Not content with just a holiday this week, Will managed to persuade me to drive him, Henry and Taffy down to Silverstone today for the penultimate race of the UK Formula Renault season. Luckily we had additional passes today, which meant the full BRDC hospitality. Spent most of the day in the Clubhouse surrounded by the driving elite (Damon Hill etc). You can’t complain.

Adam suffered mixed fortunes, finishing second in the first round, but then unfortunately succumbed to some really bad luck in the second round which means it all comes down to the next two races.

The final meet of the season is at Brands Hatch in a few weeks time, when the Championship will conclude. I’m not sure if I’m going yet, as it’s a bit of a trek, but either way I’ll be watching carefully - it’s set to be a nail-biting finish. Come on you Christo.

A week away in Spain last week was very much deserved; a chance for some respite and to catch some rays after our miserably wet summer. I went about this with gusto and torched my chest on the first day. Result.

Despite the pain, Sean, Ryan and myself set about the Asturian town of Gijon (North West Spain) and found ourselves wallowing in seafood and the local cider, which is poured from a height and swilled down quickly. We even managed to fit in some beach prowling, tapas chewing and an eventful Iberian musical experience (which included beer, The Go! Team, a bull fighting ring and some early morning violence).

In the second half of the week we stayed with Ryan’s girlfriend Aihnoa at her family’s holiday home further along the coast in Llanes (neighbouring the town of Poo). More seafood, more cider, drinking games with the locals, a failure to grasp the language and some swimming in the sea later, and the holiday was over very quickly and I spent a further four hours in the car driving back from Essex.

It was all suitably fantastic.

For all the years of cheap lager drinking that went on at university, I have always preferred a pint of something with some flavour and body to it, so I’m a little surprised that I’d not made it to a beer festival before, but then again I didn’t really know anyone who was interested.

It’s become apparent in recent months that George is a very big fan of proper beer, as is Tom, and they both are fully paid up CAMRA (Campaign for Real Ale) members, and I jumped at the idea that a Saturday afternoon could be spent in a tent in the middle of Worcester Racecourse surrounded by a silly amount of good quality alcohol.

It turns out it was a bit of a washout outside (though not as bad as last years complete submerging of the festival in the floods) so most of the time was spent hopping between the occasional bit of hard flooring over the mud, clutching at the ever-precious sampling glass.

I really don’t know how many barrels were in the place, but there were a lot - and a massive choice of bitters, milds, porters, ciders, perries, pilsners etc etc. I’m not exactly sure how much we got through in the four hours we were there, but needless to say we didn’t have many tokens left between us and it certainly was very enjoyable. Strangely enough, I didn’t feel it at all this morning.

Might be tempted to do one of those again in the future.

So the weather wasn’t really ideal for Geek In The Park, but that didn’t stop the forty or so alcoholic web-types descending on Leamington for a bit of a social and some icon-making, microformat-implementing fun.

Big thanks must go to Trev for organising the whole things, and of course a tip of the hat to One Black Bear for sponsoring it all. Jon and Drew’s talks we’re really informative and great chance to quiz them about their methods.

Of note, I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many iPhones in one place in all my life.

The week since has been pretty intense work-wise for various reasons, and I’m looking forward to some respite - on Wednesday I jet to Spain with Sean to go and upset Devito for a week. Looking forward to it a lot.

Raj interviewed me for a radio production not too long ago and I’m interested to hear the final results sometime soon. I think I was just overwhelmed at how simple it is to get high quality audio using the very expensive stick mic he has. Nice toy.

I went and splashed out on a DualHead2Go last week, and for those not in the know (probably most people), it allows you to add another screen to your iMac or Macbook, that is, when you already have two. The result, three screens. It’s all powered by USB which is useful, but has the unfortunate downside that the two additional screens it allows must sit side by side, turning my dream setup of central iMac with two satellite screens into a total rearrangement of my office. Also, it’s best to attempt it with two monitors of the same shape and size, as my current setup is a little mind bending when it comes to following the cursor. I maybe in the business of buying a new monitor soon. It looks like I’m running the Matrix. Badly.

Today is a beer festival in Worcester, so it looks like I’ll be smashed enjoying it all afternoon.

Just a brief reminder, but Multipack’s free Geek In The Park event returns next weekend to beautiful Leamington Spa (easily accessible from the Midlands, t’up North and dairn Souf by train* or car).
Trev has secured a great line up of Jon Hicks and Drew McLellen to speak at the evening event (the web bit), so this is a great chance to see two highly regarded faces from the worlds of design and development sharing some of their knowledge, costing you nothing more than the price of a journey.

If you’d like to come along (and please feel welcome to bring your family and friends for a bit of a picnic during the afternoon should the weather be good) you can find details on the website, where you can also sign up for more details.

* Trains from London Marylebone cost approx £16 return (return is valid for 30 days!), but please bear in mind the last train is just before ten so you may miss the very last part of the evening event if you have to go back this way. Trains from Birmingham cost just £7 return and take about 40 minutes.

Adam was racing again last weekend, and so in the blazing sunshine Will, Henry, Alan and myself sat and watched a good full day of motorsport at Oulton Park (photos here). It couldn’t have been any better, with Adam clinching two further victories, and the excitement generated by eating two Magnums in one day. Yes, two.

After all of that, George, Tom and myself took ourselves out to a pub on a hill in the middle of nowhere (on the way out to Leominster) and discussed music until the sun was well and truly set. It was a good weekend.

And so far this weekend has followed suit. Mike and I took trains down for a night out for Swan’s birthday in London last night - quite a few familiar faces, including some I’d not seen for a while. Duff, Jono, Richie and the rest. I think I went to some effort to convince quite a lot of girls I was a helicopter pilot, but it all got a bit hazy later on, so I’ve no idea if anyone believed me.

This morning after a well-deserved fry up I got back on that train and now find myself back in the ‘Bridge and hoping for some sunshine tomorrow.