Going 'Arty' in Sarasota....

The last day of our holidays in Sarasota (New Years Day) and it was a bit chilly so we decided that a spot of lunch out might be in order and some of us (me!) needed something to soak the gin up! so it was off in to Sarasota about 20 mins from the tennis centre.

On our arrival we were greeted this ...

It seems we had walked into an Sculpture & Art exhibition... this is the  26-foot tall “Unconditional Surrender” sculpture on Sarasota’s Bayfront. The traffic-stopping sculpture was first brought to town for Sarasota’s Season of Sculpture three years ago and has been bought back by donations from local residents...Mom & Dad stand in front for scale!

The sculpture recreates a famous photograph of a World War II sailor kissing a nurse during the end-of-war celebration in Times Square. I tried to get Jody to re-create the scene, but he was having none of it, walking off to look at the other art..
He found a weird alien looking craft which is apparently some mathmatical piece (I didn't understand when he explained it to me) although it was kind of cool...

As our walk down to the pier continued we saw a beautiful dolphin fountain

Another strange alien pointy thing (technical term)

And a strange, large round thing (again technical term)

As you can probably guess I'm not that bothered by art most of the time, but I LOVED the kissing statue. I have to admit that I was more interested in where we were eating for lunch and I was freezing (hence no more pics).
Eventually we ended up in an Irish bar (Q. why wherever you go in the world is there always an Irish bar?).. and were soon feasting on burgers and Guinness...we stayed to watch some football and then braved the cold winds back to the car...all that remained now was to pack up our things as the vactaion was officially over in the morning..
Thanks Mom & Dad, we had a great time and it's the first Chritmas I haven't put weight on with all the exercise we've had!!!! 

Tooooo much Guinness at the rugby...

My weekends back in England normally consist of some kind of debauchery .....you know, when the cats away the mice will play...well it's sort of the other way around for me ;-)


After a week at work (and too many glasses of red with my ex-boss) I rushed down the M6 on Friday evening trying desperately to get home in time for the Rugby... I'll include the match report later as you'll soon come to realise that I was not in a fit state to give any sort of commentary!


Firstly the M6 normally looks like this on a Friday evening....

Instead I flew down it like I had wings. I don't know if someone felt sorry for me because of the horrid little car I'd hired but I made it back to my parents ( and my rugby ticket) in record time. A quick change into my Worcester Warriors shirt ( and no, they don't play in pink! it's a special from last year to support breast cancer awareness) and we were off.

My Father has two season tickets, but my brother had already bagged the 2nd one, so I was going courtesy of my good friend Tony who asked his friend to step down so I could use his ticket! That's friendship for you!

The only thing you really need to know about Tony is that trips to the rugby are more about trips to the Guinness counter and Friday night was no different.

My mate Tony, Guiness in hand - this was probably no. 4

Me, with Guiness no. 2!

You can see we were stood on the back of the stands, allowing us to stand up without being heckled the whole game and, being on the end of a row, quick access down the stairs for more Guinness.

Apparently the game score was 12:12 in the end..here is the match report for anyone who might be interested.

 Match Report

Nearing the end of the match my phone started beeping...brother wanted to go for a drink and a curry after the game...

Well, never one to turn a curry down (or another beer), Tony threw his hat in for the curry jaunt..and feeling under no pressure at all, I acquiesced and on the final whistle we hot footed it out to get a taxi! My brother who has no shame, immediately stole someone else's taxi by waving a twenty pound note at the driver, some people are so fickle, and we were off....

We ended up in the Marwood. I haven't been in for years, but it's all be 'done up' and is really quite tasteful, and even better stays open late, last orders being around midnight...

Inside the Marwood...I was a little too tipsy to really appreciate!

A few glasses of wine later ( and remember the Guinness from earlier) and we walked (stumbled) along the road to the curry house (The Rajkot).

I'd like to say it was tasty, but I was at the stage where you can't really taste much at all, even heavily spiced Indian! I was having a great time though, but all fun comes to an end and we rolled out to get a taxi at approximately 2am. It's the first time in my life that I've ever closed a curry house before, I'm sort of proud in a skewed way !

The end of the night involved a surreal taxi journey back to my parents with the driver telling me that he was desperate for more children but his wife had told him no...weird..

I hope I haven't left you with the feeling that I'm an incurable alcoholic, I'm not, I'm just easily influenced!