the famous Mann’s Chinese theatre and the “stars” of LA on the roadside. From here it was up to see the good ol’ “Hollywood” sign before heading back home for a well earned afternoon kip.
The evening was a little quieter than Tuesday night’s crazy affair with a few more beers at our now local (Britannia) before turning in rather earlier, although not before having quite a few laughs with a drunken pommy bloke and his Californian girlfriend who were totally smashed!
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Wednesday, April 17, 2002 5:42:00 AM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Woke up this morning and decided it was time for a change of scenery so I packed my bags and headed down to the Greyhound Bus Terminal. To me this seemed like one of the easiest ways to make my way to LA (and the cheapest) so I bought my ticket and boarded the waiting bus. Of course been probably one of the cheapest ways to travel (well a lot cheaper than plane or train) it quickly became evident that my travelling companions weren't from the wealthy end of society. None the less I enjoyed my culture trip for the day, as well as the journey into LA Downtown bus terminal.
Here I thought it would be easiest to get to the hostel in Santa Monica by catching a cab - it only seemed like it would be a 10 mile or so ride there. Anyway $50 later I arrived at the hostel and ended up paying almost four times what it cost me to get to LA in getting just down the road! My first stay at an American Hostel, and the place seems real nice, I am currently in an 8 bedroom dorm by myself, so it is obviously not the busy season. A quick wander around the neighbourhood soon told me that there were far more beggars and homeless people in LA than San Diego, but ignoring them I tried to have a look at the beautiful palm lined roads and piers of Santa Monica, which wasn't easy to appreciate when their is a dark grey blanket of sky above and the temperature is almost freezing. I could have sworn it was like London on the beach!
Hopefully things fine up so I can enjoy the whole LA scene and get a full thrill from the bustling city (which when we drove past was not as big as I expected in size - but then I guess there is still New York to come)
I decided to head down to a pool competition in the hostel in an attempt to meet some other fellow travellers but unfortunately there was only one other girl playing pool (Annemaree : another Aussie from Sydney!) but she turned out to be heaps of fun so we messed around (along with the volunteer organising the pool who was a bit weird, real serious and played really gay music).
So after getting bored of pool AnneMaree and I decided to hit the town for a few beers. The main strip in Santa Monica (The Promenade) certainly was the happening place for a Tuesday night with late night trading every night and lots of people around. So we went to Yankee Doodles and then down to Britannia (another pub) and ended up getting quite drunk till about 2am but had a blast, especially as Karaoke was on at the Britannia pub and once drunk had a ball singing along. Met quite a few of the locals as well, including a bunch of hooters chicks, who were totally on to themselves and became quite painful. But a good night was still had by all. (Oh and the shooters they have here are nuts – in giant glasses almost the size of a bourbon glass – but still good!)
Facts you might not know about America number 3. : The MTV channel does not actually show any music (well I haven't seen any yet, it is just full of programs and doco's like any other station!)
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Tuesday, April 09, 2002 12:06:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Got a damn good sleep in and I reckon now whatever "jetlag" was in my system is now well and truly out. So after a lazy start I applied for about a dozen jobs that were advertised in the weekends papers then headed off into town.
Against the advice of our semi-friendly reception I decided to catch the bus into town (she reckons I should only use taxis). Thanks to her advice I was expecting the bus to be going past Harlem but unsurprisingly the bus wasn't unlike any transport system and was fine. The hardest part was paying which wasn't made any easier by a bus driver who was doing his utmost to avoid any conversation at all (I was waiting for him to point to a sign that said 'Don't talk to the driver'), but I finally figured out I put the 'exact' change into a funny little machine then he gave me my ticket. Then I sat down and enjoyed my first trip on public transport in a long time (and that includes back home where I pretty much never use it either).
With big plans for going to the ball game this arvo I did a bit of quick shopping then headed to Ticketmaster to buy my ticket. As it happened Ticketmaster and ticket outlets are not open in San Diego on Sunday or Monday for some ridiculous reason. I thought I'd kill a bit of time then head to the ball park anyway and so cruised down the convention centre on the marina where there was an Oracle World Conference on (a computer nerd expo). I tried a few times to sneak into the conference but was promptly escorted out much to several excuses I tried. Oh well I didn't want to hang with nerds anyway!
For my next meal in the "fast food" chain I opted to attack Subway for lunch, which was very good albiet exactly (including store layout) to Subway back home. My stomach filled I then asked around to find out how to get to the ballgame, and to my disappointment found out the game was already sold out, so I threw that idea out the window and opted for a quick movie instead (Blade 2 - read review).
Finished the evening off by catching the bus home again where I was enlightened by a local with a whole lot of baseball talk, most of which pretty much everything went straight over my head (so I just nodded and pretended to know what the hell he was talking about). Anyway he was happy because he had been at the game and his team had one, so I just shared his enjoyment then walked home from the bus stop.
American facts you may not know no. 2: Not all American taxi's are yellow. There's red ones, blue ones, white ones,... well pretty much every colour and of course good ol' yellow ones!
Posted in Clintons Diary
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Saturday, April 06, 2002 1:53:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Woke up totally buggered and almost decided to throw the day away thanks to my legs totally killing me after yesterdays marathon walking effort. But when I discovered SeaWorld didn't open until 10am I thought what the heck, I have a sleep in and I'll head off for a bit of fun.
SeaWorld turned out to be great fun with some fantastic entertainment. There were heaps of great shows with whales and dolphins doing flips out of the water as well as flipping humans out of the water and also getting surfed by humans, sealions and walruses generally playing with the crowd, and just generally heaps of pranks to try and get the crowd totally drenched and involved in the show. From the outset what this place showed me is why Atlantis went broke. It totally made Atlantis the "piss weak world" of marine parks while this was a definite 5 stars job. The shows were huge with huge crowds ( I don't know where all these people came from - this is by far the most people I have seen in all of America and it was a week day).
Then there is the exhibits. These were also all spectacular and huge, housing every animal thinkable from the marine world - from white whales to walruses to penguins to sharks. And every one of these animals had a great enclosure with heaps of each animal and all easily viewable. I thought this place was going to be a litttle boring but it turned out to be great. Finally it also had a crazy helicopter simulater which was a blast of fun and an incredible 4D show. That is a movie in 3D, but then the added dimesion was that your seat shook, you got wet, you got air blown on you and basically felt like you were in the movie (plus about 361 screaming little kids to add to the atmosphere).
So a great day was had ending with another excellent night time show which topped off another exhausting day. Oh yeah and I got my first half decent meal which was a beef roll with potato salad. This I found amongst a million stalls selling popcorn and cotton candy which seems to be all everyone else ate!
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Wednesday, April 03, 2002 10:35:00 PM (W. Australia Standard Time, UTC+08:00)
Up bright and early to begin the trip to the States and headed out to the airport for a few sad good byes. The plane trip to Sydney wasn't too painful where I met some great young entrepenuers (Kevin and Brett) who are setting up b2b websites for tyre company's around the world. Best thing was they got me in Qantas lounge plus gave some great advice.
Trip to LA was a little less comfortable with a 250 bloke called Brendon sitting next to me who install Cable TV and was on his way to Vegas for the Cable convention! This bloke sure liked complaining about everything to do with the plane, though I don't blame him cause he didn't have much room (and nor did I cause of him!). On the plus side we did get a newer plane with our own TV sets so I got to waste several hours watching crappy movies (and also watching three people squeeze into a toilet cubicle together!)
Finally arrived in LA and enjoyed my first American meal (greasy Burger King!!) and see how huge LAX is (as well as how smoggy LA is). Every American I have spoken to pretty much already enjoys the fact my name is Clinton, and make some comment with regard to the former President (or about how they want to come to Sydney to see Kangaroos and Koalas, but not to eat them, just see them!).
Transferred to San Diego on small American Airlines plane with propellers and touched down in what looks like a great city. After battling and fighting with the ridiculous shower system (they have crazy taps here!), I have finally been able to lay back in bed to relax (after about 31 hours with about 3 hours sleep)... and so ends the longest part of the journey!
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