Well there we go.  Awesome weekend.  The trip started quite badly with the fact the Nia, Dan and I missed the first flight out, due to a few problems getting to the airport, thankfully we managed to get our flights changed (even though we were literally seconds away from missing that flight as well!) and a very relieved three people touched down at Nice airport  a couple hours later.

So then it began.  A few beers in the hotel bar later and people were getting in the mood for a party.  Now why do the French (Monaconians??) never have enough pint glasses??  Obviously it wouldn”t have been any good for us to be drinking half pints, so after getting tuxedos on, we went straight onto the champagne, of which a lot was consumed.  And the free wine was also thrown down in huge quantities.  We had the office videos, showcasing each office, with the Dublin masterpiece shining.  It really was a piece of artistic genius, which I will try to locate and link to.  Mind you the funniest (probably as we knew the participants well) was the London office spoof of "The Day Today".  After these the memories seem to desert me.  Last I remember was a midnight (ish) swim (the photos are supposedly about to surface).

Dan woke me up at about 8:15 (for the mandatory breakfast) and a fry up followed.  Plenty of orange juice, grapefruit juice, bacon, sausages and egg later we were ready to complete the team building.  The brief was create a piece of art with the theme energy.  We went for an day in the life of a Gyro member of staff preparing for a Bond party, which somehow involved me being half naked in most photos, or wearing Laura”s cocktail dress.  Apparently I make a great woman.  Anyway, we got the photos printed, and Damo set about promoting the display, which apparently worked, as we all won some Ferrari apparel later on!!

So the time came for a long Bond theme preparation.  After a long session of body paint I made quite a convincing Baron Samedi (Geoffrey Holder in Live and Let Die) I impressed, and although I didn”t win the costume competition (Barnaby did with his impressive scuba get up) I was told how good it was and that I should have won something.  Again free wine, a band and singers and chaos ensued.  Stage, red wine, and me wearing nothing but a bit of a sheet, body paint and a top hat is not a good combination.  There is a video.

Shit.

After another night of missing memories I woke bright and tried to get the remaining body paint off, feeling rough.  So the best cure was a fry up, washed down with a bottle of wine and a beer.  I was described as an "animal".  By one of the top blokes in the company.

Oops.

Well that was fun!! A nice Friday day trip to Portsmouth, lunch on historic Spitbank sea fort 1 mile off the coast (see the picture!) and then flying around on RIBs (Rigid Inflatable Boats or something!) for the rest of the afternoon. Then we had a nice barbeque and free bar in our lovely hotel. This is much better than a quick Italian meal on a Saturday night like at Electric Avenue (no offence guys, but it is).

It took some recovering on Saturday and the coach trip wasn”t all that much fun, but very worth it.

Now back to the grindstone, with websites and e-mails galore to do, and football to be played in between. Hopefully the Christmas trip will be even better – and I”ve been assured it will be.