CMBuckley.co.uk :: Blog :: Nights Out

Last night we went over to Newcastle University Union to see The Automatic, supported by Mumm-Ra and Alterkicks. Liverpool-based band Alterkicks played an indie-ish (but not retro, oh no not retro) set to begin with, followed by Sussex boys Mumm-Ra and their eclectic pop/alternative rock mix. Having missed them at Leeds this year (due to sleeping in) I was glad to see them!

And finally to The Automatic, who did not disappoint with their blend of pop-punk, electronic and indie rock. If I ached from yesterday, then I don’t know how to describe this morning! Apparently I’m getting old!

View pictures of the gig

Back to Newcastle this evening for Hannah’s party — in fact, must go make a CD…

Yesterday we took the new HBMC members to Sunderland Wall. It was a big turn-out, requiring four cars in total — our biggest turn-out yet, I think!

Most of the new members thoroughly enjoyed the trip, and we found some exceptional climbers as well as many with great potential… Looks like we won’t have to worry about handing the club over at the end of this year after all!

Tonight we’re off over to Newcastle to see The Automatic over at Newcastle University… Should be amazing!

That’s where it’s at…

Tonight we tried out the new club in Durham, Love Shack. They advertise cheap drinks and good music — of course, any club that didn’t advertise those things would struggle from the off! We thought we should check it out.

The drinks were indeed cheap, coming in at only £2 for pretty much anything. On Monday nights they aim to have all drinks for £2 or less — worth considering! And as far as the music was concerned, they got it just right — I only hope that they do that each night! Rather than having a particular genre of music on a particular night, they play ten minutes of one lot, then switch tack completely — and not in a predictable, R&B-to-pop-to-rock-to-indie-to-cheese kind of way, but rather more randomly. It works! Andy didn’t seem impressed, however, with the final song — what else could it be but the B-52’s?

Being all the way over at the Walkergate complex (Gala Theatre area), it’s a little out of the way for a night out after, say, Wetherspoons, but it certainly seems to work well for the kind of night where you start off drinking at home and don’t go out until much later!

So after my induction meeting yesterday, I decided to go and get my registration form from the department, and sort out tuition fees and the like. At least, that was the plan…

I didn’t have a form. Apparently this is not surprising, and SPA (the centre that handles our registration process) don’t seem to be very good at their job. Richard seems to be in a similar situation, finding out first-hand about the general incompetence of the graduate school. Still, hopefully the department are on top of it! Looks like I’ll have to wait around for a bit. I’m off to see my office tomorrow!

After yesterday’s musings on Walkabout, I didn’t go for very long, and In fact was the only one of our lot to go, at about 1am. Since Walkabout was going to be full of Collingwood freshers, we planned to spend some time with the Hild Bede lot, who were heading to Rixies/DH1/The Loft. Now, I know that Klute is famous for its walls dripping with sweat (and I have incidentally just found the Urban Dictionary entry for it), but last night Rixies smelled particularly badly of stale beer and sweat — how lovely!

Walkabout was a refreshing change, and I got to catch up with Caroline and Reg. Caroline, remind me why you weren’t drinking?

To top it all off, Reg broke his watch by hitting me with it, and then decided to blame me. Nice one!

What a night…

“Night of Mayhem” was an accurate description for the event on Facebook (mixed feelings about the changes by the way). It started off slow — in fact, I started on my own in Wetherspoons! After that it started to grow, with Jay, Tex, Joe and Reg finding me in there, followed by a trip to The Ship and The Angel, where we found Hannah and Keasey.

This was followed by a trip up to Walkabout, and some got food whilst Reg and I walked out to find Caitlin and Katie, who managed to find their own way to Walkabout!

Jenna, Joe, Holmes, Olly and Helen (having been driven in by my Dad) arrived before we headed over Carpe Diem for some unbelievably dire pool-playing on my part.

Now it becomes a bit hazy.

From Carpe Diem, we moved on to Varsity, where there don’t seem to be any pictures. Varsity was quickly followed by Oceana to finish the night. I have no idea what the drink was that people bought me, but it was fun to drink! Thanks guys!

On the way home, another taxi driver tried to mess everyone around — I think I’m seeing some kind of pattern here… Thankfully, no messing around was completed, but we did have to walk back from the other side of Scholes!

Thanks again for a wicked night!

View pictures of the evening

So, Brown’s is a posh place, eh?

Chucky would disagree! Here’s me turning up in shirt and tie (alluding to the olden days) when I spy Chucky at the other side of the restaurant in a sweatshirt and jeans. He might as well be mocking my attire, but everyone knows that’s simply not possible…

Browns is followed by many a drink at Revolution, before finding Cat and Kat, and completing my night of meeting legends by complete surprise! Having apologised profusely to Cat because I thought I wouldn’t see her before she jetted off to sunny Russia, I manage to pick her out in a crowd in Revolution!

And to finish the evening, the taxi driver completely failed to screw us over — felt very happy about that!

View pictures of the evening

Last night we had a go at the quiz down at the Barleycorn in Scholes. I remember the days when we used to be glad to scrape half the score of the winners — this time a fairly impressive 28 put us considerably closer to the winning 35 (remember this is a pub where our group at least halved the average age). Not long now, soon we’ll be regular winners…

Bad back today. Was absolutely useless out on the bike, and gave in for the evening to regroup tomorrow and hopefully do something worthwile!

Yesterday saw the legendary Tad Run being completed in excellent style by a number of us. We started at the Falcon for a bit of lunch (the usual Brit doesn’t do food on a Monday), and working an interesting route around to finish at the Angel in plenty of time. All in all, a very respectable Run, with minor closing hiccups being dealt with promptly!

Pictures of the Run

Against all odds, Booth and I managed to get out climbing today, for a few introductory routes over at Caley Crag. A good way to clear the head after a heavy day of drinking, and a good way to start climbing after a fairly long break!