We went to see

We went to see the Perrier Comedy Awards show in Brighton last night. It was compared by Adam Hills, and starred Will Hodgson (winner of the 2004 Best newcomer), Sarah Kendall (a nominee), Jackson’s Way (winner of the 2004 Perrier Comedy Award) and finished off with non-perrier nominee Marcus Brigstocke (who was filling in for Reginald D Hunter).

Jackson’s Way and Marcus Brigstocke were excellent, the other two didn’t seem to have the experience to cope with a gig in the Brighton Dome in front of 1000 people. Yet again, I found myself leaving a comedy show feeling that I don’t see half as much live comedy as I should.

Big Bang

Last night we went to the Brighton Cafe Scientifique at Terraces Bar and Grill. Simon Singh was the guest speaker, all about the Big Bang. Despite there being a lot of people there, and the acoustics/lack of microphone making it hard to hear at times it was a very good talk, explaining the facts and theories in a really accessible manner – the way I wish I’d been taught science at school (rather than my physics teacher at senior school announcing that “as far as I’m concerned women are only here to give pleasure to me and give birth to my children and I don’t see why I should teach them physics”).

Brighton booze The council

Brighton booze: The council have OKed 24-hour drinking, while the headline of the Argus is that the Sussex Police chief attacks 24-hour drinking.

The Argus headline is a little misleading, because the Sussex chief constable is actually against the sale of cheap alcohol, and would rather have tax income to help pay for the policing of binge drinking. That’s the same binge drinking that the council is hoping to control with the new 24-hour licensing.

The first licenses will come into effect late in 2005, so it looks like we’re in for an interesting, experimental, summer in 2006…

ve been reading through

I’ve been reading through the World Snowboarding Guide 2004 (online here) to track down some likely looking places for snowboarding trips next year. Whilst looking for a piste map I came across SkiMaps.com which has a good collection of maps. I’m planning to use it to help me work out a) how many drag lifts/t-bars I’m going to have to negotiate to get around the mountain and b) how many easy/intermediate runs there are.

And whilst talking about winter holidays, I noticed that there is an interesting article over at Guardian Winter Sports about how to package your trip online which looks to have some interesting links. I picked up a copy of The Independent at the weekend and their ski section had a couple of links to tailor-made trip organisers – Ski Independence, Ski Safari and Momentum Ski – all of which look pretty useful for road trips.