Oh I do like to be beside the seaside

Published on Mon 1 Mar 2010

Someone's put what appears to be a perfectly good suitcase by the bins in my garden. When did it become acceptable to dump your unwanted luggage on other people's property? I guess round about the time it became acceptable to build porches out of old bookshelves and cling film and house foreign workers in a caravan in your front yard. Not that I have any suspicions about which of my neighbours might have done it... Though if it is who I think I'm surprised that they seem to have got rid of something in seemingly ok condition without even attempting to turn it into some kind of outbuilding. I've not dared look inside - bit scared it might be full of body parts or something. Though what if it's full of money? Or chocolate?

Had a pretty nice weekend sitting around watching sport, doing the crossword and playing (and largely losing at) chess, though they called the Cambridge game off which was a bit of a shame because that, combined with Chester getting kicked out of the league, has left them in the relegation places. Bad times.

A few of us from work went down to Bournemouth for a couple of days last week for a load of drinks on the company a spot of minigolf some field testing. Just like this time last year the minigolf course was scandalously closed, and the weather was miserable.

But, like I said last time, I have a bit of a thing for run down closed season seaside resorts, so I took some slightly better photos of a deserted, rainy Happyland and a grey sea.

They have all the stars passing through (I mean Esther Rantzen rather than Chris)

Also, one of Bournemouth's plethora of casinos was right next to the hotel so I managed to get some real life practice in for Vegas. They had a very rigorous vetting process:

"We're going to need some photo ID lads - passport or driving license"

"Sorry - I don't have any"

"Well, a credit card then, not just a bank card"

"Sorry - only got my bank card"

"Aah well, that'll do"

I'm glad they let me in. It was fun. I came out ahead, and I got to meet a nice sample of the kind of people that are out at 3am on a February Tuesday in Bournemouth. The ageing sales reps I expected, but not so much the Dutch chefs or the fathers and sons on male bonding exercises. Or the arabian prince putting hundreds of pounds on each spin of the roulette table. He did not come out on top.

The hotel was surprisingly nice, though I have to question the wisdom of having a glass bathroom door with no lock on that doesn't touch any of the sides of the doorway. At least the glass door means that you're not accidentally going to go in there when you're not meant to. I think that was the reason I managed to get through the trip with my sight intact.