Today I went to the Jazz Cafe with Chris and Libby for breakfast. Everyone else from Luke's party somehow sneaked off, but we had a nice old time anyway chatting about this and that. After breakfast we wandered around town a bit, checking out the new gadget shop 'I've got to have it' (I think), watching Chris talk to strange whistle sellers and brass bands, and that sort of thing.

In the evening I drove up to my parents in Newbury to sort out their computers. My parents have a wireless ADSL router and one of my old PCs which is rather slow, so I brought a not-quite-so-old 1GHz Athlon and 17" monitor for them to use. This is lightening-fast compared to their old one, so it should go down quite well. Reinstalling everything took a while though! I think I started at 8:30 and it's now nearly one in the morning. Computers eh?

Current Music: Don't Stop Me Now-Queen-Shaun of the Dead

Gambling

It is Luke's birthday on Tuesday so as a celebration he organised a poker night last night. The game was Texas Hold 'em and we had three tables going. It was a good night. Needless to say, I ended-up losing my cash. Life is full of lessons on why I should avoid gambling! Anyway, I took some photos which you can see in the photos section of my Web site.

I have been struggling to catch-up with my current Open University course. I applied for it a few months ago and had a vague idea that the course started at the end of November. Other things were planned as you'd expect, and it was only through luck that I logged on to the course Website the other day to see if there were any really keen people starting already. Predictably, I discovered that the course actually started at the start of November, and I was already a bit behind! Oh well... I work best (only?) under pressure! Last night was spent catching-up on what has happened so far, and I think I will be up with everyone else by the end of tomorrow. This is quite important as it is taught entirely on-line, so if you are not in the 'tutorial' conferences it's pretty obvious!

There are some universal truths that we must all accept. 'Being slack when a student yet somehow managing to get everything in on time' is one of mine. Well, as long as you don't include PhD thesis' in that, I suppose. I take some pride in never having handed any coursework in late, but it's a weird sort of pride since a lot of my friends who almost never got stuff in on time got their degrees in the end anyway. Mind you, they were arts students, and I think in the arts handing stuff in late is practically expected.

Christmas is fast approaching. I saw the first decorations going up in October. It's tempting to say something along the lines of 'It gets earlier every year!', but that's obviously not true; the people who say it are just getting older. They probably also think that Mars bars were bigger, there was less crime on the streets, and the grass was greener. All of these things are relative. In any case, I quite like the decorations going up early, otherwise everything is a bit grim in November after Guy Fawkes night.

Thinking of Christmas, I am undecided about what to do for a tree this year. A real tree is of course the nicest thing. However, I always feel slightly guilty that a tree has to die to give me a few weeks of enjoyment. Would a plastic tree be any better though? Both real and plastic trees can be recycled, and you can get some pretty decent looking fake trees these days. I think that the environmental choice is not as clear-cut as it may first appear. Hmm.

Therapy?, one of the best live bands ever, are playing Reading on the 3rd of December. Should be excellent. Come along!

The weather this weekend was fantastic, so that made our trip to Worcestershire all the better. The drive up on Saturday morning was great - no traffic at all. The hotel near Stourport was easy to find, and everything went very smoothly. On the Sunday we went for a walk around Worcester. We caught the Remembrance service outside the cathedral, looked at the shops, and looked in the cathedral itself. I haven't been to Worcester for years but it's one of my favourite cities, I think.

The drive back to Bristol was equally trouble-free, and we got back in plenty of time to get to get to the cinema and see 'Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason'. I actually quite enjoyed the first film. Yes, it's girly and silly, but it was still amusing. This one was enjoyable too, although I didn't think it was quite as good. Still definitely worth seeing though, and if the attendance at the showing we were at is anything to go by, it should do very well.

On Friday, after a bit of a misunderstanding that added a round trip to Newbury to my commute, we went to see The Polyphonic Spree at Bristol Academy. Even though we missed about an hour of their set the stuff we did see was really good. They're a top feel-good band, and 'Together We're Heavy' is almost always playing on my iPod these days.

On Sunday I was meant to go on a flying lesson, but it was cancelled because of the weather, which was a pain in the arse. I'll have to rearrange it now but by schedule is pretty full! It may have been just as well as I had to wake up early on Sunday in time for the lesson, so I wasn't 100% sharp. Apparently the planes have heated cabins now so flying later in the year shouldn't be a problem anyway. I just want to give it a go!