4 of us from work went out last night for the latest round of my continuing leaving party. This was round 5 from work. The previous rounds consisted of:
1. Long boozy lunch at Plateau in Canary Wharf
2. Lunch an Ubon in Canary Wharf
3. Dinner at Aubergine in Chelsea
4. another lunch at Plateau
Its been a fine time indeed. Last night we went to the Oxo Tower for a quick cocktail, followed by dinner at Tas in Waterloo. It'd been a while since I'd been to Tas, but it was as good as ever, always worth a trip, and always such incredibly great value. We had the £10 set menu plus a couple of extra mains cos we were feeling. (You can see the photos of the food in flickr). So after a couple of bottles of wine we piled into the Wellington pub just opposite Waterloo and then got a bit outrageous drinking all sorts shots late into the evening. By the end all semblance of respectability had been dropped and we were drining black vodka, absynth, whiskey, and aftershock (washed down with a few fosters for Dom with typical Aussie style). What we didn;t realise was that they have a late licence there now - so we didn;t get chucked out til after midnight, by which point we were a bit of a state, and I had to jump in a taxi all the way home.
Frankly though a great evening, and that's what leaving parties should be about.
Parts 6 and 7 of the leaving do are to follow next week, with part 7 being the final blow out with the majority of my colleagues next Friday night in Canary Wharf. This time I've got a hotel room booked......
Categories: londonlife
Friday, March 24, 2006
Wednesday, March 22, 2006
House Hunting in Stockholm
Here's a picture of Sigtuna, which is the oldest recorded settlement in Sweden. Its about 25 minutes north of central Stockholm and is currently our favourite town that we'd like to try and get a house in next month. This picture is taken from a walking / skating track which has been cut into the frozen lake next to the town. We were out walking on Sunday afternoon with all the locals, who were out taking a stroll.
Categories: stockholmlife
Categories: stockholmlife
A weekend in Spain
Me, Tom, James, Jon and Steve all went to the Oliva at the weekend to celebrate James' imminent wedding. We all stayed in Jon's fantastic house in the old town. Unfortunately I forgot to take my camera, but here's a picture that Steve took last year from the roof terrace overlooking the town. We had a fantastic time and basically spent 48 hours eating and drinking. It was also pretty great to see everyone together in an easy relaxed environment before my imminent departure to Sweden.
Categories: friends
Categories: friends
Thursday, March 16, 2006
yet more domain reorganisations
due to bloggers' inability to publish active FTP - I've had to move all the domains back to blogspot again. Also Borrowlodge is now closed and forwarding to globalgoat.
If you want to see the wedding photo archive you need to be invited as a contact to view my private flickr archive. (The main public flickr archive is available by clicking on the link in the side bar.) If you want me to invite you, then email me at flickr@globalgoat.com.
Categories: blogging
If you want to see the wedding photo archive you need to be invited as a contact to view my private flickr archive. (The main public flickr archive is available by clicking on the link in the side bar.) If you want me to invite you, then email me at flickr@globalgoat.com.
Categories: blogging
Thursday, March 02, 2006
Here's some pictures of my journey to work
Sunday, February 26, 2006
So much to do, so little time
So, I spoke to Microsoft this week and booked our flight to Sweden for 11th April. This is D-Day. Between then and now we've got a few things to sort out, and of course there's a whole load of stuff going down in our friends' lives as well! Over the next 3 weeks, purely in travel terms I've got to:
fly to Luxembourg for work on tuesday
fly to sweden to go househunting early next month
fly to spain for James' 2nd stag night
generally go to work most days and look interested
go to the swedish embassy to get some permits
beyond that, there'a a huge range of random and not so random things to do at home. Sarah is packing and decorating like mad before the house goes up for sale on Wednesday. I'm sorting out finances and all sorts of other administrative crap, but so far so good - its all going to (a fairly rushed) plan.
The last week here in the UK should be pretty mad, cos for a start there's 2 days of James & Prima's wedding to go to, but of course 72 hours after that finished, we'll be off to Stockholm.
I don't even know at the moment whether they'll be any time for a leaving party....
Categories: londonlife, stockholmlife
fly to Luxembourg for work on tuesday
fly to sweden to go househunting early next month
fly to spain for James' 2nd stag night
generally go to work most days and look interested
go to the swedish embassy to get some permits
beyond that, there'a a huge range of random and not so random things to do at home. Sarah is packing and decorating like mad before the house goes up for sale on Wednesday. I'm sorting out finances and all sorts of other administrative crap, but so far so good - its all going to (a fairly rushed) plan.
The last week here in the UK should be pretty mad, cos for a start there's 2 days of James & Prima's wedding to go to, but of course 72 hours after that finished, we'll be off to Stockholm.
I don't even know at the moment whether they'll be any time for a leaving party....
Categories: londonlife, stockholmlife
Thursday, February 09, 2006
Dirty Volvos in Sweden
Now that we're moving to Stockholm, maybe we'll buy our own Volvo, and see if we can get it as dirty as this one we hired in Ostersund last year.
Monday, February 06, 2006
BLIMEY....we're off to Sweden
So I resigned today...it went quite well all in all, in fact it went damn well, everyone seemed to be happy for me, which is always a good sign. So no longer the Bank of New York in London, instead me and Sarah are selling up and we're off to Stockholm, and not only that, but I've managed to get a job with Microsoft in Sweden. How cool is that? Well basically very cool indeed - on many levels:
1. It means that I'll be able to support us when we arrive
2. Microsoft will no doubt help me with a few points of integration
3. I'm gonna work for Microsoft in a cool techie role.
4. Change is always rewarding, and quitting your job and country of residence in the space of 2 months is some pretty hefty change.
5. see point 3....
I'm gonna miss working with several of current colleagues (Dom, Frances, Sam, Howard, Tim and others) and my current boss John has taught me a whole load about the bigger (non techie) picture, but its time to move on.
More to the point I'm sure I'll miss all my London friends and family as well, its bound to be a bit tough, and god, let's not forget relocating the cats as well, cos that's bound to be quite stressful, but these are all details, and at the end of the day, its just logistics (or that's what I keep telling myself!) If I tried to write the full list here of things to do...well you can imagine, its quite long....
The past 2 weeks have been fairly mad, what with 2 telephone interviews with Microsoft, flying to Stockholm for a very very intense day long interview, including some very challenging technical tests, my wedding anniversary and general thoughts and planning on how the hell I'm gonna close down all my London connections in such a short space of time. But hey - it'll be fine. All I can in summary is that I feel alive and shockingly excited, so let's see what life brings...
Categories: londonlife, stockholmlife
1. It means that I'll be able to support us when we arrive
2. Microsoft will no doubt help me with a few points of integration
3. I'm gonna work for Microsoft in a cool techie role.
4. Change is always rewarding, and quitting your job and country of residence in the space of 2 months is some pretty hefty change.
5. see point 3....
I'm gonna miss working with several of current colleagues (Dom, Frances, Sam, Howard, Tim and others) and my current boss John has taught me a whole load about the bigger (non techie) picture, but its time to move on.
More to the point I'm sure I'll miss all my London friends and family as well, its bound to be a bit tough, and god, let's not forget relocating the cats as well, cos that's bound to be quite stressful, but these are all details, and at the end of the day, its just logistics (or that's what I keep telling myself!) If I tried to write the full list here of things to do...well you can imagine, its quite long....
The past 2 weeks have been fairly mad, what with 2 telephone interviews with Microsoft, flying to Stockholm for a very very intense day long interview, including some very challenging technical tests, my wedding anniversary and general thoughts and planning on how the hell I'm gonna close down all my London connections in such a short space of time. But hey - it'll be fine. All I can in summary is that I feel alive and shockingly excited, so let's see what life brings...
Categories: londonlife, stockholmlife
Friday, February 03, 2006
I've been rather busy the past 2 weeks
Because of this, I haven't really had the chance to post. I have a list of technical entries that I need to document, and more importantly some interesting stuff to write about my visit to Stockholm last week. For various reasons which will appear in the next post, I can't really document what happened there until the matter is offically closed, but hopefully it'll close later today.
In addition to this it was my 1st wedding anniversary last weekend. Me and Sarah went to town for the (extended) weekend, with me taking a quick 24 hours in stockholm on the Friday.
On Thursday night we ate in Levantine, the small lebanese restaurant just opposite Paddington Station (London Street). I've been many times before and its a personal favourite of mine. Despite knowing the menu well, as ever I was suitably impressed with the food. We had the meat based mezze menu, which was utterly utterly fantastic, containing all the normal lebanese classics. As ever after this they served us the most massive plate of mixed fresh fruit - more of a platter than a plate in fact - along with a 5 tiered tower of lebanese nutty honeyed sweets. It doesn;t get much better than that.
Following that we checked into the Hilton hotel over the road, since I had to be at Heathrow at 5.30am the next morning, and I couldn;t be buggered to travel from home. The hotel was built when Paddington was, and resides above the concourse. Its a true design classic and in my opinion both inside and out, and has recently been refurbished inside. Our room although small (there seemed no point getting a bigger one as we were only there for 7 hours in total) was beautifully finished in lots of walnut veneer (I think) and a lovely marbled bathroom. In addition to that its the type of place where when you walk into the foyer you take a breath as its rather stunning. My other recommendation would be to always use the stairs rather than the life, as the staircase itself is rather beautiful, especially when it sweeps down into the foyer.
On Friday night I just chilled at home, but then I'd been on the go in Stockholm all day and was utterly mentally exhausted (more info to follow).....
Saturday afternoon we went to see a cock and bull story in the curzon soho, which was good fun, and an enjoyable film. Then we checked into the Holiday Inn in Mayfair had a few drinks and went off for an evening of fish eating.
First off we champagne and oysters at Bentleys in Mayfair, which was dead good, and then jumped in a cab to Islington for dinner at The Fish Shop. Again its an old favourite of ours, but always good fun and great food. I have a roasted cod with broad beans, celery, peas and lardons (amongst other things).
Following a nice long and relaxing breakfast the next morning (the HI Mayfair dining room has some very comfortable chairs compared to some I've been to), we strolled through Green Park and St. James Park before catching the train home. Nice
Categories: londonlife
In addition to this it was my 1st wedding anniversary last weekend. Me and Sarah went to town for the (extended) weekend, with me taking a quick 24 hours in stockholm on the Friday.
On Thursday night we ate in Levantine, the small lebanese restaurant just opposite Paddington Station (London Street). I've been many times before and its a personal favourite of mine. Despite knowing the menu well, as ever I was suitably impressed with the food. We had the meat based mezze menu, which was utterly utterly fantastic, containing all the normal lebanese classics. As ever after this they served us the most massive plate of mixed fresh fruit - more of a platter than a plate in fact - along with a 5 tiered tower of lebanese nutty honeyed sweets. It doesn;t get much better than that.
Following that we checked into the Hilton hotel over the road, since I had to be at Heathrow at 5.30am the next morning, and I couldn;t be buggered to travel from home. The hotel was built when Paddington was, and resides above the concourse. Its a true design classic and in my opinion both inside and out, and has recently been refurbished inside. Our room although small (there seemed no point getting a bigger one as we were only there for 7 hours in total) was beautifully finished in lots of walnut veneer (I think) and a lovely marbled bathroom. In addition to that its the type of place where when you walk into the foyer you take a breath as its rather stunning. My other recommendation would be to always use the stairs rather than the life, as the staircase itself is rather beautiful, especially when it sweeps down into the foyer.
On Friday night I just chilled at home, but then I'd been on the go in Stockholm all day and was utterly mentally exhausted (more info to follow).....
Saturday afternoon we went to see a cock and bull story in the curzon soho, which was good fun, and an enjoyable film. Then we checked into the Holiday Inn in Mayfair had a few drinks and went off for an evening of fish eating.
First off we champagne and oysters at Bentleys in Mayfair, which was dead good, and then jumped in a cab to Islington for dinner at The Fish Shop. Again its an old favourite of ours, but always good fun and great food. I have a roasted cod with broad beans, celery, peas and lardons (amongst other things).
Following a nice long and relaxing breakfast the next morning (the HI Mayfair dining room has some very comfortable chairs compared to some I've been to), we strolled through Green Park and St. James Park before catching the train home. Nice
Categories: londonlife
Wednesday, January 11, 2006
An unreasonably long journey
So, I'm standing at Honor Oak Park last night, waiting for the stopping train home. The first train gets cancelled (10.25pm). Ho hum we think, and defer back to the pub for another drink. We get back to the station for 10.55 train and its saying "DELAYED" on the board, so we use the help point to talk to the controller to see what's happening.
He informs us that there's a broken down train around Waterloo East and therefore there are no trains coming south currently, and they don't know when there will be. Getting home is starting to become slightly problematic, especially as I know I have to be up at 5.30 today for an early support shift.
So anyway, our only option seems to be to go back north again, into central London to try to connect to another train service somewhere, as trains are still running north. So off we trot back to London Bridge on the stopping train.
We arrive at London Bridge at about 11.15 - we're now an hour into our journey and all we've managed to do is go 5 miles in the wrong direction. At London Bridge there turns out to be total mayhem. There are no trains anywhere on the Croydon / Brighton line and there are hundreds of people standing around, getting just a slight upset at not being able to get home.
So 30 minutes later and we're still standing there having listened to a ridiculous selection of contradictory announcements which are based around the premise of "a train will be coming soon" - "oh no - apologies that train is now cancelled". Large synchronised groans can be heard from hundred of people after each successive piece of bad news.
Finally 11.50 a single train is found from somewhere and everyone is told to get on it, if they wish to go south to Croydon, from where in theory they can change to other services.
Unfortunately there are 2 fatal flaws in this plan:
1. Many people like myself have already missed their last train home even if they do get to Croydon.
2. There have been no trains south for about 90 minutes now, and there are now several hundred people equating to about 6 or 7 trains worth of people trying to squeeze onto a pissy little suburban commuter train.
At this point in time, I lose the will the carry on, go to the cash machine and find myself a black cab who will take me all the way home. I sit in the back and watch London fly by, at last heading in the right direction.
I get home at 1am, knowing that I have to be up in just over 4 hours, and head off to bed to grab what sleep I can.
At 4.45am the cat sits on my head and wakes me up.....
Categories: londonlife
He informs us that there's a broken down train around Waterloo East and therefore there are no trains coming south currently, and they don't know when there will be. Getting home is starting to become slightly problematic, especially as I know I have to be up at 5.30 today for an early support shift.
So anyway, our only option seems to be to go back north again, into central London to try to connect to another train service somewhere, as trains are still running north. So off we trot back to London Bridge on the stopping train.
We arrive at London Bridge at about 11.15 - we're now an hour into our journey and all we've managed to do is go 5 miles in the wrong direction. At London Bridge there turns out to be total mayhem. There are no trains anywhere on the Croydon / Brighton line and there are hundreds of people standing around, getting just a slight upset at not being able to get home.
So 30 minutes later and we're still standing there having listened to a ridiculous selection of contradictory announcements which are based around the premise of "a train will be coming soon" - "oh no - apologies that train is now cancelled". Large synchronised groans can be heard from hundred of people after each successive piece of bad news.
Finally 11.50 a single train is found from somewhere and everyone is told to get on it, if they wish to go south to Croydon, from where in theory they can change to other services.
Unfortunately there are 2 fatal flaws in this plan:
1. Many people like myself have already missed their last train home even if they do get to Croydon.
2. There have been no trains south for about 90 minutes now, and there are now several hundred people equating to about 6 or 7 trains worth of people trying to squeeze onto a pissy little suburban commuter train.
At this point in time, I lose the will the carry on, go to the cash machine and find myself a black cab who will take me all the way home. I sit in the back and watch London fly by, at last heading in the right direction.
I get home at 1am, knowing that I have to be up in just over 4 hours, and head off to bed to grab what sleep I can.
At 4.45am the cat sits on my head and wakes me up.....
Categories: londonlife
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