A week today.........CALGARY HERE WE COME...YAAHOOOOOOO!

Good day my fine friends and blog followers, how are you all this Friday? Hope your all well or as well as you can be. I will keep this update short, a bit like myself. The reason for this being is that our next update is going to be a long one, after all we have 16 days in Calgary, Canada to tell you all about and we have allot planned and booked.

So we shall start off this brief update with the 6 nations. Yes...i will tell you how crap Wales are and how they haven't got a clue and still the WRU 4 hours before kick off on the 3rd game of the 6 nations wanted for the cheapest seat £80 a ticket even though there were around 22,500 seats still unsold, the lowest capacity for any game held at the Principality stadium, what idiots!

This update starts with the second game so the only way to watch the game is in our local with pints and lots of shots, i think it was 12 shots each by the end of the game to numb the boredom, CHEERS!

In between games it was valentines day and Sian got me the best present i've ever had on this day of love. A fresh food box from Devon of pasties and scones with jam and clotted cream. It tasted sooooo gooooood!

Also on valentines day as a pre Canada meal we went to Cardiff's Hickory Smokehouse restaurant.

This was our seat, we had a chefs booth next to kitchen, smelt amazing, mmmmmm!

We started with some iced coffees, one maple syrup and one blueberry.

And now on to the amazing food, we went all out with our order, a platter for 2 which had so much meat it was great, bbq glazed ribs, bourbon glazed chicken wings, jalapeno-cheese sausages x 2, butter smoked chicken breasts x 2, hot honey glazed pork belly, pulled pork with beans, Texas style brisket (we ask for no fries) and a side of onion blossom.

And because we said we liked frickles the staff were amazing and gave us those instead of fries, how good is that.

I think we did quite well, just one sausage and some chicken to take home for a snack.

Rugby at home for the 3rd game and if France score a try it's a coffee tequila shot and if Wales score a try it's a gold tequila shot, we do this for every try.

As you can see we finished off over half a bottle of coffee tequila and did only one gold tequila. At one point we were just doing a coffee shot for France scoring and before we had swallowed that down i was pouring another shot, good time was had by all though, HIC!

A week later it's off to Gloucester to see UK Foo Fighters at the Guildhall and a lovely room with a view of the canal.

Table booked at Brewhouse for the Wales game and a great view of the TV for Wales V Scotland and again another ridiculous collapse by Wales but no shots today as lots of jumping around later after the game at the gig.

And here we go again. Where is everybody?

Ah, that's better, it's a sell out, HOO-RAH! Because it's a ballroom it has a sprung floor which is really weird to be on when everybody is jumping around.

So Sian makes up an excuse of a bad leg and we get shown up to the balcony where we continue to jump around like maniacs and sing as loud as we can until our lungs burn.

Hmm, we are there somewhere in this selfie, my phone is so old and crap but it's ok for me as don't need anything more.

Now then....at this point i am now going to tell you a tale of people who go to gigs and haven't got the faintest of ideas who they're watching. We went up to the balcony and stood at the very back where there are no seats so we could jump around like loons, everyone else was seated. Then 2 women about our age come up and stand in the row we're stood in, they were fully able and a little drunk. We're in the centre of the row, they at the far end about 20 feet away. As the gig progressed they moved closer, then closer, then closer again until they were 2 feet away from me, what the hell is all that about? There's bloody loads of space and you sway over to by us. We ignore them, we made no type of contact at all. Then from the corner of my eye i can see the closest woman mouthing no lyrics whatsoever as she didn't know any and flailing here arms around like Kate Bush...no that's an insult to Kate Bush....i got it....like one of those inflatable tubes with a face on and arms that wave about like a maniac. It was cringe worthy, it made David Brent's dance in The Office look professional. We could see she was glancing over at us but we just ignored her.

It was the worst out of place person at a gig we've ever seen.

And now it's time for Calgary, 16 day vacation including 2 days in Banff, 4 ice hockey games, 1 St Patricks Day, 1 Day on the slopes at Winsport Calgary Olympic village, a table booked at the top of Calgary Tower for an evening meal, 4 tattoos - 2 for Sian and 2 for me, lots of Popeyes, lots of Bbq smokehouse meats and lots of flavoured beers but just look at the temp last week at 10am, they are 7 hours behind us. Brrrrrrrrrrr!!! That's bloody cold!

CALGARY HERE WE COME!

So until we get back from our beautiful Calgary......

Serve All, Love All, Peace All Kevlar, Mrs. P. & Squidly Out!

REVIEW OF THE YEAR 2025 (Blimey, there's allot) and here's to 2026. HOORAH! and YAAHOO!

Well, well, well, it's 2026 and this is a very significant year, firstly it's 30 years since i first met Sian and it's our 10th anniversary in November and wow we've had a great 10 years and 2025 is just a small snippet of what we get up to and 2025 we did allot, so lets start the review of 2025.

We woke up in January 2025 to a snowy Munich. Has it only been a year , it seems like a lifetime ago we were dodging home made fireworks on the streets of Munich.

February and it's a trip to Tintern Abbey and to watch the Six Nations in a local Tintern Pub.

March it was off to Birmingham to start our cultural year of theatres and concerts with tickets for Only fools and horses musical at the Hippodrome Theatre.

April and it's another trip to Birmingham to see The shark is broken at the Birmingham Rep. That was a great play, loved it.

May and it's musical time again and we're off to see War of the Worlds.

June....what can i say about June but there was allot going on. Piraeus, Hydra and Athens, a trip of a lifetime and would do it all again.

ATHENS

HYDRA

PIREAUS

July, the day after our first anniversary ooh la la it's Paris and a very drunken visit to see Imagine Dragons, also in July it's London for a not so drunken visit for another Imagine Dragons concert.

PARIS

LONDON

August and yet another visit to London this time for Coldplay.

September and again in London we visited my arch nemesis Gordon "BLOODY" Ramsay at Lucky Cat.

October and Oh my God a third concert in London, at this rate we'll need a weekend pad there. It's time for GaGa.

Also in October we went to see Greg Davies in Bath Forum and once again we've never laughed so hard to the point we were crying and our cheeks were sore.

November and a third theatre visit to Birmingham, so that's a pad in London and Birmingham needed. This time for a new Christmas show, Sherlock Holmes and the 12 days of Christmas.

December and as you know it's our traditional Christmas Monmouth trip.

Sian asking me how many fingers is she holding up and i guess 8 by this stage of the night, just look at those shots, they got to be doubles.

And to make ourselves feel better the next day some lovely picky food mmmmm we do like good buffet style food.

And last but not least a trip to Monmouth wouldn't be the same without feeding our lovely funny ducks.

This year to finish 2025 off it's a UK stay with Squidly in a cottage in Saundersfoot. Every other year we stay in the UK and take Squidly but wherever we stay it has to have a log fire. The cottage we have rented is so nice and cosy and just what we like and just the right size for the 2 of us and a small bunny.

Let's get unpacked, DONE!

Squidly settles in instantly.

This is Squidly's look out point as the guard rabbit.

Lets get the fire going and settle down for the evening for tomorrow is New Years Eve, PARTY TIME!.

We had pre booked a taxi from and to the cottage for New Years Eve night down to Saundersfoot town centre so we're ready to go and we had booked ourselves in for lunch at The Stone Crab to line our stomachs ready for the evenings celebrations.

I was so looking forward to ordering lobster for lunch and guess what......they didn't have any that day.....NOOOOOOOOOOOO! I actually put my hands to my head and said out loud NOOOOOOO! when the waitress told us, i was so gutted BUT the food we did have was amazing.

I AM A GIANT!

After we had fed good and were full to the brim it was time for a very slow walk along the beach as it was a lovely sunny day but that wind was freezing cold so good job we wrapped up warm.

Back to the cottage, a short rest and time to get ready for the night. Our taxi driver Chris arrived on time and dropped us off in Saundersfoot and would then pick us up at 1am, time now being 8pm. We get out in the middle of town and have a walk around to see where we like the look of and decide on The Chemist Inn.

The pub is packed and outside in a marquee they have a live acoustic singer so we brave the cold and find seats outside. The singer was ok, nothing special, just ok but he did hardly any singing as he was asking people from the crowd if they wanted to sing anything while he played guitar. Of course they were plants in the audience, locals who knew the singer and he knew them as they knew the lyrics and he knew how to play the songs but it was ok for free entertainment. The cold got the better of us and we move inside when a table came free....NOW WE CAN GET DRINKING!

A few pints of Blue Moon and many shots later it's almost midnight and time to see the New Year in.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

We hug, we kiss, we say "I love you" and 2026 is off to a beautiful start BUT 15 mins later i forgot the walk from one pub to another. That's OK, we're in the next pub and i'm fully functioning again....that was weird. We only have one drink in there and then it's time to meet our taxi driver Chris.

We wake up in bed, no hang over, no ones been sick but how did we get back? God don't you just hate that. We can't remember getting in the taxi and how the hell did we get in to the cottage as it is a pin code Yale door lock that needed 6 digits and neither of us could remember it sober let alone drunk so how did we read it off my phone, that is so scary.

New Years day is just a chilled out day with Scrabble, movies and nibbles, what a great way to spend the first day of 2026, just what we like.

It doesn't look like allot but we had more ready to go after that little starter.

And folks there you have it our review of 2025 and it was AWESOME! I may have forgotten some bits and pieces of the year but we do so much over 12 months its very overwhelming and things we do seem like years ago not months ago as we do so much.

So now we look forward to 2026 and i have to say it's looking just as eventful for us.

We've already been to see Ruth Jones and James Corden in their stage show "When Gavin met Stacey".

I actually had an exchange of words with James in front of 5000 people and it went like this:

James and Ruth: We loved filming in Cardiff in Oceana Club and Tiger Tiger, is Tiger Tiger still there?"

Me: "No it's an empty building"

James: "It's empty?"

Me: "Yeah it's derelict"

James: "It's derelict? That's such a shame"

And that was that. We had a really good night at the event and i know absolutely nothing about Gavin and Stacey. In fact i know so little about it in 2007 a customer came in to Oceanic and called out "Gavlar". i replied "No it's Kevlar", the wife then said "No, Gavin and Stacey", i stood there bemused and said "Are they customers of mine?" She then went on to tell me about this show that was on TV back in the UK, i didn't have a clue and to this day i've seen maybe 4 episodes at the most.

So we've started off January with a bang and we still have 11 months to go and what else is already on the cards for us:

Well.....March we have our 16 day trip to Calgary, our 4th visit in 6 years. This time we're visiting Banff National Park, going snowboarding or rubber ring riding at Calgary Olympic village, 3 Calgary Flames ice hockey games & a Calgary Hitmen ice hockey game and we're booked in for 2 tattoo's each at a local tattooist near our apartment, also we're looking into starting our paperwork to emigrate over to Canada.

May we have a trip Bristol to see the live musical "The Greatest Showman" and have tickets for a 3 day music festival in Redruth, Cornwall called "The Great Estate festival", it looks like a great weekend.

June we have Metallica in concert but not only that......

Within 7 days we are seeing Metallica on the Sunday in June then flying out to Milan to see Florence & the Machine on the Thursday the day of our anniversary then 2 days after that concert on the Sunday also in Milan we're seeing the Foo Fighters, 3 concerts in 7 days in 2 countries.

September we have the days booked off but still deciding between St. Malo in France OR back to the island which we love.....Zakynthos. It all depends on cost. We're only going for 5 days but the price is crazy money it's over £800 just for 5 days on Zakynthos in Zakynthos town as that's the place we were always at our happiest just chilling eating and drinking. St Malo is a little less but with better flight times and less travel time so we'll see but it will definitely be one of those 2 in September.

October it's back to Bath to see War of the Worlds

November we're in London once again for our Christmas visit as we do alternate years between London and Birmingham.

December for New Years Eve we already have Barcelona locked, loaded and paid for with a hotel a short walk from the Basilica.

I'm sure we'll have few other weekends away but nothing booked in as yet. You got to book early to get the good places and good prices.

And this will seem absolutely bonkers but we have started to book in dates for 2027 including Greg Davies in Cardiff, Alan Carr in Dublin and a real big travel extravaganza all in one go from UK to France to Belgium to Luxemburg to Germany to Switzerland to France and back to UK by train with a European train pass for 3 weeks. We've started planning the route and hotels with days needed in each country and costs and to be honest for all those countries you visit the cost at the moment which i've totalled up is as much as a fortnights stay in a 4 star hotel in a resort in the Med so we think that's great value.

And finally..........

We have become Tequila connoisseurs, just look at the range we have going on from Sierra up to Clase Azul. SHOT! SHOT! SHOT! SHOT!

We have 3 Squizzles living in our garden, YAY! They love those nuts!

I tried my hand at baking again and found a great recipe for a Greek yoghurt cake which looked amazing.

And here's my effort in all its glory......

........WTF!!!!!!!!

Separated at birth.......

                                      KATIE PRICE?                                        PETE BURNS?

I know you may find this hard to believe but it's true, this small update has just taken me nearly 4 hours, by the time i edit the pics in the correct positions, edit my stream of nonsense dribble and remember everything in the right order it takes so long but while your all still reading it i'll keep writing it, i still get people reading the early years posts and last month my views hit it's highest ever views for a month that was 11,274, so this is also true i am now in the views bracket to be considered a micro influencer. 

Hmmm, i think i may have taken offence to that if i was of the woke generation, i can't help only being 5' 6" 😆

So i think the next update will be the end of Feb just before we head off to Canada and until then.....

Serve All, Love All, Peace All Kevlar, Mrs. P. & Squidly Out!