Wednesday, 19 May 2010
Tuesday, 7 July 2009
Take That @ Wembley
I'm not ashamed to admit I'm a huge fan of Take That..
I have great memories as a twenty something lad out on the town with my mates in the nightclubs, smashed, shirts off dancing like an idiot to Take That.
So the wife and i went to see them on Friday at Wembley.
i must be honest it was initially quite intimidating as we arrived at Wembley park tube station to be greeted by thousands of females. Hardly any men in sight! Well my first thoughts were.. WOW! hello ladies! The male species were certainly outnumbered in Wembley. It was great!!
I was at Wembley last year to watch England. We were in the cheap seats right at the top. I do recall whinging like a 8 year old about the absolutely diabolical prices, service and selection, but to be honest i believe my comments are correct. If they can spent what was it £875 million!! the least they can do is provide reasonable eating and drinking facilities for us mere peasants who don't enter via the corporate doors.
However we were on level 2 this time, and the facilities were much improved. A larger selection of munchies and drinks along with more bars. The service was still beyond a joke. In that i mean when you are literally the only bloke waiting at a bar to get served. you make eye contact with the barman on several occasions, yet he continues to serve all the ladies around you. I kind of understood him as he was clearly enjoying himself and i felt that maybe i would have done the same thing as him 10 years ago. But now i am a mature grown up and expect a certain amount of service for that pint of warm brown in a plastic glass costing £4.50.
As we were treating ourselves and agreed that this was a one off and were unlikely to come back and see Take That anytime soon, we made a visit to the seafood & champagne bar.
We all know what a total rip off the food and drink is at Wembley. Sure the FA have to get their money back somehow, as they are completely incompetent morons who couldn't organise a piss up in a brewery. But i thought the prices for champagne were fairly reasonable. If i remember a 2000 bottle of Louis Roderer Cristal was £289, which lets face it could be a lot more expensive. Shame it is served in plastic champagne glasses. Quality!
And no we didn't have the Louis, we settled for a £30 half bottle of Lanson!!! Last of the Big spenders!!
Needless to say the lads banged out a great show, with a nice firework display to finish it off.
Take That 10/10
Wembley 5/10
Wednesday, 1 July 2009
Smoking V New Hobby
I have smoked since the tender age of 16, and at the fourth attempt and 20 years later, i have managed 'so far' to kick the habit.
it's now been 3 weeks 2 days, 22 hours and 3 minutes. And to be honest it hasn't been as difficult as i thought.
Don't get me wrong I'd happily light up again if in a beer garden with a beer, so socialising is out for a while!
So for many years i have had an interest in kiting, more to accurately, power kiting or land kiting.
As i have successfully quit the habit i decided it was time to reward myself and start the hobby i have been interested in for some time.
Basically you get a really big kite, hang on and see what happens.
When it comes to this kind of thing i am quite spontaneous, i don't research, simply buy the equipment and dive straight in.
Bad Idea..
The little initial research i did do was on ebay. i quickly noticed that the bigger the kite the dearer it was (obviously you might think). And as usual most of the like for like was half the price on ebay USA, so i found the biggest kite i could on the USA ebay, emailed the seller for a shipping cost and 1 week later i was the proud owner of a 14 metre kite.
The owner said it was a 2004 kite and had only been used 2 times. it looked fantastic in the pictures and i was very happy when it arrived.
It was just the kite i purchased, so i had to buy the lines and the bar to be able to control it.
I started looking on ebay for a particular bar, as because it was a large kite you have to have a larger length handle. Well this is where the sport becomes expensive. I couldn't find a handle or lines that were at a reasonable price. In fact even the 2nd hand ones were fetching prices twice as much as i paid for the kite.
This is wear i decided to start some proper research. I found some kite forums and joined a couple of the busier ones.
I posted an add for advice and help regarding the type of kite i had purchased, explained that i wanted to do some land kiting, to be able to get some air and do some jumps etc, and added a photo of the kite i have purchased.
It only took a few hours for the replies to start coming in....
most of the replies, No that's wrong, All of the replies had the same theme.
You Muppet your gonna kill yourself!!
Currently there have been 25 replies all with the same kind of response!
Turns out that this kite i have is for use on the sea. Kite surfing requires a bigger kite because of the friction caused by the board and water etc. To use a 14 metre kite on land although ok in very low winds, would be suicide for an amateur. Plus it being a 2004 kite, it doesn't have a certain safety feature that all new kites have which allows you to 'de power' the kite giving you much more control of the kite.
The guys on the forum said that if i paid more than 50 bucks for the kite then i was ripped off and that by the time i have spent hundreds on a new bar and lines it will be much cheaper to buy a new safer kite. Dohh!!
So after Much more research i have now purchased a brand new kite that has all the lines and handles included.
it is also quite a large kite coming in at 9 metres, but it is a proper land kite and a new design.
So last night i took it for a spin down at a local park.
Far from impressed i took the wife, helping me untangle 25 metre lines, unpack a huge piece of fabric in front of dog walkers, joggers and local youth playing football, all who seemed to be looking forward to a spectacle of an imminent kite launch.
After about 40 minutes of untangling and preparation i was ready for launch.
There was hardly any wind, but i was confident as my buddies on the forum said that as it was a large kite it required little if any wind to launch.
So the wife held the kite and i pulled.
Nothing!!
Again..
Nothing.
Unsure if the kite was positioned correctly we turned it around, did the classic trick of throwing blades of grass in the air, wetting the finger, sticking it in the air. Yep we were facing the right way, everything seemed correct.
By now the dog walkers and youth were losing interest, as was the wife.
So we tried again, this time i started running, which resulted in the kite being dragged along the ground. i was becoming fearful that my new toy would become damaged, and there was a overwhelming stench of manure that part of the park had been sprayed, and i really didn't fancy the kite being dragged through that.
So we gave up.
What a waste of time..
I tell you, i really could have done with a smoke after that.....
it's now been 3 weeks 2 days, 22 hours and 3 minutes. And to be honest it hasn't been as difficult as i thought.
Don't get me wrong I'd happily light up again if in a beer garden with a beer, so socialising is out for a while!
So for many years i have had an interest in kiting, more to accurately, power kiting or land kiting.
As i have successfully quit the habit i decided it was time to reward myself and start the hobby i have been interested in for some time.
Basically you get a really big kite, hang on and see what happens.
When it comes to this kind of thing i am quite spontaneous, i don't research, simply buy the equipment and dive straight in.
Bad Idea..
The little initial research i did do was on ebay. i quickly noticed that the bigger the kite the dearer it was (obviously you might think). And as usual most of the like for like was half the price on ebay USA, so i found the biggest kite i could on the USA ebay, emailed the seller for a shipping cost and 1 week later i was the proud owner of a 14 metre kite.
The owner said it was a 2004 kite and had only been used 2 times. it looked fantastic in the pictures and i was very happy when it arrived.
It was just the kite i purchased, so i had to buy the lines and the bar to be able to control it.
I started looking on ebay for a particular bar, as because it was a large kite you have to have a larger length handle. Well this is where the sport becomes expensive. I couldn't find a handle or lines that were at a reasonable price. In fact even the 2nd hand ones were fetching prices twice as much as i paid for the kite.
This is wear i decided to start some proper research. I found some kite forums and joined a couple of the busier ones.
I posted an add for advice and help regarding the type of kite i had purchased, explained that i wanted to do some land kiting, to be able to get some air and do some jumps etc, and added a photo of the kite i have purchased.
It only took a few hours for the replies to start coming in....
most of the replies, No that's wrong, All of the replies had the same theme.
You Muppet your gonna kill yourself!!
Currently there have been 25 replies all with the same kind of response!
Turns out that this kite i have is for use on the sea. Kite surfing requires a bigger kite because of the friction caused by the board and water etc. To use a 14 metre kite on land although ok in very low winds, would be suicide for an amateur. Plus it being a 2004 kite, it doesn't have a certain safety feature that all new kites have which allows you to 'de power' the kite giving you much more control of the kite.
The guys on the forum said that if i paid more than 50 bucks for the kite then i was ripped off and that by the time i have spent hundreds on a new bar and lines it will be much cheaper to buy a new safer kite. Dohh!!
So after Much more research i have now purchased a brand new kite that has all the lines and handles included.
it is also quite a large kite coming in at 9 metres, but it is a proper land kite and a new design.
So last night i took it for a spin down at a local park.
Far from impressed i took the wife, helping me untangle 25 metre lines, unpack a huge piece of fabric in front of dog walkers, joggers and local youth playing football, all who seemed to be looking forward to a spectacle of an imminent kite launch.
After about 40 minutes of untangling and preparation i was ready for launch.
There was hardly any wind, but i was confident as my buddies on the forum said that as it was a large kite it required little if any wind to launch.
So the wife held the kite and i pulled.
Nothing!!
Again..
Nothing.
Unsure if the kite was positioned correctly we turned it around, did the classic trick of throwing blades of grass in the air, wetting the finger, sticking it in the air. Yep we were facing the right way, everything seemed correct.
By now the dog walkers and youth were losing interest, as was the wife.
So we tried again, this time i started running, which resulted in the kite being dragged along the ground. i was becoming fearful that my new toy would become damaged, and there was a overwhelming stench of manure that part of the park had been sprayed, and i really didn't fancy the kite being dragged through that.
So we gave up.
What a waste of time..
I tell you, i really could have done with a smoke after that.....
Monday, 29 June 2009
Bar Show 09
I've been running TBB 'officially' since July 2004. And since that day i have always had god knows how many calls EVERY year from the guys at Bar Show to err, how should i put it, 'give them thousands of pounds to borrow a few square metres of floor' at Earls Court.
Having attended almost every other show within the industry, i don't know how but until this year i had never been able to attend the Bar Show.
So to be honest i was quite excited to be finally attending this year as i guess it is classed as the 'cool' show of the industry, so i was looking forward to meeting some of the big players and hopefully strike some deals.
What a disappointment!
i guess I'm no longer the target market for this kind of trade show. if your between 18 & 25 and fancy getting pi$$ed for free then it's definitely your show.
Don't get me wrong there was a small but diverse selection of companies from catering suppliers and manufacturers, the usual furniture suppliers, but obviously being bar, it was mainly about energy drinks, cocktails, vodka, tequila and ohh yes more energy drinks!!
I had seriously considered having a stand at bar this time round, but am glad i held off, as I'm pretty sure it would have been a wasted expense as many of the supplier / services stands were simply being walked by, as it looked like the majority of visitors were mainly interested in the free booze . To be honest you can't really compete with that unless you have a stand full of top heavy lovelys promoting your product!!, So something for future companies to consider if exhibiting at the bar show. Free booze!!!
Having attended almost every other show within the industry, i don't know how but until this year i had never been able to attend the Bar Show.
So to be honest i was quite excited to be finally attending this year as i guess it is classed as the 'cool' show of the industry, so i was looking forward to meeting some of the big players and hopefully strike some deals.
What a disappointment!
i guess I'm no longer the target market for this kind of trade show. if your between 18 & 25 and fancy getting pi$$ed for free then it's definitely your show.
Don't get me wrong there was a small but diverse selection of companies from catering suppliers and manufacturers, the usual furniture suppliers, but obviously being bar, it was mainly about energy drinks, cocktails, vodka, tequila and ohh yes more energy drinks!!
I had seriously considered having a stand at bar this time round, but am glad i held off, as I'm pretty sure it would have been a wasted expense as many of the supplier / services stands were simply being walked by, as it looked like the majority of visitors were mainly interested in the free booze . To be honest you can't really compete with that unless you have a stand full of top heavy lovelys promoting your product!!, So something for future companies to consider if exhibiting at the bar show. Free booze!!!
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