Sunday 5 October 2008

Off we went to the circus...

...But not any old circus. Oh no. This was Cabot Circus - Bristol's brand new shopping complex development, which promises to 'place Bristol firmly on centre stage'. Aside from the annoying logo (I had a massive urge to go round with a bottle of Tipp-Ex and put dots on all of the 'i's) it's certainly architecturally impressive, with vast Eden Project-esque glass dome structures acting as a roof, although the place is still somewhat open to the elements. The range of shops is as you'd expect, with a few 'classier' ones thrown in for good measure. The funky furniture shop Dwell is a nice addition. There's also one of those down the road from me in Balham (oh, and if any of the lovely people from Dwell happen to be reading this, feel free to chuck some free furniture my way, especially a sofa!).


Everyone's been banging on about Harvey Nichols, which has also opened as part of the new development. I went in there for the sake of it and personally felt it was a complete waste of space. Literally. Not that it actually takes up much space - the place is tiny. And £620 for a bloomin cardigan?! Come on! This is Broadmead, not Knightsbridge!

I must say it was nice to see Broadmead (the shopping area of Bristol) buzzing again. Just a shame it comes down to retail and commercial interests to pump some money into the city.

Oh, and funny thing happened at the coach station in Bristol - some girl got off the coach, ran up behind her friend and gave her a massive 'surprise' hug, only for her 'friend' to turn around and reveal themselves to be a complete stranger. My brother and I chuckled heartily at this - only because it's exactly the kind of embarrassing situation that I would all too easily get myself into.

Wednesday 1 October 2008

Blogtailing

Crikey, I haven't written this blog for ages. Tooooo busy! But simply have to sing the praises of the latest London Bloggers Meetup, which took place last night at Diageo plc, home of Smirnoff. It was free cocktails (and food, because it's ALL about 'responsible drinking' these days....), plus a personalised 'blogtail' - as I like to call them - for each blogger according to what they write about. Being a fan of puns (check out www.punlimited.co.uk) I was served a lemon and lime twist, because I like playing with (or 'twisting') my words. Clever. Plus we then got a free bottle of vodka at the end of the night. Not bad, eh?

Great to meet some more cool bloggers too, here's a brief roundup (sorry if I've forgotten anyone or don't have your urls):

Niamh (blogs about food)
Tom Phillips (blogs for Metro, likes robots)
Jaz
MissGeeky (loads of ace tips)
Cristiano (more tips)
Andy (organiser extraordinaire)
Rax (co-organiser extraordinaire)
Peter Marshall (photography exhibition coming up soon)
Lolly (great to catch up again)
Melanie (I think she got the best personalised cocktail)
Zoe
Gary (my friend from 'real life'!)
Chris (who still thinks my band should be called 'Hunter Wing')
Lewis