Posts Tagged ‘james’

It’s not often that we have an eminent doctor of chemistry visiting Leeds. But earlier this month we were graced with James and Meg dropping by for a wedding.

This is one of the few occasions where we would deliberately want to eat British. So, we hit George’s. They put candy floss on everything, and the food was generally acceptable but mediocre.

We also hit Blackhouse for Sunday lunch. My beef roast was so bad I had to send it back. But they did replace it with a much better one and took it off the bill. I’ll happily go back but stick to a classic steak next time.

We forgot to take a picture, so here is a stock image…

Back in January, James left us, like a traitor, for a research job in South Korea. To commiserate is leaving we went for a meal at Red Chilli. I’ve only just found the photo on my camera.

Congratulations to James who recently completed his PhD viva. To help clarify the situation I have included a group photo above where I have crossed out all the faces of people who do not have a doctorate…

At the start of the film Rounders, Matt Damon points out that you soon forget your big wins in poker, but your bad beats linger on in your memory forever.

That is true even when given a generous definition of bad beat, as realistically, it wasn’t even that bad. But as Norm had organised a poker night a few weeks ago, we found ourselves sitting round the table, cards in hand.

Chris was obviously going to win at this point – by the time the first two players had gone, he was so far ahead in chip count that there was almost no coming back (we would have probably needed three double ups in a row). So when it got down to the final three, paying the top two, it was between myself and James for second place, both short stacked.

Then a gift of a hand arrived. James shoved on a jack eight, while I was holding pocket kings. Better still, Chris called with an ace ten. Now all I needed was James not to win – if I won, that would obviously bag me second, but even if Chris won, I would place second as well, and there are no jacks or eights to be seen.

James’ only out is a ten to make is straight, and one of those is in Chris’s hand – it was all going so well. Until the river…

Huzzah I hear you cry! Yes, I’m please to announce three new episodes of the podcast are on their way – the first one is available today, and the next two will follow on consecutive Fridays. This series features expert insight from Norm “The No Man”, Hugh and James (now possibly known as “Old James” given there is a new A-Soc president also called James).

I didn’t take any photos while we were recording, so here is a stock picture of Hugh.

On Tuesday, Atheist Society held their 2011/2012 intro meeting. It was great to see a lot of new faces there and James is looking to take the society in an exciting direction, so I’m sure they’re in for a great year.

I accidentally squashed the photos in processing, but it doesn’t matter too much because they were rubbish photos anyway.

Because a certain group of people who wine a lot about Atheist Society always going to Stick or Twist, el preisdente James decided that the weekly summer socials should start rotating around venues.

So the final summer social before freshers’ week was scheduled to take place at the Slug & Lettuce, which the A-Soc oldies will remember as the venue for the first ever A-Soc Winter Solstice meal.

Unfortunately, the people who whine about it don’t actually bother to turn up – the week saw a total of four of us there, myself, James, Elettra and Will – whereas those of us that actually do just want to go to steak night at ‘Spoons every week, bravely stick by the society! Oh, the irony… :D.

As it happens, Slug & Lettuce was pretty rubbish. We waited an hour for service, which despite asking for never actually arrived, so in the end we walked out and headed over the road to Beckett’s Bank for a proper steak night. Good times.

Earlier this month, myself and George headed down to the Humanist Society of West Yorkshire social at The Adelphi for a few drinks.

James had a voucher for two meals and a bottle of wine – so we ended up having a rather romantic evening. Surprisingly as well, I found myself around the median age range – shocking for HSoWY! 😛

Having had to eat and drink at quite some speed in order to make it to Alea on time to register for the poker tournament, I was somewhat intoxicated by the time I left and ended up doing quite well – adding further evidence to the idea that I play better poker when I’m drunk.

Prior to the Sunrise Conference 2011, we held a pre-filming event for those speakers who were unable to make it on the day. James Murray was on his way to Stockholm while Nicola Jackson was heading out to Uganda to do some volunteer work, so both had to pre-record.

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.