Being sober is overated

The days of sobriety have gone past, not a suprise, it has always been a flash but the weeks of late have been hard agaisnt the wall at work and every other way. Never have i ever felt more drained and at a loss. There has been alot of change in circumstance and situations, we have moved into a new place and my job has taken a different path. If that alone is not enough there are other factors that keep me awake at night. It is sad to say that my only moments of release have been under the influence. Im not quite sure whats going on , or rather no else really knows.....

How a year flies past.....

Arguably one of the most cliche expressions of all time, how time has flown past. It has in every sense of the word this last year. Never have I once thought man this is the grind, just to see the weekend then back to the grind. I don't think i have ever held the weekend or even after work hours for that matter in such high regard. There is never enough time here in London.

Don't get me wrong, it wasn't all enjoyable, sometimes you get into situations where you would like to say, screw this I'm going home but i have to admit of late i haven't thought this at all. With a year being up we are starting to see the transition occur with the Aussie's that call London home. There have been a few close calls already with the Highly Skilled Migrants Visas that are really the holy grail for those wanting to work past one year. We have had people burnt by minor technicalities while others have got away with murder, <3 British bureaucracy.

I cant help but wonder what changes there have been in Sydney. I have heard varying reports from people who visit home after being away, from nothing changing to the dramatic. A lot of here in London surrounded by Aussies, living with Aussies, going out with Aussies imagine ourselves to be in a bubble with our lives on hold. I used to think that too until, i got the time just to realise how much i have changed.I wonder how everyone is getting on at home, im sure there will be plenty of suprises in store. Back home in 1 week and counting!............

Another one bites the dust

Well with Khoung's engagement (Congrats man) this week the grand total is now up to 3 engagements in the last few months with more to follow im sure. It is just another sure reminder that life if moving on in the rest of the world. I still havent quite got over the bubble that is London. Now that im coming closer to returning home for a visit there has been alot of thinking going on. While i am sure to return to London after my visit the whole question of just how long i will stay is another matter entirely.

It is a bit of a crossroads as London is moving in to the full party mode of Summer, definitely the most interesting time in Europe and now compared to the relatively bleak Sydney, give that it has its own charms and comforts. Ever since i returned from my Euro trip i have taken everything at a new slant, i was just reminiscing about what i thought of London when i got off the plane last August and how i think about it now. I could almost say it, that i dont want to leave in the immediate future. There are other things of course that my heart is set on in Sydney but i think i might finally be finding the larger attraction of London that is beyond the clubbing and drink.

Just last Sunday i went to lie on the grass at Hyde Park, on an overcast afternoon, i would have ridiculed the pasty white English people that were doing the very same just last year. Things have changed.

Keeping Busy

Hoho its been a few busy weeks since getting back to London, getting back to work coupled with plenty of nights out have made it a bit of a blur. There have been a couple of stand outs in the last few weeks, seeing daylight stumbling out of Turnmills the 2nd night back sorta set the tone for things to come. Serdy has made it back to London after 9 long weeks in Europe, his return unfortunately kicked off by a less than desireable night at Fabric (Dave i just dont get it). With the month kicking over to June it's getting abit scary how fast it has all gone by.

The Big One

Well the time has come, aside from my pilgrimage to the Guinness Storehouse in Dublin, the most important objective of me even moving to London. EUROTRIP! Its difficult to say what i had expected of the trip now that im typing this in hindsight. I would probably be safe to say that it turned out nothing like i expected but a blast all the same.

If you didn’t know by now 3 of us were to travel through Western Europe, well for my leg anyway, Binh, Serdy and I were to go thru Spain, France, Belgium, The Netherlands, Germany, Denmark, Sweden. It did turn out rather similar but lets just say there were many iterations in our plan. Funnily enough planning ahead might have been an idea :) You live and you learn.

There were 2 things that i spent my money on in Europe that i thought was rather retarded. One was the amount of time in internet cafes planning, nuff said, the other was toilets. At 50 euro cents a pop it wasnt long before i went over the 10 euro mark, and they wonder why Europe generally smells like a urinal.

I'll have to be honest that i didn’t plan(nice work Serdy) or expect anything from Europe, in the end i was surprised by what i found and enjoyed it to the full. Ill type a full trip blow by blow account in the next section , don’t be obliged to read it all .

Fabric with the hoochies

Wow not quite what i expected from Fabric, the music was a bit harder that what i have been used to, since it has been months + a Eurotrip in between this night out is now quite a blur.

Fabric has a seedy undertone that we havent really been getting in other places, im sure Jean will agree. There are many who have touted that it is the definitive London club experience on Fridays so we will be heading back soonish with Serdy, lets see how we do.

And thats Feb done and dusted.

Man that was quick, Feb flashed pass by without me taking much notice. Nothing to do at all with probably one of the more drunken months so far. I haven't survived without injury though, im still trying to work out if my niggling shoulder injury has been cause by a drunken tumble down some stairs or over exertion on the Wii. Injury due to a ding ding ding 4 match winning streak in Wii boxing sounds like a more probable cause at this point.

I have settled in well to my new job at 1stContact, not the best job in the world but definitely a step up i think. I have been offered a more permanent position there which im likely to take. Never has the my future here in London been more hazy, there will be a few key decisions to be made in the coming months.

We have also had the very recent arrival of Amy to our house at 7:02am Monday morning, thats 7:02am ie before my wake up time! She has replaced Michelle as our resident neat freak, uhh i mean female housemate. Amy has assured us that shes been all cool with what she has seen so far but she is starting to develop some Michellesque traits already. I came home to find some sorta out of date still ok custard missing from the fridge.... mmmmmz. At least she doesnt have a Mac

/turns to the Darkside

All men do desperate things when the situation calls for it. I wanted to make that clear, losing 300gb of data comes in as one of those situations. My main media drive that holds pretty much freakin everything decided to develop what my laptop claims to be a bad sector. It crashes windows when put on with a desktop, it refuses to even power up in Binh's portable case. But.. it works on Michelle's f*@king Mac, i have no idea how and no idea why but 4hrs tinkering tell the truth. In defeat i purchased a portable drive to make the transfer, i had nowhere else to turn, it was a dark day indeed.

To rub salt into the wound im probably going to have to give up my sexy blue "For the Bling" case and resort to using a big assed Seagate, technically more realiable and safe but... yeah. /cries


Michelle's desk at times does reflect her state of mind

Snow in London

After a relatively mild winter so far in London with cold snaps here and there it has snowed in London for the first time in 5 years. Co-incidentally it was just in time for my family's first morning in London. They made the most of it crossing into Hyde park which was transformed briefly into a winter wonderland, far from the brown crap pile of horse manure it was in summer.

It was the kick off the a eventful 5 days that my family was due to spend in London along with the Tees from KL. It doesn't take long for to get that familiar feeling with family around.... sheer annoyance. Oh how we love/hate our family, I'll admit it , i missed them dearly, but ffs they know how to get on your nerves.

All in all it was great to see my family, we went to watch We will rock you, Billy Elliot, had dinner out and i cooked dinner on the Sat night before they headed off to Manchester. In typical fashion the left their passports at my place and got me to head out at 9am on a Sun morning to deliver them... /sigh

wow i type well while drunk

At the risk of blowing my own horn, im rather impressed with the last two catch up posts i made last night. Yes the timestamp is actually accurate, with just a few punctuation marks and letters this morning i was quite proud of my efforts.

It has been awhile since we headed out to MoS, its been a few months i think since Dave left. It was a bit belated for a Bday bash but it was a good excuse as any to head out. It was a good night out, with even Andrew came along for the entire night, only marred by the fact that Binh (cough... softcock) decided to pike on me and Khoa not being able to make it with work commitments.

I would have never imagined that i would have picked a place like MoS to head out to a year ago. I guess times and attitudes do change, i have inexplicably become a fan of the duff-duff that i previously so despised. Cant wait for the next night out.

and 26 years on..............

Im still a kid at heart. I had almost forgotten it was birthday while up on the slopes, the good old DB crew from Sydney made sure i didnt forget it. Before we even departed they presented me with my birthday gift, a pair of Oakley Iridium ski goggles, i had been ogling them for months now, yet i was being too much of a tight ass to buy it for myself.

On the slopes they bought me a cake with candles and all, and also played bday drinking games, which i was so sure it was rigged. The "Learn to play bridge' card in French =/ a Joker Chinh , i dont care what you say. Just a word of thanks guys, ty for going to all the effort it was much appreciated!

Mount Du Pain!

With my nonexistant skills in French i have dubbed Val Torrens the highest resort in the Alps of France, Mount Du Pain. Its amazing how little i thought about what a week long snow trip would entail.

1) Im unfit as a bitch
2) I had to live with 2 couples ( Chinh+Linda and Binh + Jen ) the agony. Dr Phil Save me!
3) French TV is shit ( CNN being the only english channel and DBZ being the only cartoon dubbed in French we could sort of understand)
4) Me snowboarding for 6 days
5) Snowboard intructor that was a hard ass.
6) Binhs dragonboat team.

As much as a torture that is sounded like i enjoyed myself thoroughly and it was the best snow trip that i have ever been on. The alps have a scenery that has to be witnessed, no photograph or video can really translate the sensation. The biggest lesson to be learnt in snowboarding is to buy PROTECTION/Body Armour, something which i didnt do and i am still regretting it a week and a bit later. Learning to snowboard was rough especially for me as i could ski to a semi competent level, but the bruises, bumps and pain were well worth it.

All in all i can hazard to say i would do i again.

Pics to be posted soon on the phat links ================>

NYE 2006: Turnmills revisited

Gotta say that this was another great night out at Turnmills, not the best of venues, they have had some pretty good acts play there. Being NYE with the Chemical Brothers playing, it was quite crowded but man the music was good. There were about 10 of us in there but due to crowd i didnt get to see everyone. Binh, Jen, Michelle and myself were joined by Jean + Thomas + Khoa & Co freshly back from their ski trip. Turnmills is a bit of a maze inside and i still havent been able to figure it out but we werent all able to fit in the main room which did suck.

Im not sure if i would want to do NYE in a club again, there was no countdown and it was abit of lackluster NYE confetti, the only real downer of the night. Binh and I once again successfully arrived at Farringdon tube hanging hard for a piss, this time we were civil and managed to find a pub but only after we were rejected by some terrified Indian guy at a KFC that locked the door in our face. We have found our new vodka 42 Below, product of NZ funilly enough, that + Red Bulls yes yes FTW

NYE Pics are now posted over there ======>

The theme was rock stars, we made an effort! cant you tell?

Turkey Curry mmmm........

Well another Xmas has past. I had it in my head that this was the first Xmas i had spent away from home or away from family, but im sure its not, rather i think it was the first Xmas i has spent with just friends and not any family mmmmz.....

What ever it was this will be the Xmas forever marked as the one with a distinct lack of pressies. We did have a household Kris Kringle tho and THANK YOU John Foong for inventing that crazy present stealing game, i am now a proud owner of an Akira DVD box set.

We had a gathering over at my place for Xmas eve and *sigh* i cant say it was the same. Sure sure its minus the family, but the John Foong Xmas Party's have come to define Xmas the last few years.

Get back to Sydney John! maybe ill join you there next year :p but back to London. We had 11 of us total at my place so naturally you look for a turkey to feed 11, apparently a 7 Kilo turkey was the right one for the job. Terrified that i was going to run out of food I decided to do a pork roast to go along with the goose fat potatoes, butternut squash, sausages and bacon. Now for dessert, there were i think 3 chocalate cakes, ice cream, fruit and custard, stewed pears, yeah alot of food.

So these few days it has all been about creative cooking. Judging by this morning last night's BBC recommended turkey curry was abit mmm yer. Turkey stock miso ramen was alot better and tasted normal. The question is what am i going to do with the rest of the turkey, yes there is still more.

Changing Jobs

Next week i start a role, yes im getting underpaid again, in a support company that will hopefully teach me something new. My current role allows me to stay at home, do nothing basically, unless something actually happens. When something does happen, its restart the computer, plug in the printer blah blah blah. I hope i dont get bitten in the ass for wishing my next job could be something more complicated. It is a pleasure and a bit of a worry at the same time that im getting paid to do officially nothing atm , but i guess thats why the pay officially sucks! I hope i get a desk job plz plz plz, travelling on the tube is for the lack of a better word "bollocks!".

Over the course of the last few weeks there have been many cases where i have been on the clock and been experimenting with cooking, there was the day i baked pizza and pecan pie on the clock, miso ramen day, more recently there was paid banana cake day, i do wonder sometimes if i should send my boss a slice. Besides last weeks visit to the Science museum i havent been able to duck out TPG style as im on call, doh!i I want a desk job but I'm so gonna miss this way of life .

Grots says ~byes! for good

~Sigh~
It's post patch day, too bad im missing the joys of it, it's done.... Grots has been passed onto a lucky new owner on Ebay, its hard not to feel some sort of attachment, even the money in my pocket does little for this. I have worked it out, Wow is quite possibly the first and the last video game i made a profit out of. Here's the working out

21 months of WoW + Retail value of the game = 7*USD$41.27 + AUD$70? = ~USD$340

With Sale value - auction fees - all subcription + retail fees. Its a clear profit. I wonder if i have to pay tax on it somewhere.

So i have clear profit from this one, lets not think of the time investment that was put into it, it does make me shudder, you could have called it a 2nd job with the number of hours invested but it was all in the name of entertainment, I think, so im going to write that one off.

So with that and my pressing need for more HD space for my next addiction:

It was quite uncanny and quite fitting for all this to happen today, Binh and Kerrie joined me for a visit down memory lane at the Science Museum's latest exhibit "GAME ON FKERS!". Being a Friday where regular people are working and stuff, I took a page out of Juz's book and got paid to go out. It was an impressive exhibition covering Arcade/Console games back from its humble beginnings with Pong in the 70's to the PS3 and Wii.

There were many favourites from Xevious, DigDug, Gravius, some bomberman knock off, Street Fighter 2 and some classic games i can now say i have played on the actual arcades, D(M)onkey Kong, Pong, Asteroids, Centipede,Tron, Star Wars 1983 just to name a few. Disappointingly the only PC game i saw or rather the only port of a PC game was the classic Monkey Island!!!! mmm it would have been good to see but ah well.

Part of the exhibition inc a turn on the Wii OR PS3 so with 3 of us it was a game of tennis on the Wii. I have to say its pretty cool but im not sure how long the gimmick factor will keep me going, side by side the PS3 had stunning graphics but questionable gameplay, the Wii has less pretty pictures but seemed more fun to mess around with so meh, i have other housemates intent on a Wii so well see what happens.

Full concentration required!

Paul Oakenwho?

Last nite we had possibly the best experience out a club, well i had , i cant speak for everyone else. Chinh and Linda came down from Liverpool and rocked up at about 10pm, just in time to start the drinking. Binh, Jenn, Chinh, Linda, Michelle and I then headed out to whats to be our NYE venue ,Turnmills. For NYE we had been deciding to go for Groove Armada at the Cross or Chemical Bros out at Turnmills, after last nite i think we have made the right choice.

As we headed up to the bar to grab a few drinks i saw something that i never thought i would come across again Cream Bulbs!! or N20 or Nitrous Oxide or Happy Gas! There were a table of girls in ridiculous cowgirl outfits filling balloons up straight from the whipped cream bottle. At 2 pounds a pop it wasnt cheap but lols it doesnt hurt when u slap urself in the face :P

You could say that it was wasted on me the fact it was Paul Oakenfold, for a relative noob like myself i wouldnt be able to tell who from who but the talent was unmistakeable. With some of the best music that ive heard to date he kept us going till wee hours of the morning. Can't wait for NYE.

Vodka Redbulls + Cream Bulbs + Good Music + Good Company = WIN

Chinh, Linda + Michelle @ Turnmills

Divine intervention perhaps

Ho ho i think someone is trying to tell me something, i woke up today to find my listing for Grots on ebay missing. My first thoughts were "FUCK" did blizzard get ebay to pull the listing, did i forget to scrub out all the details? Well in the end it was less sinister than that, ebay in their wisdom decided to freeze my account and unlist Grots. Maybe changing your address details, creditcard details and email during a listing wasnt the best thing to do but meh. After a quick call to my registered number which happens to be my Australian number and about an hour and a half chatting to my ebay representative it was all sorted. No no were back on track here, now if only someone bids.

Grotsnik out!

Its been an interesting ride. Finally put Grots up for sale on ebay, it feels like the end on an era, loading up wow for the last time had its pangs on nostalgia. Never did i imagine the drama, the e-drama and the irl variety it would bring when i picked up a copy on that fateful day. It was great fun playing wow but it was really the players that made the game. Even if i wasnt freezing over here on the otherside of the world it would have been doubtful that i would have continued playing with most of my mates moving on. Ah well all good things come to an end. Time to see what else is out there.