Karohemd's World

First I utterly overslept, getting up around noon, had breakfast and didn't do much then decided to go shopping after all (quite a bit at Tesco's), got home and then realised I could phone robinbloke and ask him if he minded my company if I came over and cooked duck breasts for the both us. He mentioned that he was going to twentypence's birthday meal, getting a lift with hardcore_genki. I had completely forgotten about it as we were supposed to do the Charity Poker tournament instead. Some panicking, unsuccessful phonecalls and LJ commenting later, I went over to hardcore_genki's to get a lift as well.
We first stopped over at the Bar Hill SuperTesco to pick up cards and presents for twentypence, then picked up robinbloke and drove to Farcet where we were frantically greeted by a very hyper Pippin and an equally hyper Lizzie. Al, rirekon and Simon turned after a while as well. After some chatting and faffing about we set off in three cars to P'boro where we found the iciest car park ever and then slid/skated/skittered to Imperial Bento, a huge Chinese restaurant where Alan joined our party. We had one of the huge round tables with a spinning disc in the centre upstairs. The food was superb, various starters served on two enormous platters, the second course was wonderful crispy duck with pancakes and a very good sauce and the main course was another huge selection of various dishes including a superb Char Sui pork and a not too hot but nicely flavoured Thai Green Chicken Curry. Considering the size of the place the amount of people they were serving, the food was very good indeed. It was really good fun seeing people I don't see too often anymore and everybody else had fun, too.

Now I need to finish the BnGH photo album before I go to bed so I'm awake for the Tai Chi intensive tomorrow morning.

or Tales of Films, Friends and Fun at The Fantastic Films Weekend in Bradford, Yorkshire.

Friday
Got up at an ungodly hour to catch the 6:50 to Peterborough, then on to Wakefield and finally Brighouse. All on time and the hotel was only five minutes walk away.
Checked into the Waterfront Lodge and texted snapesbabe as I was wandering up to hers. She was already on the bus to pick up the festival passes so I was too late to join her but she offered to get my pass as well so that was nice. I wandered around Brighouse a bit and took a few photos until The Old Ship opened. I had a pint of Riggwelter and some lovely stuffed peppers. I just had been served my food when snapesbabe arrived so we hugged and chatted and caught up on things. The next people to join us were burlesque_bunny and James WINOLJ (I think). We chatted a bit more, then I dropped off some stuff at the hotel.
After that I met pmoodie (who was shorter than expected) and El at the bus stop as well as some of their friends from the BFH forum (Darryl and er, gah, my memory for names has failed me again) so I not only had people to chat to but also who knew the way as SB and J joined us at their stop.

We were a bit late for the start of Black Christmas but nothing much had happened yet and I found a reasonable seat in the dark. The other films on the menu for Friday were An American Werewolf in London and The Mist (first showing in the UK). There will be a separate film post. Somewhere in between matgb joined us who had gone in earlier and watched Vampire Diary (which apparently has a club scene filmed at Inferno). This had been on my list but I wanted to wait for the others for getting into Bradford.

After The Mist we wandered over to the Arabian/Indian restaurant where I had a lovely Chicken Tagine and fun was had chatting. After our late dinner the party split and I tagged along with SB, matgb, burlesque_bunny and SB's and BB's boss Liz to a rock club. There was still a rather rubbish Roxy Music playing but the club afterwards had some reasonable music. People started to flake after 1, though, so we taxi'ed back to Brighouse and I had a shortish but good night's sleep.

Saturday
After breakfast, we got into Bradford early for the showing of ...And Now The Screaming Starts which was good fun. After that, it was the Dr Phibes double bill which was cheese on a stick, especially the second. After that we consumed the yummy sandwiches and goodies burlesque_bunny and matgb had prepared. Next on our schedule was The House that Dripped BloodMagenta, one of those anthologies. Good fun, too, especially Pertwee hamming it up. That took quite long so we needed to head straight for the other cinema for the day's main feature: John Carpenter's The Thing in 70mm. With a short introduction from the man himself (he had recorded and sent in as he couldn't be there). Really really good.
It finished in time for us to catch the last bus back into Brighouse, where we stopped over at SB and matgb's for chats, drinks, heckling at The Creeping Flesh on the DVD player and other fun. I excused myself a bit after 1am and walked Liz back to the Lodge.

Sunday
We made it in early enough to watch The Most Dangerous Game that despite its age was really good. I then watched the short films which had some really good ones and then joined the others for the showing of Blood on Satan's Claw, another classic. The talk with writer and director afterwards was interesting, too. Daughters of Darkness was next and met with varied reactions. As I was really hungry, I stopped at the vegetarian Indian buffet place while SB and cohorts tried to find some drinks (which they found at the cinema bar).
After more relaxing at the bar, it was time for the last film of the festival, the classic Horror Express which was the perfect finish to the festival, much more so than the planned Hell's Ground would have been (the print didn't make it in time).
We again took the last bus to Brighouse, wanted to drop in to The Old Ship but that had already closed so we gathered at the bar at the Lodge and had a few drinks.

Monday
Got up at 8:30, had a nice long shower and then suddenly realised that it was a week day and breakfast would have finished by 9 so I threw on some clothes and raced down. There was still some cereal and toast and sweet things and a friendly waitress dug out some sausages and bacon from the kitchen and a pot of coffee so I managed to have breakfast after all. I packed and chilled in my room a bit (finished my penguin classic) and then wandered to the station. Realised that I could have managed to catch the train an hour earlier but it was OK, the connections worked really well and I was home reasonably early.

All in all a fantastic weekend. Old friends met and new ones made, put some faces to LJ names and saw lots of films you usually don't get to see on the big screen. Very much worth it.

Came home, felt too tired to cook so just had a big sandwich, and then actually fell asleep reading while I waited for feanelwa to arrive.
We found a reasonable shortcut to slick_mink's (you still need to walk down to Woodhead Drive and up again but at least not all the way around, so not even 10 mins) and found jholloway's "thesis submission party" in full swing. A mix of familiar faces, old friends (yay, faerierhona) and new faces, too. Probably the funniest party in quite a while. jholloway had just a little too much Jameson and he makes an awesome funny drunk. ;o)
Walked home, caught the rest of Later... and now I'm off to sleep. Good night. Lazy weekend ahead although I'm going down to London for the ASP gig on Sunday evening.

James: *fingers crossed for the Viva*

I finally found the missing piece for my F11 cable so here's the only reasonable photo from the last Mas: All marvel at nekofairy666's fabulous quiff:



Note: That star-shaped twinkle off Andy's glasses was entirely random.

As I arrived at martinhesselius', I was greeted, vetted and accepted by the Matter of Britain, his black, incredibly cute and curious cat. We played a bit and took a few photos, too:


hearthwitch, a friend and neighbour dropped by and we all went around the block for Mexican dinner. The food was simple but good, cheap as chips (almost literally, my spinach burrito was under $7) . We also ran into two more of martinhesselius' friends (which isn't really a surprise as he has so many) there. We dropped off hearthwitch and then set out on a little tour of Birmingham while Glas told me a little about it's history. We visited Vulcan (a huge statue) who overlooks the city. Sadly, the weather was still miserable or we might have had a good view (not sure how long it's open, though).


The next stop was a pagan cafe, one of Glas' hangouts where we met more of his friends and after talking about Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman decided to go to the cinema and watch Stardust.
We got there and it was only ONE DOLLAR! For a film in a reasonable cinema. That's about 50p currently. *cries* Still, the film is so good that I'll go and see it in Cambridge again, anyway.

After the cinema we met up with aeromancer13 who also crashed at Glas' as he was in town for urgent family matters. We chatted quite a while about this and that while checking emails/processing photos. I think I got the earliest night during my whole holiday as Glas would leave at 7.30 in the morning. I had a good night's sleep and all was good.

Last night I went over to robinbloke's for some wii fun. I had to create a mii which, according to nekofairy666 looks "scarily accurately" like me.
We started with some bowling in which wasn't too bad at all at first but then the others (robinbloke, mobbsy and razornet) caught up quickly. Then nekofairy666 popped in and brought another two wiimotes so we switched to tennis. Except when serving, I'm still crap but it was all good fun. I didn't do too badly at golf this time, though.

Saturday
a whole lot of nothing until the evening when I went to belak_krin's family BBQ. For report and photos, click the thumbnail:



Sunday
Consisted mainly of housework, when I wasn't too lazy and spodded online or watched a film (as low-budget slasher fics go, Rooms for Tourists is rather fine). I also managed to get to bed just after midnight so I'm reasonably rested this morning.

Filled with lots of sleep, music in Ely and lots of friends and good food.
The last day of hardcore_genki's BBQ was mellow and lovely. My food (spicy marinated pork steaks and marinated courgette/mushroom skewers and Dippadoom™, of course) was a hit with those who knew it and tried it for the first time and it was good to see faerierhona again. raggedy_man convinced me that something I thought I wouldn't like was actually gorgeous (beef marinated in maple syrup and honey without spiciness to counteract the sweetness). Just like my taste in music has expanded and keeps expanding, my palate seems to do the same thing.

I'm now listening to the new Prince album (yes, I bought the Mail on Sunday, shut up, I only took out the CD and binned the rest) which I actually really like. I've never been a big fan of his hits but the funk stuff he's done (especially live) has always been good and this album has funk, soul and R&B (in the tradional sense although there are a few tracks which are a bit too modern for me).

I'm now going to watch Apocalypto while slurping the thick strawberry/blueberry milkshake I just made. Might watch Bulletproof Monk on 4 and then go to bed early to be prepared for the week.

Cheerio.

On Monday evening, I had quick dinner at home and walked into town centre for the closing ceremony. I found a spot which I thought to be rather ideal to take photos of the mayor's balcony from until two people in front of me took their kids onto their shoulders, blocking my view. As I was already in the crowd, I couldn't move so sadly, no photos from there, except for a few shots of the balloons flying off into the distance.

After the ceremony, I followed the masses to the fairground and found a good spot to take photos of the Spielmannszug (a traditional marching band) riding on the kids' merry-go-round, which is always good fun. It was a bit shorter than usual, though, so as I switched cameras to take a short video, they stopped. :o(

Walked around the fairground a bit, ate a skewer of strawberries coated in dark chocolate and ran into a friend. We chatted a bit while she waited for her pizza and we waited for our other friend to arrive. She did shortly after so we found a seat and caught up on life and things. Afterwards we strolled around the fairground a bit, bought some more food and then saw Astrid off as she had to get up early the next morning. Bubble and I then took a ride on the ferris wheel which was perfect timing as the sun had just set and there was some great light.
Afterwards, we sat in the wine garden and chatted about things, me mostly about Antarctica. :o)

Just before midnight, I said good-bye, walked home and spent a few hours making a photo preview and wasting my parents' money online.

Tuesday was lazy day, slept in, had lunch, finished the photo preview (now online on flickr) and took a long nap.
After dinner, I gave my parents a quick introduction to laptop, PC and Word *groan*), then watched some interesting TV and came online to upload photos, chat with jupiter_jones and catch up with LJ and email.

was fantastic if a bit warm in places.
Got there around 12 walked from Victoria Ave to the cityside entrance, bought a programme and got a text from faerierhona that she was here and having lunch. I just wanted to call her back to see where she was and walked right into her as I went around the corner of the stall.
Shortly after, puddingcat, a BRIGHT PINK nurse_liz and professoryaffle turned up. Then puddingcat and faerierhona dealed BPAL which looked incredibly dodgy indeed. ;o)
After food was found, cabd, elliphant, bloomeenee and others had turned up, too. We chatted a bit and then I went to find raggedy_man and nekofairy666, stopping to listen to a cool Rock'n'Roll/Soul band.
Found them and wandered back to find the Northern Babes gone so we had a look at the Film tent (which was boiling and didn't have a belak_krin inside). I then headed to the East Stage while raggedy_man went to see puddingcat to give her some books. Completely contrary to the Strawberry Fair law was that I never saw the Northern Babes again to say good-bye. *grump*
The band at the East Stage was very strange with various people doing very different things so I chatted to toripink a bit and then wandered on.
My next stop was the Green Stage where a reggae-ish band from Devon played cool stuff involving horns. Got some great shots of them.
The Theatrikals stage had a Classic/Cheese/Funk Rock band on with a singer channeling Robert Plant and they were really rather good.
Randomly saw raggedy_man, nekofairy666 and robinbloke again and shortly after the_mendicant with sons. We wandered around a bit and then parted ways again, I ended up at the Theatrikals stage again where a superb band called Points of Origin played all kinds of classic soul and similar songs in a sort of funky ska style. Very very cool.

After they had finished, I bought some falafel and then a crepe with strawberries and found a shady spot by the Future stage to relax a bit.
I wandered around some more and then headed to the East Stage where Rome Burns had just started their set. It was short but very sweet indeed, especially compared to the quality of some of the other bands there. Halfway through their set, the battery on the D70 ran out and I had to switch to the Fuji as I had forgotten to pack a spare. Sooo stoooopid!!! At least I got two vids out of it, which might even be reasonably good, at least for YouTube.

After RB had finished, found a shady spot with raggedy_man, robinbloke, razornet, vyvyan, owdbetts and deborah_c to relax a bit, chat and listen to crap music. Thankfully, the next band were a lot better so we listened some more.

Various people had to leave at this point, so I casually wandered back, was interviewed about the fair by a reporter for Radio 209, had curried goat, stopped occasionally to listen to some more music but nothing struck my fancy much so I walked back in the fading sunshine. As I had just missed a bus, I walked all the way home, which wasn't too bad.
I had a long shower because I was feeling really sweaty and spent the rest of the evening watching Seven Ages of Rock, making a photo preview while chatting to jupiter_jones and later suzerain.