1 walk, 1 stag night, 0 callouts….

So that was a busy weekend.

Friday night Sean and I went out for dinner to Fwrrwm Ishta in Machen, which is a cracking good quality restaurant. We thoroughly enjoyed ourselves, the food was incredibly good and the atmosphere although busy, was very welcoming.

Saturday was the stag night of one of the lads from the team, Tim. All in all, we had a fun evening though there were a few dampeners on it.

We started off with a meal at Taurus, which is one of Cardiff’s steak houses. I’ve heard really good things about this place, so I was looking forward to it. The other two places to get steak in Cardiff are Charleston’s of course and The Brasserie – all 3 are situation at the bottom end of St Mary’s Street all within a 100yd stretch. I ordered steak mornay – their selection was mainly centred around rump and sirloin steaks – unusual for a steak house, as I’ve found their offerings usually tend to centre around a fillet. We were 18 in total and I have to admit, the food did arrive quite quickly, however a few things.

We had to send food back because it was ordered wrong – when you have people ordering “blue” steak and it arrives more like medium, it just doesn’t work. Some steaks were just plain wrong, and the people who ordered fillet got….well….something that looked like sirloin, but we were assured it was fillet. My steak had plenty of gristle and fat around the edges and was quite tough – I really had to work with my knife (see the best knife sharpener) to get through it, and Sean’s garlic steak was tough and dry. The side dishes arrived separately after the rest of the food, which was bad, since most people were well into their meals by then. Still, the taste was nice, they had plenty of mustard and other sauces on the table (including English mustard which I love) and coupled with the alcohol, things went OK. Price was reasonable, but considering what we had, I’m not inclined to go there again.

After that, we’d been booked into Tiger Tiger, where penny had arranged that we were on the guest list as an “official team” party (apparently they don’t take stag parties) – which it was in a way, it’s just we were celebrating Tim’s marriage-to-be. *grin* Coupled with the fact that Penny and Lynfa were with us, we headed off down Queen street. Now, that morning I’d found out that the dress code was collar-and-shoes which prompted a manic and none-too-cheap shopping trip for Sean, so when we arrived and Sean was turned away for being under 21, I was somewhat less than amused. Still sober, I know the futility of arguing with door staff (they don’t make decisions, they just implement them) and not wanting to spoil Tim’s night, we left and had cocktails at Old Orleans before some more drinks at the Golden Cross. We finally met up with the rest of them at Flares, where we grabbed Mal’s keys and headed back to his place – our night somewhat soured and both of us fairly tired by then. I think we managed about 2 hours of sleep before Mal, Lisa, Lynfa and Chris descended on us, pissed as newts. Mal and Chris decided that more whisky was a good idea, and after a good laugh we finally got back to sleep about 0600.

Sunday was a relaxed recovery-type affair for most people – Sean and I hadn’t drunk much, but Mal, Lynfa and Chris were suffering. After Chris, Lisa and Lynfa had disappeared, Mal, Sean and I headed into Canton for a fry-up at the Tuck-In before deciding we’d go for a bimble. We headed back to Senghenydd where we fixed my car and headed up to the waterfalls in the Nedd valley again. Apart from a quick detour when two police cars came past us and we followed them into Dinas Rock (as a pre-emptive strike) where we found a gaggle of fit shirtless young guys to ogle (sorry, no pics), the walk went fine and we headed from Clun Gwyn into the falls. Mal’s got some great pictures of us in Sgwd yr Eira, but we’d started quite late and nightfall came before we could see the rest of the falls, so back to the car and back home, where Sean had to pack – he left for London this morning to get his things sorted for University. It’s going to be odd without him around.

This week: exercise with a vengeance. I’ve slacked off with Sean around (cuddling with him in a nice warm bed is far too tempting to resist) so I’ve got some catching up to do now.