FRIDAY, JANUARY
21 2005
Happy Birthday Mike!
by
Kings
Mikey turns 24 today so here’s a picture of him wearing underwear over the top of his jeans. Happy birthday Mike!
Kingsley
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MONDAY, JANUARY
17 2005
flights that make my head hurt
by
mike
so i havent had a bad flight before really, that is until yesterday. and it wasnt the flight as such, it was my head. i had a headache from the moment the plane starting to taxi out to the runway, right through the 5 hour flight and for the following few hours once i landed.
anyways - i made here in the end, and i think my flu/headache that's been annoying me of the past week has finally started to end.
i'm not quite sure what i'll be up to this week, but my birthday is next friday, and there's talk of a trip to whistler for the weekend. so that could be a bit of fun. i'm staying with my friend brenna (who i met in london) for the next few days, and hopefully i'll also get to crash with my friend sheila (who kings and i met way back when we first started this trip, in berlin).
next stop will probably be back into the US to see seattle, then i may get down to portland and make my way south through california - i have to visit the governator and all!
that's it for now. i want to say a huge thanks to olga for putting up with me this past week in toronto - was great staying with you for a few days. i also have a bunch of pictures from my last few days in toronto, including a house party we went to on friday night.
i'll try to check in again soon :)
mike
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SUNDAY, JANUARY
16 2005
New York Skyline
by
Kings
Hey everyone. I know it has been a little while since Mike and I were in New York but I thought I'd put this up because I think it is kinda cool. I stitched together 6 photos I took from the top of the Empire State building to produce this 180 degree panorama of the New York skyline looking north. Several features are visible such as Central Park just left of the middle. Anyhow, the full size photo is available here. It is just under 1MB in size so if you are on a modem it may take a little while.
Kingsley
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THURSDAY, JANUARY
13 2005
Give it up for the headers
by
Kings
Greetings all.
As some of you have already noticed, the headers at the top of the page have been updated with pictures Mike and I took while the US. I really liked the old headers that we had on the page so I created this page dedicated to all the headers that at one time graced the top of mikeandkings.com.
It was quite funny seeing the headers from the very first version of the site when it was called 'Mike & Kings do Europe'. They are a striking of how much Mike and I have seen since we left over 18 months ago!
If you have a particular favorite one add a comment below and perhaps I'll move it back into the current rotation.
Enjoy!
Kingsley
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TUESDAY, JANUARY
11 2005
ooohh caaaaaaaaanada
by
mike
  bye bye USA - at least for the next few weeks. i made it over the border from new york state into canada at around 6am yesterday morning. the bus ride stated out in new hampshire back to boston - then i had an hour till the next bus, which took me north to buffalo or albany (i forget at the moment), through canadian customs, and into toronto only an hour late at around 10am...i started at 6pm so it was a pretty long trip.
once i arrived, i chucked all my stuff less the camera and a few bits and pieces, into the lockers in the station, and headed off minus a map to see what toronto had to offer.
i started out finding the town hall (pictured here) before wandering further south through the financial district. i didn't really have any idea where i was going to go, but it was a great little walk, and i ended up near the CN Tower.
the CN tower, if you don't know, is the tallest standing man-made object - and you can take the elevator up to the 114th floor and have a look at what toronto would look like if you were 553.33m tall.
 down one level to 113, you can stand on the infamous glass floor, looking straight down from a pretty dizzyingly high place. this pic, if it isn't that clear, is my feet standing on the glass.
 i was pretty tired from the bus ride (i only managed to sleep a few hours with all the changing of buses, customs, and uncomfortable seating) so i ducked into starbucks for a coffee pick-me-up after the tower, then headed towards the art gallery...unfortunately, being monday, the gallery was closed so i'll have to go back. but, that means i can also go to the bata shoe museum which is pretty close by.
with no art gallery to go to, i kept walking and ended up at the fourth university visit of my trip to date - this time to the university of toronto (the others, in case i didn't mention or forgot, were; harvard, MIT, and the university of new hampshire).
 this is a really nice campus - some of the buildings remind me of old cathedrals and buildings throughout europe, and that could be because they are a few hundred years old. but, the cold and my tiredness got the better of me, and knowing that i had about two hours to kill before i was meant to be meeting up with my good friend olga (who's so kindly putting me up here -- thank you so much, i really do appreciate it!!) - i headed back down university ave to see how lost i could get on the way to the bus station.
fortunately enough i found my way pretty easily, and after sitting around relaxing/reading for a while, i packed up my things from the locker, and headed down toward college st to find olga's place. again i was fortunate that she'd given me directions, so i managed to even find her apartment without much hassle.
 anyways - tonight we went and had dinner just down the road, and came back to watch the new season of '24' and the bachelorette (worst...show...EVER! bring back the real gilligans island i say!)
 i will hopefully be heading to niagara falls tomorrow if i can convince myself that the $50 return fair is worth it (i know it is, but i spent waaaaaay too much money in new york, so will have to cut back here and there for the rest of the trip). i'll be here in toronto until saturday morning, and am then flying to vancouver for a week or so.
i hope you're all well and enjoying my pictures of toronto. i'll try to keep the updates coming as regularly as possible.
someone post something on one of my messages - i'm feeling left out. oh, and kings, i like the new headers!
until next time...
mike
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SUNDAY, JANUARY
9 2005
NH & moving on
by
mike
i'll have to make another quick update, cause i can't stay on the computer too long...but, i'm in new hampshire at the moment. the bus ride was only an hour and a half, but was through some great snow.
the snow started just as we left boston, and hasn't stopped falling yet. i'll be sure to take a few photos.
i'm heading back to boston tomorrow afternoon before a 12 hour bus ride to toronto - it's overnight so shouldn't be too unpleasant.
anyway - i've got about 150 photos of boston to upload, plus all of my NY shots, so hopefully i'll get around to doing that soon.
hope everyone is well - leave me some comments/messages.
mike
***update*** i've added some photos so you can have a look!! you can find photos of boston here and new hampshire here. was just walking out on the lake here - it's 1:30am and damn cold out, but was a lot of fun wandering around the ice... mike
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SATURDAY, JANUARY
8 2005
boston to new hampshire
by
mike
today i walked all over boston - i started out in the morning with ciaran, and irish guy who's staying in the room here, and we walked the freedom trail; it's about 2.5 miles long, and took a few hours.
we ended up in cambridge, and went to harvard uni, then wandered down to MIT for a bit of a look-see.
anyway - i'm off to new hampshire tomorrow afternoon to catch up with scott who i met at the wedding in milford, CT. i'll be in toronto on monday with any luck.
have to run, i have about 23 seconds left here...
leave me some comments!!
ciao
mike
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FRIDAY, JANUARY
7 2005
Mike and Kings Version 3
by
Kings
Welcome!
Well it’s done. After a year of procrastination on my behalf, I’ve managed to whip up a completely new re-write of the site.
Everything should look and feel pretty much like the old site did with a few slight changes. Firstly, you can all now sign up for an account on the site. This will allow you to post comments on all our posts and participate on the message board. It will also help Mike and I keep in contact with everyone that uses the site.
There is also an RSS feed available for the main news and also for the topics in the messages board. If you’re interested in subscribing to our RSS feed but don’t have the software, check out Sauce Reader.
As always, if you find any problems with the site give me an email at kings@mikeandkings.com.
Hope you like the changes, if you don’t, well, tough. :)
Kingsley
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THURSDAY, JANUARY
6 2005
start spreading the news...
by
Kings
i'm going to boston today...after just over 3 weeks in (and around) the big apple, my time has finally come to leave for another city. i hadn't planned on spending quite this long here, but it's been a huge amount of fun, so why leave?
anyway - boston is next. i'm catching a bus from chinatown at 11am, so i don't have a lot of time to write. but a quite update on what i've been doing since i'm slack as hell, and haven't updated in a week or so...
a friend of mine and kings's, obi who we met at creamfields last august, got into new york new years eve. we didn't manage to catch up on new years itself, but he and his two friends who came with him (paul and kelsey) came up to the apartment for a few drinks just inside the new year.
i also had the chance to go and see the musical 'rent' with obi and the guys two nights ago. we managed to get cheap ($44) tickets from the tkts booth, and i have to say it was a fantastic musical! the seats we got were great (second row, mezzanine level) and the music was amasing.
after the show we stopped into blue fin, a bar/seafoo restaurant where kelsey's friend carrie works (she also came to the show with us). the guys couldn't stay that long but we did squeeze in a few cocktails. carrie and her sister were off to suede - a cool little club on 23rd...being slightly intoxicated and not ready to go home, i jumped in the cab with them and tagged along.
the club was packed, which isn't surprising as it was their big night (a tuesday? it is new york). but it was a lot of fun dancing around for a few hours - i think i finally crashed in bed at about 5am.
anyway -- i have to finish packing and get down to the bus. i'll try to update more from boston, otherwise you may find me in new hampshire, montreal, ottawa or toronto. i will be in toronto on monday if everything goes right (the inbetween part isn't yet planned).
ok, ciao all. leave some messages in the guestbook :)
mike
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THURSDAY, JANUARY
6 2005
New York, New Years Eve and the rest
by
Kings
 New Years Eve in Times Square is one of those once in a lifetime experience (read ordeal) that I am extremely happy that I was able to experience it while in New York. It also happened to be the 100th anniversary of the event which I suppose is kinda cool.
I had my mind made up pretty early on that I was going to Times Square no matter what anyone else was doing. The thing that didn’t appeal to most people was that there is a considerable amount of waiting involved and an even greater lack of  alcohol. More accurately, 8 hours and none respectively. I managed to talk Kara, Prue and Mike into joining me and we set off up Broadway to join the crowd.
We were situated at the very front next to where Fox were doing their live broadcast from hosted by Jenny McCarthy (you may know her from Playboy) and the host of American Idol, Ryan Seacrest. We also had a pretty good view of Kathy Griffin (the red-head woman from Seinfeld) all night.
 The 8 hours passed fairly quickly even though there was nothing to do. We were all given orange hats, gold pompoms, 2005 glasses, and red balloon things to play with during the evening which also helped. And then it was midnight, the ball dropped, fireworks exploded and 50 tons of confetti was dumped on us.
But now my holiday to New York has come to an end. I arrived in London last night after a rather quick and hassle free journey home. My flatmates are away on holiday  so I returned home to a cold and empty flat. A rather anti-climatic end to what was an extremely enjoyable holiday.
Mike is still in the USA is will be making his way around the states and Canada until the end of Feb so check back to see how he’s going.
Anyhow, that’s about enough from me. Hope everyone had a great Xmas and New Year, why not let us know what you got up to on the guestbook.
The photos are slowly going up, you can find them here.
Kingsley
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WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER
29 2004
more family reunions
by
Kings
 last week we all went for dinner with my cousin stuart and his girlfriend erin. it was a great dinner, and was nice to catch up with him. but he also reminded me that he'd promised to take me skiing, and that i had promised to go to his place in connecticut around christmas.
so i decided that, given that grandfather was flying up from florida for a few days, and the rest of the fam was going to be there, i'd train it up to connecticut again, this time to cornwall bridge - i'd visited here back when i was 9 or so, and had gone skiing for the first (and only) time. there's a bunch of photos here.
the train trip wasn't too long, and stuart was there in the new mini to pick me up from the station. we reached the house a little while later, and soon enough debbie and bart (aunty cathy's sister and her husband) arrived from the airport after picking grandfather up.
 we all said our hello's - it had been 14 years and all - we headed out for a bit of a hike up the housatonic river. we only walked for about an hour, but the scenery was amasing. of course, i was stupid enough to leave my camera at the house!
when we got back to the house, we settled down to a few drinks before dinner. of course the food was amasing - debbie does everything so perfectly; the food, the wine, the table setting...it was all perfect.
dinner finished, but the drinks kept flowing over a few games of pool and table tennis. grandfather went off to bed, and debbie and bart followed shortly after, leaving just us 'kids' - so we did what any red-blooded kids do; grab a few more drinks, jump in the pick-up truck (a ute back home) and head to the nearest frozen pond.
after a bit of jumping and running around, we headed up the road to the beaver pond. this was a little more stable than the other one, so we felt a bit safer! it was snowy, cold, and on the way back to the car, pete kind of fell through the ice - allbeit on the very edge of the pond - he only fell on the edge of the pond and didn't get too wet!
anyways, we ended up back at the house, and crashed pretty much when we got back home.
 monday was the day of skiing; my first time on the slopes in 14 years, and i have to say that i started off a little shakey, but steadied myself enough to ski fairly well for a few hours...that is, until i crashed and burned pretty badly, twisting my knee and falling about 30 metres down the mountain. after the fall, i lost most of my confidence, and energy, so the following two runs were pretty much me falling down a hell of a lot.
but it was great fun, and i can't wait to ski again - i should get a chance when i get up to canada. my knee is fine for the moment, bro-in-law michael took a look at it tonight, and strapped it. if it keeps hurting in a week or two i'll have to get someone to look at it.
 last night was family scrabble - i haven't played scrabble in about 10 years so i wasn't expecting to do too well, but i ended up crawling back from last to second by the end, and used all my letter first..yay for me!
i headed home today at around 1pm on the train and met up with aimee and michael, prue and kings at harry's bar opposite central park. prue and i went to harry's bar in rome, so it was cool to see another bar here in new york.
tomorrow morning we're up nice and early to head back to times square to meet up with aimee and michael at 8am so we can jump around behind the fox & friends window on foxs news - if you have foxtel in australia or any other cable elsewhere in the world, tune in tomorrow and hopefully you'll see us jumping up and down like the fools we are.
it's almost 1am so i'm off to sleep. i hope everyone is well - thank you so much to debbie and bart and the whole family for having me in cornwall bridge these last few days - i hope i can make it back up there soon!
drop us a note in the guestbook and let us know about your christmas...
mike
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SUNDAY, DECEMBER
26 2004
not white but still great
by
Kings
we didn't get a white xmas in the end, which is a little sad but i guess we'll live. xmas this year was celebrated here in out apartment on w 34th street - cam and erin, craig and julls all came over around 11am to start the festivities.
erin cooked us a great meal of tofurkey and turkey, vegies etc and we all got merrily tipsy in the afternoon.
i can't write too much more now because i'm about to get a train to connecticut to see my cousin and family (and hopefully go skiing!) but happy holidays everyone! i hope your day was filled with good fun.
i'll try to post from connecticut -- oh, and we have a fair few photos to upload too!
until later...
mike
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WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER
22 2004
Live from New York, its Mike and Kings
by
Kings
 Morning y’all!
 Yesterday was my first day in the city and what a day that was. It was -6F with wind chill (yes, Fahrenheit) which is about -21C. So needless to say everyone was frozen. So risking severe frost bite we managed to get outside and see some of the sites. We started with getting on a bus and heading uptown to 49th Street to meet up with Craig, Julls, Cam and Erin for a tour of NBC Studios in the Rockefeller Center. The tour didn’t leave until later that day so we then headed to Central Park for some ice skating.
The NBC tour took us thru the studios in the Rockefeller Center including the set of Saturday Night Live which very cool.
Anyhow, just a small update from me. We have loads of photos here.
Kings
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MONDAY, DECEMBER
20 2004
Tripping the Trans-Atlantic
by
Kings
Hey all,
 Sorry for the late first post. I have been in the US of A since Wednesday but have been tucked away up north in Troy visiting my very old friend Morgan.
 Well, the big news is that Prue is here, and Cam is here, and Erin is here too! Surprise! Well, there is a bit of a story to all that which I am sure Mike will tell everyone about. Prue and I have been secretly conspiring to surprise Mike (kinda like we did for Shannon in London), but it wasn’t until the last minute that I accidentally found out that the newlyweds – Cam and Erin – were also heading to the Big Apple.
So Prue, Cam, Erin, Craig, Julls, Mike and I all managed to meet up at our flat on 34th Street. One could say it was a miracle.
So anyhow, my first day in the big city, looking down onto the street there is a small amount of snow still left over from last night. The chances of a white Xmas look pretty good. Not too sure where to start today but I’m sure its going to be great.
Talk to you all again soon!
Kings
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SUNDAY, DECEMBER
19 2004
rent-a-family
by
Kings
so i guess that kings is being a little slack - he's been in the US for a few days now and hasn't even posted. maybe they haven't got electricity all the way up in albany?
i can't really remember what i last posted about (and am far too lazy/out of time) to check the last post, so, a quick re-cap on the trip so far:
stayed with my good friend noelle on long island for a few nights, before heading into the city to stay with craig and julls. then got the shock of the trip to date with cam and erin (2 of my bestest friends from back home) opening the door when i got there! was really cool that everyone managed to keep yet another secret from me for so long!
um, we all went to the olive garden, where julls promptly managed to get himself lost in the restaurant, then enjoyed a meeting with the bowl after one too many vodka's...needless to say he had to be taken home :P
um, we did a little walk thru central park, did some shopping (i got the best jacket from barney's yesterday) and now am in connecticut for a wedding that's going to happen in all of 3 hours! missy and scott are to be wed at 3pm, the reception will follow in one of the most romantic locations i've seen for a wedding..i'll be sure there's a bunch of photos.
i've also got a few pics from the last few days, so when i get abck into the city, hopefully i'll be able to upload some new images for you all to see. i think we have about 3000 pics on here from the last 17 months, so if you're ever bored, why not relive our entire trip! haha
ok so that's about it for now. i should go and shower etc cause we're leaving pretty soon - i'll be all suited up today; i haven't worn a suit in about 18 months so it should be interesting to be all dressed up again.
anyways - hope you are all well...leave a message on the guestbook for us or drop us an email (links at the top).
i'll let you know how the wedding goes...
- mike
ps: i have a US cell now, so if anyone wants the number, drop me an email.
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WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER
15 2004
mike has left the building
by
Kings
after 14 months and one week, i've finally left london for some more travelling. 14 months of the generator, 14 months of new work, new friends...14 months of a hell of a lot of fun!
it's was weird leaving; kinda like leaving home all over again. but it was about time for a break, and i'll be back there in like 3 months anways.
this will be a really quick update cause i'm about to go out. but, i have a ton of pics from my last week in london, and they'll go here when i get them up. there's only a few there now.
so very quickly - the flight from heathrow to JFK was long, bad head winds, delays in heathrow etc. but virgin atlantic are so great! their in-flight entertainment is like having cable tv in front of you! i watched half a season of friends and will & grace, super size me AND bad santa...go see that by the way -- hillarious!
when i finally got here, noelle - my great friend who used to work the traveldesk at the gen before me, and her friend cori picked me up (i'm staying at noelle's place for a few days) and took me on a wirl-wind tour of NY before we decided a trip to jersey was in order...so we drove for a while, got some taco bell, headed back to the city...i was so damn tired i fell asleep in the car for a while..
and today we've done basically nothing, but are heading about now to get me a new sim for my phone, and are doing ??? tonite...should be some fun.
craig and julls, if you see this, i'll give you a buzz later on.
i'll be sure to take a crap load of photos - i have my laptop here so i can hopefully get online pretty easily over the next few months!
but -- for now, leave some messages on the guestbook, and email kings to get him to put the damn new website up!!
mike
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THURSDAY, DECEMBER
9 2004
SoccerFootball anyone?
by
Kings
On Tuesday I had the good fortune to be offered a ticket to see Arsenal play Rosenborg in the Champions League at Highbury Stadium. Paul, a work colleague, is a Arsenal season ticket holder and has been since his early teens. Being such a long time supporter his seats were fantastic! Arsenal is arguably England’s best squad, winning the Premiership last season and going 49 games undefeated during the 2003-2004 seasons. Arsenal needed a win to guarantee entry into the next round so the game was shaping up to be a good match. By half time Arsenal was winning 4-1 and at full time they had managed to score one more bring it to 5-1. Shortly before their fifth goal, the ball went flying into the crowd and landed right next to me. With my lightning reflexes I beat off several other fans to have a short hold of the ball before it was thrown back into the game – certainly the highlight of the evening.
Most of the photos I took didn’t come out too well, I wasn’t using the flash and the pictures were a little blurry. The panorama above is a composite of 4 different photos I took during the evening and it worked out quite well, you can certainly see how good our seats were – thanks Paul! You can check the rest of the photos out here.
Kings
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WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER
24 2004
You can never have too many dancing Nazi girls!
by
Kings
 Hey everyone, well, not much been going on around here by the looks. The site is sure to fire up when we head to the US. Which reminds me, I probably haven’t mention this yet, but I am also going to the US for Xmas and New Year from the 15th of December until the 5th of January so if you’re anywhere near that general area please get in touch and hopefully we can have a mini mikeandkings.com reunion!
 Last night I had a wonderful evening at The Producers, a West End musical by Mel Brooks staring Nathan Lane and Lee Evans. It’s a comedy about two down and out guys who attempt to perpetrate a fraud by producing the worst musical on Broadway, ‘Springtime for Hitler’. Anyhow, hilarity ensures with the help of an outrageously gay Hitler, a coup of Nazi pigeons and a jazzy number by a chorus of old ladies in Zimmer frames.
Well that’s about it from here. 21 days to the USA for me (slightly less for Mike). Cant wait!
Kings
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SATURDAY, NOVEMBER
6 2004
halloween, parties, a week off and more
by
Kings
it's been a while since i've posted on here, so i thought it was about time i gave you all a little update. it's just over 5 weeks till i trek out to the US, so i decided it was as good a time as any to take my remaining holidays from work.
with a week off i almost took the opportunity to get out of london for a while, but decided against it (i know i would've spent far too much money if i went anywhere). so i stayed here and had a party for a week. and it was pretty good fun; not going to bed before 5am felt like old days travelling...and i'm not really looking forward to the old routine starting again on monday.
 one big event that happened was the halloween party on sunday. you can find all the pictures here. i was dressed (see left) in something like tom cruise in eyes wide shut (remember the plain white mask and black robe in the weird orgy thing?)
 during the day, a friend of mine (brenna from vancouver) and i took part in the pumpkin carving contest - and WON! ehhe was a lot of fun; we made the stoner pumpkin with a pimp-ass hat. we won 5 days free accomodation, which i cant really use (i dont pay for my accomodation and all) so brenna's coming back next week to stay a few extra days.
unfortunatley, staff weren't allowed to take part in the best costume contest, so i couldn't go in that. but kevin, the living statue (he's a street performer) won his free weeks accomodation with his great outfit.
 all in all, it was a great halloween. al, beck and kings came down at some point, and i managed to lose them in my drunken haze. amber and brian (two of my good friends here at the gen) took us on a ghost walk: the bloody history of the generator. this was possibly the highlight of the evening - there's nothing better than walking around your house, learning how it used to be a women's prison in the early 1900's, 4 women tried to escape and were eventually put to death a holloway prison (just near my old flat), and the story behind dorothy and room 303...
so with halloween done, the rest of the week has been spent sleeping till 1pm, reading, playing with my laptop, watching movies, playing a lot of pool, guitar after 2am, drinking etc etc etc. it's been a very relaxing few days!
the countdown's on for the states. as i said, it's just over 5 weeks till i fly out. i have one more weekend off before i go (next weekend i think) so that will probably be spent going out. though i do have to save more money, so i wont be going out too much.
i'm really, REALLY looking forward to this trip. i still have a few things to organise (like a rail pass for canada, and accomodation in a few places...i'm staying with friends for a lot of the time i'm away, but not the whole lot - if anyone wants to put me up for a few nights, i'd love to stay - and i'll cook you dinner!) i have to also make sure it's ok for me to enter the US on the visa-waiver programme, then go to canada, and back into the US from the west coast of canada. i'm 98% sure it's fine, but i want to be sure.
think of me at 12pm back at work (i'm working the late on monday), drop me an email some time, and sign the guestbook. oh, and to our good ole school friends who are posting on the guestbook - thanks, it's been pretty cool reading your ramblings!
mike
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TUESDAY, NOVEMBER
2 2004
Al and Beck livin' large in capital city
by
Kings
 Big Al – Jeebus Himself – was in town! After a conference in Nice and a whirlwind tour of Scandinavia, Jeebs stopped by jolly old London to spend a week living the KrispyKreme fuelled highlife before  heading back to Perth.
Two days before he left Beck came up from Minehead (birthplace of Arthur C. Clarke! and where she has been living for the last 15 months) to catch up with Al and to enjoy London before she heads home to Perth next week.
So on Monday night; Alan, Beck, Mike, myself and Trev – who went to Uni with Alan and I – all had dinner at BRB and at the same time set a new record of 5 people from our Perth social circle in London at once – not a bad effort. We have a few pictures of the final evening here for your viewing pleasure.
Hope to see you both again soon.
Kings
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MONDAY, OCTOBER
18 2004
Entertaining the German contingent
by
Kings
 I had a pretty wild week with Anke and Ane. The week for me looked something like this: wake up at 8am, work ‘till 5pm, drinking ‘till 4am, repeat.
 I had so much fun during the week and it reminded me a lot of what travelling thru Europe was like. I cant believe that we’ve been in London for a year now. Time has flown here. Fortunatly it isn't too much longer until we’re in the US of A.
I have put up some photos that Anke and Ane took while they were in town here.
Kings
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TUESDAY, OCTOBER
5 2004
another anniversary
by
Kings
  12 months ago tonite, kings and i were making our way home from our last nite at oktoberfest. this was also our last day travelling around europe before heading off to london to try and make it in the big city.
tomorrow is our one year anniversary of arriving in london. while this marked the end of one part of our trip, it started another. we found jobs, flats, friends, pubs, clubs, and everything else that comes with moving your life half way around the world.
a lot has happened in the past 12 months, some good, some bad, but i think we've managed to mainly have a lot of fun...and we've met a hell of a lot of great people in our time here. i won't get all sappy, but there's a huge amount of people here who mean a great deal to me, as i know there is for kings too.
from christmas at kings's place, to new years at fabric, australia day in the walkie, my birthday, kings's birthday, the generator, family dinner, family picnic, running into old friends at the pub...you can't quite fit 12 months into one post. this is our second home now, and it's a pretty damn good one at that! tomorrow nite will be pretty quiet (i think kings is working late as it is), but hopefully we'll be celebrating big on wednesday nite in the gen bar. if you're near by, please drop in and have a drink with us!
hopefully i'll remember to charge my batteries and i'll actually upload some new pics. i've been taking a lot recently, but am getting pretty slack with the whole uploading thing - i'll try a little harder before i head off to the states (10 weeks today!!!)
enough from me - let us know what's been happening in the guestbook - posts are getting more and more sporatic as the weeks go by...maybe if we got around to updating the site a bit more often? we'll try... :P
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MONDAY, SEPTEMBER
27 2004
Went to Brighton. Anke is coming!
by
Kings
Trev, Scotty, Mike and I headed to Brighton ages ago. Mike and I are way too slack to put a post up. The day can be summed up with one photo.
The rest of the photos are here.
In other news; our friend Anke from Madrid is coming to London for a week and we cant wait! See you soon Anke!!!
Kings
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WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER
15 2004
It has begun
by
Kings
 Winter that is. Although it is autumn, there is no doubt that winter has started brewing. And it all starts with the wind from the north. Monday evening walking home I got a sudden gust of ice cold air and with it the familiar feeling and almost a kind of smell that reminded me of what England was like when I first arrived.
Despite the weather, Mike and I are heading to Brighton for the day on Saturday. For those who don’t know, Brighton is a costal community in the south of England and about an hour by train. Perfect for those who want to escape London for something a little different.
 Saturday there is suppose to be a fireworks show for the Mayors Thames Festival. There are usually fireworks at Tower Bridge every fortnight or so, but apparently these ones will be extra special since they were designed by the company that designed the fireworks for the Athens Olympics. It is all part of the London 2012 Olympic Bid and they mayors effort to drum up enthusiasm. It isn’t a bad thing to be a part of since there are plenty of things to see and do each weekend.
For example last weekend was the Brick Lane Festival which Trev and I went to celebrate the invention of curry! Well not just curry, but that was the only thing Trev and I were interested in. It could have been a lot better, but after a sampling the goods and drinking a beer outside a pub playing the most god awful music ever written (think 60s English drinking anthems featuring piano accordions) it turned out to be a pretty good day.
Kings
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WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER
8 2004
SHE'S BAAAACK!
by
Kings
 well, almost anyway. yes, noelle, busty st. claire herself is returning to london for a short vacation away from the states to visit us over here in the uk! and about damn time too! noelle, for anyone who doesn't know, is one of my best friends in the world, and lived and worked at the generator for 10 months until a few months ago, when i took her job at the travel desk and she went back to the good old US of A.
BUT, the time has come for her return, and at about 11am tomorrow, her flight will be touching down at heathrow, laptop in arm, a short tube journey to the gen to begin as she left, drinking "noelles", staying awake for days at a time...and never setting foot out the door. well, maybe it'll be a little different this time around.
so, on behalf of both myself and kings, we welcome our NUMBER ONE FAN noelle p johnston back into our lives (allbeit for only a few weeks).
we can't wait to see you bella!!!
- mike
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MONDAY, SEPTEMBER
6 2004
colourful and loud
by
Kings
 Hello all. I spent last week with the flu and was stuck in bed for a couple of days, and Mike is working his ass off working like a madman with his two jobs so the site hasn’t had much attention lately. This post will probably be re-written or added later since I currently have a 3 alarm hang over and will probably be remarkably undescriptive.
Creamfields was a week ago and trust me, we needed a week to recover from it. The coach ride to the event was a great way to get there and back – very convenient especially the next day when you don’t want the hassle of wondering how the heck to get home 400km away. The weather was pretty good, it did rain towards the end but since all the outside events had finished by then it didn’t really matter.
On Monday I headed to the Notting Hill Carnival with Trev and Jen. I’ve put up loads of photos here. It was very colourful and loud. We tried to walk down to the stalls but when I saw the cops staring to really worry about the number of people crushed into one street we decided it probably wouldn’t be worth the effort and decided to go home instead.
This weekend just been Trev and I headed to a computer games expo in east London. It too was colourful and loud. I find it pretty funny that many of the bigger stalls had the obligatory girl in hotpants and tight top with the company logo splashed over her breasts and butt with a bunch of losers standing around saying ‘oh this is the [STARE AT BREASTS] Atari stall’. The highlight of my visit was when a 8 year old kid challenged me to a 2 player death match of Metroid Prime 2 and quietly whimpered before we begun ‘I’ve never played this game before, I hope you’re not good’. Hehehe. Toast!
Kings
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WEDNESDAY, AUGUST
25 2004
Creamfields 2004
by
Kings
 It’s been around about a month since I last posted and I feel very naughty. The fact is I haven’t been up to much other than the normal Monday to Friday work, drinks on the weekend sort of thing these last few weeks – but this is all about to change.
 The weekend of the 28th of August is known in the UK as the late summer bank holiday, and as such one of the UKs biggest music festivals – approximately 40,000 people are expected – and Mike and I will be there.
Now for people not into the good old oscillator music (as my father calls it - electronic to the rest of us) not many of these names will ring any bells – however for the rest of you, you will quickly see that this line up is about 5 years worth of touring acts you would see in Australia crammed into one 3pm to 6am session.
Creamfields Outdoor Stage: Chemical Brothers, Scissor Sisters, Goldfrapp, A Man Called Adam, Scratch Perverts featuring Dynamite MC, Mylo.
 Cream/Goodgreef & Mixmag Arena: Paul Oakenfold, Paul Van Dyk, Armin Van Buuren, Ferry Corsten, Judge Jules, Fergie, Tall Paul, Eddie Halliwell, Christopher Lawrence, Adam Sheridan, Shan, Alex Kidd.
Subliminal Sessions Arena: Erick Morillo, Seb Fontaine, Harry ‘Choo Choo’ Romero, Audio Bullys, Jose Nunez, Jorge Jaramillo (Who Da Funk), Shawnee Taylor (Live). Featuring very special guest: Felix Da Housecat.
Cream MTV Dance Arena: Sasha, Sander Kleinenberg, Dave Seaman, Gabriel & Dresden, David Guetta, Nic Fanciulli, MYNC Project, Steve Parry, Lee Ellis, Anthony Probyn, Way Out West (Live), Infusion (Live and AUSTRALIAN).
Underwater Vs Circus Arena: Darren Emerson, Yousef, Tim Deluxe (Live), Mark Farina, Tim Westwood, Josh Wink, Mutiny, Paul Jackson, Paul Woolford, Lewis Boardman.
Radio 1 Essential Mix Arena: Pete Tong, Deep Dish, Jeff Mills, Layo & Bushwacka, Danny Howells, Plump DJ's, Hernan Cattaneo, Steve Mac, Michael Burian. Plus exclusive live performance: Dave Clarke.
Chibuku Shake Shake Presents the Caukus Roadshow Tent: DJ Marky & MC Stamina (Brazil), D’Julz (Families, Paris), Krafty Kuts, Luke Carr & Wandy, The Beat Monkeys (4Decks/2Mixers), Dom Chung, Leo Belchetz, Loz (Contrast/Chibuku), DJ Emma.
 Tidy Arena: Lisa Lashes, Yoji Biomehanica, Tidy Boys, Andy Farley, Anne Savage, BK, Paul Glazby, Lee Haslam, Rob Tissera, Tara Reynolds, Amber D, Paul Maddox (Live).
Strongbow Rooms: Justin Robertson, Mutiny (DJ Set), FC Kahuna, Rob Da Bank, Medicine 8, Glimmer Twins, Arthur Baker, Kris Bones.
So, where is this event of epic proportions? Unfortunately, the answer isn’t London. Instead it is held at an old airfield on the outskirts of Liverpool. For those who don’t know where Liverpool is, a handy map is provided - roughly translating the map for you, it is 5 hours and £35 return away.
 We’ll let you know how it went – hopefully we will have some pictures. Oh and by the way, there’s this little thing called the Notting Hill Festival this weekend too – but I’m sure no one really cares about that. :) Anyhow, hope everyone is well and that my temporary absence didn’t disappoint too many people!
Kings
from mike: just a little add on to this...it's going to most likely be wet in liverpool this weekend; you can see a forcast here. oh, and the notting hill carnival -- it's nothing too large - in its 40th year for 2004, they're only expecting about 2 million people to attend...hopefully there'll be plenty of photos from both events! - mike
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TUESDAY, AUGUST
24 2004
happy birthday time...
by
Kings
 once again it's come to that time of birthdays. a few at that too.
aunty cathy's birthday was yesterday, and i was fortunate enough to have a quick chat with her. cathy is my second mother, who did a great deal in raising me to be the person i am today. god knows what would've happened without her influence in my life..so
HAPPY BIRTHDAY CATHY
i wish i could've been there to help drink the bar in pellew gardens dry, but i will be there next year (probably!)
 my good friend, owner of the gen, louise celebrated her birthday in style on saturday night. her party was a wash of cocktails, dancing and laughs in soho. after far too many drinks, and dancing on glass tables, i headed home at about 2am, only to stop off TWICE for food (it's only a 15 minute walk!). the hardest part was waking up on sunday morning at 7.30 to come to work...it was a little painful. BUT, you can see all the pics here.
happy birthday louise, i hope you had fun on saturday.
finally, joanna, miss suvi is having her birthday on wednesday. there'll be a little gathering and of course plenty of drinking, so look out soon for more pics!
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TUESDAY, AUGUST
17 2004
a few new pics
by
Kings
 i know that not much has been happening on the site recently, so i'm going to take it upon myself to update at least photos once a week (plus, this will force me to take more pics, i've been pretty slack recently).
SO, look out for new folders in the London/Generator section soon! but for now, settle for a very small handful of new pics here - new photos are right at the bottom. the pic on the left here is from the other nite -- is that christian slater standing with my friend melissa???
- mike
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THURSDAY, AUGUST
5 2004
it's official!!!!
by
Kings
 MIKE'S GOING TO THE US!
today i went to STA and picked up my new tickets to the US! december 13th at 1755 i'll be on the plane, jet setting my way to JFK airport. i'll be staying in NY for around 3 weeks before heading up to canada. then, 3 weeks or so travelling arcoss canada - toronto to vancouver - stopping wherever possible, and of course getting in as much skiing as possible!
 then i'll be training my way across the US of A. hopefully stopping everywhere, and i want to try and plan on being in new orleans come february 8 for mardi gras! but, we'll have to wait and see about that i guess.
the trip will end up with me backin NY after about 10 weeks, then i'll be flying back to london to work for a few more months before heading back to perth some time towards the middle of 2005.
the trip home, as it's semi-planned for the minute, is to save enough money to take the big trip - trans siberian railway, from moscow to beijing. 5000 miles on a train. then work my way down through china to shanghai, to hong kong, then thailand, and finally back to sydney. there i hope to go see my sister and bro-in-law and their kids, then meet up with the boys for ROADTRIP back to perth. should be a lot of fun. when all this is going to happen, well, god knows, but it'll be some time next year i'm sure.
ok...that's my news for the day. hope everyone is well, send me a mail some time, and sign the guestbook with something :)
- mike
ps: photos from last nite (just a random nite in the gen bar) can be found here. enjoy!
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TUESDAY, JULY
27 2004
Life at 0”00’00’’ – The Prime Meridian – Greenwich
by
Kings
 Last Saturday Trev, Jen and I took a trip to Greenwich to check out the Millennium Dome and the Royal Observatory – the home of Greenwich Mean Time.
We took the tube to North Greenwich (big mistake) which is right next to the dome situated in an industrial wasteland and nowhere near anything else. No one was there and the dome was rather inaccessible which was a big shame since it looked really cool.
 We then decided to walk (another mistake) and find Greenwich Park ourselves. After about 59 minutes Trev said lets go home, and a moment later we arrived. Nice one Trev. The park was fantastic! It was split in two with the Maritime Museum in the middle and the Observatory at one end on top of a large hill. Everyone was enjoying the nice weather, lying in the park sunbathing. An interesting side note is that given nice weather and a grassed area larger than a square meter there will be at least one person sunbathing on it. At first I thought it was a little strange, but then I realised that they simply don’t have any suitable beaches near by!
The Observatory was free (score!) and quite interesting. It discussed the history of timekeeping and the need for accurate time when sailing in order to calculate the ships position relative to longitude. And yes, I got the obligatory ‘standing on the meridian’ photo.
On the way home we took the DLR (Docklands Light Railway) to Canary Warf for a bite to eat. Canary Warf is a large business district outside of the centre of London which is very modern and quite a nice place to hang out. We watch some sk8ers do their thing on the corporate art and then headed home.
You can check out all the photos here.
Kings
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TUESDAY, JULY
27 2004
News of the site's death have been greatly exaggerated
by
Kings
 Hello everyone!
Thank you all for your emails of concern while the site was down.
I’m afraid I’m going to have to take full responsibility for this one. While trying to fix a small problem with the site – I broke it even more. Ooops!
Thanks again for the emails!
Kings
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SUNDAY, JULY
25 2004
a farewell to a generator icon...
by
Kings
 after just over 11 months, richie, generator events supervisor, ladiesman, everybody's mate, has finally left the building. he decided a while ago that it was time to go, and so we had to say farewell (not goodbye) to our good friend.
wednesday night saw richie's final event - the wild wild west party - as well as his final night at the gen, and in typical fashion, he went out with a bang! please go here for photos of the night.
in reflecting on the past 9 months or so that i've known richie, i remembered one of the first time's we chatted. there he was, lying in the hallway, no shirt, pants around his ankles, his drink still firmly in his hand, at around 3am on a school night. who knows what we chatted about - i think i was telling him to put his pants back on, but that's not really important. this was the old richie, and while his transformation was slow, richie really did change over his 11 months here at the gen.
he's always been around as a friend to me, and i know he'll be sorely missed by everyone here. the place is kind of quiet now, and we can but hope that richie decides to at least drop in for a visit from time to time.
at richie's request i've created somewhat of a tribute to his time at the generator. please click here for photos from the past 9 months - the good times, the thousands of drinks, the women, the bar...richie, i hope you enjoy the photos, and remember to stay in touch. good luck, best wishes, and take care.
- mike
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TUESDAY, JULY
20 2004
birthday's a-plenty
by
Kings
 why do my friends always seem to have birthdays close together?
HAPPY BIRTHDAY KATRINA
katrina's a great friend of mine here in london (she's in the photo with me below right). she decided to leave the gold coast for sunny(?) london a few months back, and today marks her 20-something birthday. happy birthday kat!
anyone coming to dinner - meet at the gen at 7pm tonite and we'll then be heading down to la porchetta for some sweeeeeeeeet italian food!
i've just uploaded the photos, so have a look at them here!
another birthday was but two days ago. kings and i met sheila way back in berlin, our very first stop! since then we've kept in touch and hopefully we'll be catching up when i make it to vancouver...i hope you had a great birthday - remmeber that you promised to send the pics (i'll put them online when i get them).
i think that's all for this week, but i could be wrong, so sorry if i've missed your bday. let me know when it is and i'll try to remember to put a post up!
- mike
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WEDNESDAY, JULY
14 2004
new pics
by
Kings
i've been busy using kings' latest program 'image injector' uploading a lot of photos recently. the majority of these are noelle's pics, but she has kindly donated their use to mikeandkings.com (she is, after all, the president of the mikeandkings fan club). SO...if you happen to want to have a look through a few hundred new and old photos (these are from the past 9 months or so) please go here.
other new of the moment - next trip might be to ireland next month. not sure yet, have to price it first, but hopefully a 3 day southern or something like that.
plus, in case you haven't heard, i should be receiving my wonderful new laptop this week - hopefully tomorrow! so look out for a thousand glamour shots of my new toy soon :)
......very soon is now, click here.
that's all...someone sign the guestbook so i have something to read!
- mike
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THURSDAY, JULY
8 2004
one year on party
by
Kings
  celebrating a year away is a little like a birthday with less presents. a few drinks and a lot of drinking. so last nite we celebrated in the one and only gen bar with whoever wanted to come along. i wont say much, but i had a great nite, allbeit fairly quiet, but if you want to check out some of the pictures go here. these two are of the mishap with jimstons shirt...its a long story...and katrina and myself (i think this may have been after a few drinks?)
thanks to everyone who came along - and to everyone else who couldn't be bothered, shame on you! it doesn't take much to come and say hi for an hour...so send me an email and explain yourself!
anyway - hope everyone is well, let us know in the guestbook what what you've been up to. i'll post some more news soon - my new laptop should be arriving next week so there'll be some new pics of that up soon...
until then, i remain...working at the desk -
- mike (i'm not even supposed to be here today)
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