Park Meet 2007

On Saturday 4th August I popped down to London for 'Park Meet': the annual get-together of my "Star Wars" fan friends, or "the groovy gang" as Jane has named us! We've done this since the summer of 2002, with all of these meet-ups being very well attended, and thankfully held on days of great weather! This year's was no exception. The only downer being that Carla couldn't come with me this time as she was working that Saturday. Oh well. It was Paul that came up with the idea, so before anything else, a big thank you to him for some fun days!

I got down to Euston just after 11am, and headed over to 'Planet Organic' for my vegan 'bunny munch' sandwiches etc, and then headed on over to kill some time in the book shops on Charring Cross road. What type of book shops, eh?! Ahem. I'll leave you to guess. On the way down Tottenham Court Road, I was surprised to have a flyer for a computer fare thrust into my hands by some young American lass who then said, "Wow, I luuuoooooooove your t-shirt!!" in a her croaky yankee accent. I was trying to eat crisps at the time so didn't really engage in much conversation, apart from a "Thanks, it is a great film, isn't it!" I suppose I could have stopped and chatted as she seemed friendly enough, but the crisp eating took over. Plus I had to meet my pal Sarah. In fact, I got several looks and smiles with regard to my t-shirt choice of the day: a 'Vote for Pedro' shirt, as featured in the cult film "Napoleon Dynamite". It certainly has a following! With lines like "I caught you a delicious bass." and "Napoleon, don't be jealous that I've been chatting online with babes, all day. Besides, we both know I'm training to become a cage fighter." I'm not surprised!

I got to rendezvous with Sarah about mid-day at Leicester Square, and we then checked out Forbidden Planet, The Cinema Store and Vintage Magazine collector shops for what must be the premier piece of film merchandise in the world: A Daniel Craig fridge magnet. Yes. Daniel Craig. On your fridge. We couldn't find one, but Clinton's Cards have them so Sarah can hopefully get it there! (She did, BTW - thought you should know.)

We walked over in hot sun (glad I brought the sun cream) to Green Park tube station, got some water from a local Pret-a-Manger, and then found Tess, Lindy and her boyfriend sitting in the park making friends with a VERY TAME squirrel! He was so tame; he literally came up to eat nuts from their hands! What a cute little critter. After chatting for a bit I managed to find the rest of the gang via the glory of mobile phone technology, and we moved over to our usual tree. The afternoon was a rather nice and relaxing few hours, spent lazing about talking, eating and drinking. We had a great turn out, some 25 of us I believe. People were arriving and leaving and different times.

Several of us chatted about the recently released "Transformers" film (I think about a 50/50 split there between 'like' and 'dislike'), and there was the usual chit-chat about movies and DVDs, Lego collecting, classic children's TV, and other such geeky fare combined with a more grown up stuff like impending flat purchase (Paul), weddings (Kerry-Anne, Craig and Karen), shopping and vegan diets (Tess), college stuff (Lindy). The usual silly games of cricket and frisbee went on in the background (you had to be careful - those balls flew everywhere!) as the rest of us chilled out. Some of us took photos. I went over to Piccadilly with Lindy, Tess and her bf to look at the artwork, just before they left to check out the Japan centre.

I left about 6:20pm to get my 7pm train back home. I think the rest of them went to the pub! All in all, an easy going fun day! I guess we'll have another one next year. Let's just hope for good weather.

Oh, thanks to Kerry-Anne for the wine and showing us her picture of meeting Mark Hamill at Star Wars Celebration Europe!

Family vist and a cinema trip

I always seem to be catching up with this silly blog! You may have noticed that I have severe apathy when it comes to updating it. Sorry!

Still, here goes with what's been happening of late…

Carla's family visit (Saturday 21 - Monday 30 July.)

Carl and Ethan, Carla's father and son, came over for a visit. We met them at Birmingham airport a full day later than planned as they ran into some trouble with connecting flights in the USA. Oh well, it was raining and grey all that Friday so they didn't miss much! The first weekend was spent at home doing stuff locally, as was the second. I was at work for two days into their holiday but one of those days Carla took them into Birmingham city centre to look around the shops. I think they got as far as doing the Bull Ring centre and china town. Ethan decided he didn't want to see the new "Harry Potter" flick, even though it was showing in 3D at the Imax cinema. On the Wednesday, we all went down to London to do touristy stuff there: The Tower of London, a trip on the DLR out to Greenwich, then a boat trip up the Thames to Embankment (near Westminster.) We didn’t have much time at the Tower, after getting to London at lunchtime and having a bite to eat, checking into our hotel etc. Still, it was a nice if brief visit. The place was full of scouts! Onto the river trip, which was wonderful! You get some fantastic views of the city from the river - even when it is grey and windswept. I really want to do that again! To finish off the day we had a meal in Wagamama (yummy noodles and vegan nosh!) and then went to Namco Station arcade in County Hall, so Ethan could play video games until his credits ran out!

Thursday was spent out at Hampton Court Palace in Surrey. What an impressive place this is! We had time to explore a great deal of the palace and its grounds. The staterooms are opulent and a little overwhelming. The whole place is very interesting. I particularly liked the display about King Henry VIII and the Tudor kitchens with plastic re-creations of 500-year-old food! haha. Great stuff. The gardens are beautiful as well. Very scenic, especially as the Thames flows right by there.

In the evening we went back into Central London and went bowling in Bayswater (as it was close to Paddington station) and then we got the train to Bath, so we had a few hours doing more touristy stuff there on the Friday. This included the Roman Baths museum (the commentary playing machines now include added comments from author Bill Bryson!), a tour on one of those hop-on hop-off buses, a nice lunch by the river, and a quick trip to the fashion museum. Bath is a grand city of primarily Georgian architecture, set in a picturesque valley of the river Avon. As the weather was nice that day, it was a great visit.

Over the holidays, I dug out my old Nintendo Gamecube system, which kept Ethan happy! He played my various "Star Wars" video games on it for quite some time. Its amazing to think that five years ago, this system was state-of-the-art, and now everyone treats it like its from the Noah's ark!

Oh, and on the last full day of their visit we went to see….

Transformers at the Nuneaton Odeon. Yep, Michael Bay and Steven Spielberg's big screen version of the 1980's toy and cartoon finally got released that weekend. I'd been buzzed about this film since it was announced, being a big fan of the robots in disguise. Well, I have to say I loved it! I came out of the screening with a big smile. Excellent sfx, remarkably funny script, good lead actors, particularly Shia LaBeouf. Everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves, especially ILM's special effects guys. The only downside is my standard criticism of any Michael Bay film…his editing style takes some getting used to as everything moves at a cracking pace. Anyway, I think this is his best film, and we all enjoyed it so let's give it 9/10! I hope to see this again before it ends its run.

Oh, I have completed (yes! actually completed!!!) my Merlin "Transformers" sticker album. This was achieved by getting a few packs last week, some doubles from friends at work, and then buying a complete box on Sunday! Now I need to try and complete my "Star Wars Episode 3" album (oh where are you no 154?!)

Anyway, it was fun to see Carla's family, being hosts and do touristy stuff with them. Thankfully, all seemed to go well!

I will cover Park Meet, our annual fun day out at Green Park, in a few days time!