Friday, October 23, 2009

Back to the blog

Well, I've managed pretty much a week of cold turkey with regard Facebook and I've been fine, despite the odd twitch about getting back on. It's been a lot better since I put a message on saying I'd gone, since I had a ton of people asking if i'd cut them off :)
[Above: Bryan Reynolds, left and Gordon Hall, masquerading as Basil Fawlty]

I survived the weekend trip to Amsterdam to celebrate Gordon Hall's 40th, 15 of us (more or less) partied for 3 days and incredibly enough there were no major casualties, save for the usual suspect being a social time-bomb on the last day. I can't imagine the battery he got when get back from his missus who advised me she'd flipped the "bitch switch" or something on the phone... Nice one Debs.

We spent most of the first day in the Old Bell pub in a large square, given that we started drinking before we got on the plane (it was a 7am flight) it was no wonder that for most, the first day was over by about 9pm... not that I remember.

Day two commenced around 11am and we spent pretty much all day in my favourite Amsterdam bar, "Cafe De Dam" which is the smallest pub in town, just off Dam Square. We did adjourn for a rather fantastic steak, ironically just across the road after we'd googled for "best steak in Amsterdam" - it was 20secs walk to "Gauchos". Hijinks, drinks and laughs followed well into the night before the fog of war got the better of me in particular and I was safely escorted back to the hotel.

Sunday was very slow, a collection of zombiefied revellers and people slowly made their way to different flights during the day, with our lot leaving in the evening and most quite jolly by the time our plane was ready to board. Cracking group of lads, great trip and nice to see Gordie in such good spirits.

Back at work and this week saw a few highlights, notably being interviewed for a spot about Team17 on national BBC news (aired Tuesday 27th, ironically the day we sponsor the London Games Conference at Bafta, which I'm also attending), a great chat with Keith Hackett, ex premiership ref who is now in charge of the Ref's association and good movement on our titles, which include a new edition of Worms for iPhone (with great 3GS visuals), a new update for Worms 2 Armageddon on XBLA and also good to see Alien Breed edge ever closer to release.

I was also at Elland Road earlier in the week to see a winner 3rd minute into extra time over Norwich, despite being 2nd best most of the game. Great stuff, top of the league and looking good to start a long overdue return up the league and back to where we belong.

Out tomorrow with Trina, JD and his missis. Another trip to Akbars (cue Fish Masala, Giant Nan and fave Balti) and then likely on to Reform, Mojo and Sandanista bars... nice end to the week.

Got a fair bit on next week, including two days in London, which means I'll miss the T17 booth at the Eurogamer careers fair at the Armouries, although I'll try and get there to show my face.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

So you may turn up but not for the
careers fair, what about Alien Breed will you be there for that?
Hope to see you again

Niki

Martyn James Brown said...

Am not sure yet, just depends if I get back from London early or not - that's a bit open right now.