Archive for the ‘Friends’ Category

On Norm’s (almost) actual birthday we headed down to River Plate for a good piece of steak.

Having already pre-decided, Norm went for the 1kg steak! It covered an entire dinner plate and to be honest, I think we all had our doubts as to whether it could physically be eaten by one man – never the less, Norm stepped up to the challenge and defeated it.

I decided a smaller steak would be a good call – especially as I was having half a rack of ribs to start with! Plus having only eaten what could be considered two meals in itself, I still had some room for dessert.

Overall, however, I was somewhat disappointed with River Plate. It was excellent, but it didn’t live up to my expectations given previous experiences. The judge’s verdicts are in, and Blackhouse is officially the best steak restaurant in Leeds.

I’m very dubious about this idea that every Wendy has to be adopted as part of people doubling up on their birthday celebrations with something on the actual day and then a Wendy as well – especially as I’m bitter about not being able to do this with Viv’s birthday being on what would have been my birthday Wendy and Halloween the weekend after.

Never the less, September Wendy was a fantastic night with the usual drinks starting at our apartment, followed by a bit of time in the Old Bar before heading in.

I actually felt somewhat guilty in the morning because I woke up feeling fine. Though any chance of that being a problem was quickly solved when we held the post-Wendy fry up the next day, once again cooked primarily by yours truly – and also included Yorkshire Puddings!

Unfortunately, my camera died soon after we got to The Old Bar, so I have a distinct lack of photos, so the ones from inside of Wendy were snapped by Norm.

With the university term drawing near, Elina had to return to Finland for the final year of her degree. So, at the end of August we headed over to Manchester Airport to drop her off.

It was pretty rubbish. I hate airports at the best of time, but when you’re only going there so that it can take away your girlfriend, that’s just a kick in the nuts.

Luckily, in today’s modern age, distance is only a partial barrier and Skype has been serving us well ever since. Big thanks to George for coming to keep me company too.

As part of Jonni’s never ending birthday celebration, we forwent our usual Wendy pre-party this month for drinks elsewhere, before heading up to the union. Not the best Wendy ever, but still good.

Recently, we headed over to James’s house for a bit of a party. It was interesting to see the exact same bag and printer at his house, but in the end we decided that he hadn’t burgled me, then got home quicker than we could get to his house and pretended he owned everything all along. So, in the end, a good night all round.

Having hit Fazenda last month, and then again a few weeks ago, I took one more trip there recently, to celebrate Jonni’s birthday.

As usual, they delivered some good meat, though with us being there on a Tuesday, they seem to suffer from a lack of turn over, as the meat was often slow coming. This was a little disappointing, though ultimately we ate to bursting point, so we didn’t have any less food.

We also got a free cocktail for checking in – they weren’t shy with the alcohol either.

I think it clearly has a critical mass point though, so if you’re going to go, I would recommend going on a Saturday evening when there are plenty of people and plenty of meat coming round.

It was a rather all-star turn out for our poker night last week with myself, Elina, Jonni, Kat, Norm, Casual Dave, Happy Matt and Jason all eventually turning up.

Nobody dressed up this week, which was a little disappointing, but never the less it was a good night with Jason and Happy Matt eventually walking away with the prize, after just managing to knock out Kat the Card Shark.

Last week, I took Elina to meet my friends at York Brights. It was a rather strange evening as when I walked in I found them sitting in a whole different corner to the usual one, due to the amount of people at the pub. For creatures of habit, like myself, this simply isn’t cool and I spent a good twenty minutes repeating over and over again “this isn’t where we sit…” ;).

There were also lower numbers than usually turn out, perhaps due to so many people taking holidays at this time of year – which also contributed to a slightly lower than expected turn out to Skeptics this month.

Never the less it was a great night all the same, and we tried the food for the first time which turned out to be average.

On the way back, the heavens opened to what I think was the heaviest rainfall I have ever driven through, possibly even heavier than the torrential downpour I went through on my way to appear on Ummah Channel. We’re talking so heavy that I was driving significantly below the speed limit! Nothing wrong with rain, when you’re inside though ;).

As usual, Viki was pretending to be ill at Wendy, which meant she was feeling fully refreshed on Sunday morning having gone home early. You would think that would mean she could go and get breakfast, but apparently not. Luckily Fonze stepped up to the plate and delivered the goods, with Norm adding his cheffing expertise to prepare it all.

This month’s Wendy House turned out to be a bit of a handful. The night started off with Viki’s 21st birthday party, to which none of Viki’s mates turned up, but luckily the three of us are so popular that we made up the numbers with our own friends ;).

To celebrate we did trays of shots, and managed to mix around eight different spirits leading to be receiving the following text next day from Jonni…

Fuck your shots. I woke up in the doorway of my old flat.

As I explained, it’s not really a good night unless you wake up on someone else’s porch. Having carefully planned ahead to make sure I would have chicken wings ready for when I got home too, what more could you really want from a night out.

Thanks to Nicola for the photos.