A Brief Time-Out to Catch Up

We tend to lead a fairly quiet life without a lot of overtly social activities, but once in a while a week comes along that ends up being jam-packed with social engagements.

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Last Sunday, I went to play "Airsoft" at Ground Zero with some people from work. This is a boys-and-their-toys type of activity involving war games with replica fire-arms that shoot plastic BBs at a high velocity and rate. It's a bit like paintball without the paint and with realistic weapons. We all got into it with gusto, climbing around amongst the bushes and trees. Even though the weather was absolutely miserable that day, cold and pissing down rain the entire time, we enjoyed it immensely. The guy who organised the get-together is already working on another one. We didn't really have a chance to take pictures what with the BBs flying past and the inclement weather, but here's a picture of me the day before, testing out my "fatigues":



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Then on Wednesday, we were invited to a presentation given by a surgeon who went on an expedition to the North Pole (the true North Pole, not the magnetic one). He had come to the Arts Institute in January this year for advise on how to use an HD video camera in general and in arctic conditions. He's a friend of the school principal. The principal put him in touch with me. I advised him on what kind of shots to get and what he needed to do to keep the camera from seizing up and the batteries from dying quickly in the cold. He would be travelling with a Norwegian documentary crew, but wanted to bring his own camera to get additional footage. It transpired that the Norwegian crew hardly got any footage because their cameras seized up, so his footage was practically the only existing from the expedition. He was very grateful for this and gave me an entire case of Chilean wine as thanks. Well, he was also very effusive in his presentation at the Royal Motor Yacht Club in Sandbanks which we attended. Afterwards, there were a few people who came up to congratulate me and were perplexed about how I could have outdone the seasoned Norwegian crew. All I did was a little research on the internet about shooting in extreme cold and mixed that with my camera experience. He's the one who actually shot it!



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On Thursday evening we went to see the Kaiser Chiefs at the Bournemouth International Centre. Again, this was with a couple of people from the Arts Institute. K and I hadn't been to a concert in quite some time. They played a great set. This is one of those bands that's great to see live because they put on a good, energetic show.

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Friday night, my dad arrived from Denmark again to teach another of his Chiropractic seminars on Saturday. We went to dinner with him at Taj Mahal, our favorite Indian restaurant in Westbourne, on Saturday night. This morning we had homemade Liege waffles for breakfast and spent a few hours working at a laptop, each of us. He left on a National Express bus for Heathrow a while ago.