I was in Vinyl Exchange in Manchester on Saturday when I found a record that made me slightly giddy. I found a new record by Silver Sun. I knew they'd reformed, but I never knew they'd made an actual record.
So I'm listening to it as I type this. The first Silver Sun album was one of my favourites of all time, yet the second album (which led to them being dropped by their record label) was a bit shite. Who can tell what way this album will go? Well, I'm on track 3 now, and it seems quite nice, the usual mix of harmonies and spikey guitars. It doesn't seem as turbocharged as their debut but who knows…
I also picked up the 'best of' album of my favourite mid-nineties noiseniks, Compulsion. For one earth pound. Bargain.
On Friday, I sneaked off early-ish from work to play Grand Theft Auto. I played it for about seven or eight hours straight, yet oddly haven't touched it since. This isn't because it is shit, but more to do with the fact that we've had a busy weekend. I've come in early today so I can go home early tonight to play it. Sadly my flexi-balance is awful, and I need to repair that. I think I need a non-debilitating illness or something.
Anyway, I was disappointed with the game at first. For the first twenty minutes I was a bit lost in it and downbeat about the slightly changed control mechanism. I think I'd blown the game up into the being the best possible thing ever, and had become slightly upset that it'd hadn't made me soil my pants within 5 minutes.
I soon got into the swing of it though, and the time flew by (or drove-by? No forget that).
Actually, I think it's Nick Taylor's 30th birthday today (though, it may be tomorrow). If he bothers to answer my email, I guess we may visit tonight. The selfish bastard! Bah, GTA denial.

Saturday was the 3rd annual nexus5 awards. The old awards on nexus2 seemed to be a combination of voting and the decision of Tazz. The nexus5 awards are far more democratic though. I enjoy the fact that each nexus awards throws up a couple of controversial winners, just like all the famous award ceremonies.
Last year it was held in Tiggis, where we were upsettingly mistaken for people from Games Workshop (actually, that was rather funny). This year we held it at Crows in Lancaster. Usually the food there is very nice but on Saturday it was fucking awful. Most of it was burnt, they kept getting things wrong and it all looked rushed and half-arsed. We should have complained about it, but because there were 14 of us and it was a bit unwieldy, we ended up sort of giving them a really large tip. When, a big combined poo pile on the table would have been more appropriate. I won't be rushing back though, and I hope one or more of our party writes a complaint letter.
We had less attention whilst giving the awards out this year, mainly because the background noise was higher. I could give a full list of award winners, but I think it'd be slightly dull unless you were on nexus, in which case you know who won what. I did however end up taking home a framed golden file (beautifully crafted by Dave) for the Best File award. Dave, conversely, took home the award I made for the sulkiest user.
It was quite nice though, mainly because we met up with Tazz again. I haven't seen Tazz for a while, mainly due to the fact that he's married now and has different priorities, other than hanging around with us arsewits. It is also down to the fact that we can both be a bit rubbish at staying in touch. In fact I hadn't seen him since my 29th birthday. He couldn't make my birthday the other week and it soon became clear why.
Tazz is a dad!
His wife gave birth to a baby girl only last week (I think). Congratulations Tahir Amin! Congratulations Tahir Amin's lady wife who we have still never met!
He seemed really happy about it and it was nice to see. Jesus, two friends who I've known for many years have become dads this year. It's frightening how much we're growing up.
It's not actually frightening; it's a good thing methinks. It makes me smile thinking about it anyway.
After the awards and promises of staying in touch better with Tazz, we had a cup of tea with dave and Clare and then made our way home.
I spent Sunday morning tidying the house up as my ma and da were visiting. They took us to Wellies for dinner and it was nice wandering around town. I finally secured Nick's present, if he isn't fucking sulking about turning 30 then he can have it tonight. Have it!

Hmm, shortish blog today. I'll write more during the week, but I've become slightly concerned that interlopers may be moving into our office.