Nigel Smith

Wow, how busy have I been this weekend.

I started on Friday, like any other Friday, off to work. Finishing at lunchtime I headed home to sort out my shtuff for the weekend, the plan: Off to see a mate of mine who now lives ‘darn sarf’, not really, it’s Henley-on-Thames don’t you know, the real reason was that K’s best friend is getting married soon and she had to go and try the bridesmaid dress on and sort out for hair and make-up, I just used it as an opportunity to catch up with my mate Neil.

Friday started as well as any other workday would, but as soon as I had left at lunchtime and returned home I realised that I had forgotten to borrow the SatNav from my dad, $H!T, I had no idea where my mate’s new gaff was, ah well! I guess I can legitimise the expense of buying one myself by putting it through the firm and claiming it back as a business expense against the tax bill, off to town then to buy me a TomTom GO 500.

I opted for the TomTom GO 500 ‘cos it’s got a bluetooth handsfree kit built-in, that means K can use it when she’s in the car and I can use it when in the van without having to fart around with car kits. A super quick check on t’interweb and I find that most places have reduce the price and Comet, PcWorld, and Curry’s are all selling them for £450, off we trot to Forster Square to get on then.

If I couldn’t claim it back against tax there is no way I could justify spending that kind of money like that. Thanks Mr. Brown.

Anyway now I have the SatNav I can set off to Aylesbury to drop K at her grandparents, then on to my mates house in Henley, upon arriving at said grandparents I am greeted with masses of food, hmm… warmed up homestyle Fish ‘n Chips, hmmm….. it wasn’t actually bad at all, but it sound better like that, closeley followed by a rather large portion (suits you sir) of Apple Crumble and Custard, my god, my gut is busting (no it wasn’t already).

Back on the road to Henley, I start off by putting the address into the TomTom and start driving, I have no idea where it will take me, I only hope it get’s me within reason to my mates house, “Right turn ahead”, erm… OK, I turn right, following the instructions as they are announced, it seems to know the way, then it told me to head down this rather dark, creepy, and pretty dodgy backlane, the kind you hear abou on the news when womeone has been murdered and the body is discovered weeks later by a rambler, crap, all I can do is follow the road and hope the car doesn’t breakdown. All is well, I emerge after about 20mins onto civilised roads with other traffic and the directions start again, this time, within five minutes it announces that I have reach my destination, erm… Have I?… I best call my mate see where he is, on the phone he suggest I follow his directions in as there’s no way I’ll find it, then when I tell hime I’ve already stopped having just passed a double roundabout he comes out of his house, facing where I have parked the car, DAMN… the TomTom did it!

It was around 7:30 when I arrived and my mate was starving, oops, I had just eaten at K’s grandparents, ah well.. mate not too impressed tho, after a quick chat inside and drop the guitar off we headed to his grilfs, mainly so he could raid the fridge and get fed, but also so on the way we could stop by another frineds and fix his webcam.

After a rather brief visit to see his missus we head back to the house and piss around on the guitar for a while until his pager starts to go off, it was his turn to be on-call so every 10-15 mins the bloomin thing would go off, a little more fun with the guitars, a brief look at the stuff he does at work and suddenly it’s 3am, time for bed then.

Wake up in the morning wanting some breakfast, some margerine to spread on my toast, Oh, Oh Vitealite erm…… that’s not how it went.

Wake up the next morning nice and early 8:30, I didn’t think Neil would be too impressed so I left it an hour, when I did eventually rise I gave hime a knock in the other room and heard the groan of a man that clearly doesn’t do early morning very well. Once up we head down to StarBucks for a coffee and then round the corner for a bacon buttie, actually it was more like a baguette, not like that up north.

Music planned for later that night invloved seeing ‘flick’ a legendary funnyman and guitarist down those parts, see seperate blog titled ‘Flick’.

Spent most of the afternoon waxing and polishing Neils car so he could sell it Sunday, all for free of course, aren’t I kind? Did a damn good job of it n’all.

Just as we had finished the car K rang and needed picking up from Marlow (reasons detailed here), not far from Henley/Ascot/Windsor, seemed like as good a time as any to grab some food so we headed out grabbed K and went and found the Henley local Wetherspoon, defo posher than the ones up here. Food was good, and prices were just like home, impressed, not been anywhere like that for ages now.

That was it really, I’ll mention the music later that night in a seperate blog.

A very hectic, but enjoyable weekend.