What A Hoot!

OK, so I guess people are gonna want to know about the Stag Do. Obviously I'm not going to divulge all the details, not that there is much that I can't divulge.

When my brother arrived he didn't have much clue what we had lined up. I think he'd worked out there was gonna be paintball, and he knew about the casino because I'd okayed it with him first.

Paintballing, as it happened, was a blast (pun intended). It wasn't quite as strenuous as I'd expected, which was good, because it was a nice day and running around lots and lots in heat would've been a bit much. In the first two games I was out pretty quickly, the first time owing to having a duff gun, and the second time down to bad luck more than anything else - I was the first one out in that game.

Lots of people were having problems with guns during the first two games and it wasn't until the third that things really got sorted out properly. I think it was also on the way up to the zone for the third game that someone shot me in the arse. During the third game myself and one of the other guys on the stag do managed to pin down a guy from the other team for quite some time, and judging by the amount of reloads got through 3-500 paintballs between us.

The next game I think was the most fun for me. A group of us got pinned down and it was actually pretty exciting for a while as we did our best to hold out, then frustrating as we got picked off one by one. The last game was also cool, and ended for me with me and another guy pinning each other down and then taking each other out simultaneously.

So, you wanna know where I got hit (you blood-thirsty bastards). The first hit was as near as dammit right on my left nipple. Ouch. Ouch. I took a hit on bare skin on the inside of my wrist, that also fucking stung. Most of the hits I took were on the arms, but as I said, I got shot in the arse outside of the game, and in the last game got shot right between the eyes. Obviously, I had goggles on. And, just because it was too good an opportunity to miss, while I was standing around "dead" at one point I siezed the chance to shoot myself in the foot. Since I had boots on, it didn't really hurt. When a guy with trainers on was shot in the foot by his mate at close range, judging by the string of expletives he unleashed, it did hurt.

Getting to the Hotel was pretty straightforward with the exception of negotiating the Nottingham one-way system. The Hotel itself wasn't what I'd gotten used to on all my excursions up and down the country for work, but it was okay. I also resented not being able to plug in the XBox. We had a fair amount of downtime after paintball before heading out for the evening, and I had been planning to get a bit of gaming in. Instead I watched the repeat of the Buffy finale on Sky, and found to my horror (though not surprise) that it had been nastily cut. This was mostly not a problem but a) one of the important bits made no sense, and b) they cut the best line. Feh.

So, when we headed out, we went to Hooters to eat. At this point I think, I'm not going to try and describe the place, or what happened, when a couple of jpegs can do it so much better...

On leaving Hooters things became contentious. Despite the fact that they had said fuck all on email when I was canvassing for choices and left me to sort things out for myself, a few of Stu's college friends decided that we weren't going to the Casino and that we were going to a lapdancing club instead. I have to admit I lost my rag at this point. All of the frustrations of trying to organise everyone the past two or three weeks came spilling out. In the end we let Stu decide, and he just wanted to drink. So some of the college mates went to the lapdance place anyway, and his workmates went to explore the town, and the rest of us, Stu included, just went back to the Hotel bar.

I retired when it reached the point that all I was really doing was watching people get drunk, which is never a fun sport. Stu, going by a phonecall his fianc�e received at that point, retired at 1.30am. The rest, well, I don't know, and have to admit I'm not amazingly bothered either.

This morning, following the aggro of the night before I pretty much wanted to get out of there as quickly as possible. Stu was getting a lift back with his workmates, so I was pretty much a free agent.

Since I got back I've spent the rest of the day chilling out, pretty much. I would appear to be quite knackered and quite bruised, both physically and emotionally. But all in all it was a pretty good night, it went a lot better than I expected, and Stu enjoyed himself, which is the most important thing.