FMUKCON Manchester - Saturday 5th April 2014

[alythonian]

Glad you all had a good time. Sorry I didn't make it, but Justin Timberlake tickets were very hard competition for you!

[Preston1990]

TheFirstMrsPreston1990 and myself have just arrived back home from the absolutely splendid Manchester do.

And, can I just say, what a fabulous fun-filled time we both had!

It was great to meet up with so many of the lovely people that I feel I've come to know on the FMUK site over the years. To be able to finally put faces to names was just awesome.

We'd especially both like to thank everyone who's hard work, hospitality, organisational skills and efforts made the day such a great success. Take a bow Diane65, Steve, Yogi and the rest of the Manchester group - you all did a fantastic job!!

We were both extremely impressed with Manchester and it's blend of old and new architecture - what a vibrant eclectic City!

Like Andrews said - we'll definitely be returning soon for a longer visit.

[ejwrank]

Feel quite certain that you meant TheOneAndOnlyMrs Preston1990! So glad to hear that everyone had such a splendid time in Manchester.

[chelle1973]

Me and my mum really had a lot of fun with everyone. We can't thank you guys enough for taking us under your wings like you did! I am still laughing at MrG not 'pushing' that door open........after running down the stairs (100feet) and then having to go alllllll the way back up, thinking the door was locked! Good excercise though!

[TheyCallMeMrGlass]

Well I had a truly awesome 2 days with the wonderful company of the United Fmukcon in the Midlands!

DAY ONE

First stop was Glossop on Friday evening by which I had promised the glories of the universe, its secrets and answers to everything about life, all from a little piece of greenery called Manor Park and my telescope.

The answers however, came not from Manor Park where I mercilessly traumatised my fmuk friends through a gruelling regime trek through canals, a miniature railway line straight out of Lilliput, a threatening swarm of hungry ducks looking for revenge as we had no bread for them, ordering poor Baty on crutches to climb over a fence at the edge of a canal (with an encouraging nudge from Steve to keep up the evil prank), only to find Baty believing me and ready to do it, that I had to stop her and call a halt to my evil doings, then an uphill walk on high roads with no pedestrian path, dodging speeding cars at which point I was close to living my last day on Earth, not from getting hit by a car but via impalement by the crutch of poor Baty.

But No, the answers to the meaning of life and the universe came not from any of the above, it all came in the form of home made Jacket potatoes, chillie con carne, rice, garlic bread and carrot cakes. The sacred answers were right there in all its divine revelations.

The Cosmos closed it sky doors to us so that we can understand who we really were and what we, the fmuk posse, were about. It was about sharing and enjoying the unexpected delights, the simple things in life, together.

Let me rewind to the beginning. How would I have known that upon small talk chat with my lovely and awesome cottage landlady, Julie, whom I just simply told her why I was in staying in Glossop, that she would then say to me, why dont I invite all my friends to the cottage and she will cook jacket potato meals for all of them. That way I wouldnt have to carry my telescope around and furthermore, she warned with a mysterious smile...Manor Park is invaded with...teenagers.

Teeanagers? Who are these strange creatures? But forget that..invite the fmuk posse, all 7 of us to dine and stargaze at "my" cottage? What an awesome gesture! So I immediately relayed the idea to Diane and PXC whom I had to go back to the station and meet. Both, responded positively as I hope they would. So PXC, OH and I chilled out at the local Ale house getting slowly drunk with a series of "half" pints of 5.9% ales while we wait an hour or so for Diane and co to arrive. Then Diane texted me saying there will now be 14. Whoa...14! Now "my" cottage was only a two room guest house and so the dining area was certainly not meant to accomodate 14 people...then diane texted again..."plus you 3"!..uh 14+3...17!!! to which PXC coaxed me in replying with "stop inviting strangers in your train carriage!". I had a feeling of excitement but a heavy doubt that this would be good news for my landlady and I certainly didnt want to be imposing so as I called her back informing of the "slight" increase in number, I had to add that it was such a lovely gesture but I understand if that is too many to accomodate. Her reaction was "17!! Oh my! that is a lot...I only have about 12 plates..." I knew the answer would be an understandable no-go but then she continued "but wait I think I it will be ok, I will call my son and ask him to open up his workshop and I think I can still cook the food for everyone". Perhaps my poor kind landlady might be suffering from shock and a lack of sense of reality as we are talking about an impossible 2-3 hour notice here but she seemed insistent and confident. ok...brilliant!

And so that was how the meaning of life, the universe and everything started to unravel...and as we fast forward back to our impromptu grand jacket Potato feast in "my cottage", my truly awesome landlady then produced the bigger surprise with a large platter of freshly made carrot cake for everyone. I then asked her if she can give me a local cab number for Baty and OH to return back to the station. She said no. Oh. Then she added she will drive Baty + OH to the station herself...

Julie of Allmans Heath Cottage, landlady of the century in my book.


But thanks so much to Diane for grouping all the wonderfully sporting locals together (it was wonderful to meet all of you, thank you all for coming) and PXC too for keeping me in check with my potential evil doings having downed a few 5.9% vol local ales.

And especially to Baty who smiled all the way, not a "I'll get you" twisted smile but a smile of sheer determination to meet the challenge. You were great, Baty, such a trooper, I'm sorry the walk turned out longer than I thought with that uphill stretch, though!

Ironically as I walked everyone else back to the station the skies opened up to me and so I took advantage of it with me telescope treating Julie and her family to the tour that I had promised the fmukers. I promise I will come back and give you guys another opportunity as I so love it here anyway :)



DAY TWO

Then came the main event, the second day, in which our supreme leader Diane, was truly in her element, demonstrating her awesome leadership powers, all day long, orchestrating, taking care of, and meticulously shepherding a decidedly wayward fmuk herd!

And what a fantastic fun day it was. I thoroughly enjoyed it. Again, it was great to meet familiar faces and new ones from extreme ends of the British Isle.

We started off with a gentle introduction to the streets of Manchester City going through the Printworks centre of arts, restaurants, nightlife and cinema but the first major stop was a wonderful cathedral in which a couple of female musicians were rehearsing for an in church concert that would be starting in a couple of hours. Their music, one on a piano and one on a flute was enchanting, sweet and lovely that, even though they were just rehearsing, we were compelled to take a seat and enjoy it as they played through bits and pieces of all of their songs, much like clicking on the amazon preview tracks of an album.

Next stop was the Town Hall, a striking building with an intricately sculptured interior that oozes a sense of fascinating history which Diane (in her expert guided tour narrative which she maintained throughout the day), had pointed out that Manchester fmukers were also part of as they attended a tea party screening of the Iron Lady here, and that it was also filmed there too. Well done for being part of an extra chapter in its history! Unfortuntely, half the fmuk party did not hear Diane's rich narrative as they continued walking PAST the town hall, in another aimless direction. So on Diane's orders I ran after them to bring them back, and so we entered the town hall, walked down through it and exited through the back which effectively made this the most fascinating "tunnel" I have walked through!

Steve then took the lead as we approached the Football Museum. Now I dont follow footie so I didnt expect to be much interested in this particular attraction but I was pleasantly surprised. While this is not a theme that excites me, I was very impressed with its presentation of Football's fascinating history through well designed aesthetic layout of media, interactivity and historical artefacts including some very odd looking footballs one of which looked like a Quidditch "quaffle" and another that seemed painful if you were to header it. There were four floors and no doubt a paradise of footie history and a glorious shrine to footie fans.

We then continued on walking through the bustling Saturday shopping crowds towards our next and main destination, Mizzouri. A plush looking bar and restaurant in which Diane, yogi+OH brilliantly hosted a fun dinner event including a swopshop and a deviously challenging team movie quiz created by Yogi. I partnered up with Chelle and her mother and together we totalled up a very respectable 20 score just two short of the winners (congrats to Jeanelle, Weliveandbreathwords, and vealster). However i robbed my team of victory by answering three questions correctly, only to get a last minute panic of doubt and change what would have been the correct answers to the "wrong"ones doh! Great fun though. The biggest laugh for me, however, apart from Steve's relentlessly funny jabs and jokes at Diane came from the staff of Mizzouri. As we ordered from the menus we were greeted with:

"Sorry, we out of Scampi, sir..." Followed by,
"Sorry, we out of fish and chips, sir..." Followed by,
"Sorry, we out of Milk, sir"...

Despite the fact, I was one of the victims, i found it an hilarious Fawlty Towers moment.

We then moved on to The "Steve Library". Wow, this has got to be the most diverse library I've seen anywhere that I've been in the world! Steve must be proud to be part of this. It's got books. Ok it's got a lot more than just books, there is also a hands on musical instruments section (in all honesty I didn't see it there was so much here just not enough time!), a vintage archive multi screen centre in which we can watch a wide selection of archive movies. However being a video games player I headed straight to the games consoles section to try out the latest generation consoles. joining me was Rawxor whom I thought I would teach this youngster a thing or two about real game playing mastery and skills given the surmountable experience that I have...naturally, she proceeded to whoop my ass at Assassins Creed IV Black Flag...hmphh. Next to this games console section was the young adult fiction which we browsed because of course I totally fall into such category, ahem.

This was a library that we all completely dispersed and lost ourselves in, I could spend hours in this place. You lucky locals.

And so we moved on to our mini excursion trip on a bus to wow, what is this place...Media City! A futopian looking mini city flaunting its eye catching modern architecture. Such a contrast to the charming age old buildings and bustling crowd of Man City. There is a lot here but wisely Diane has us spend more quality time at less attractions than to rush through everything the city has to offer. So our first call was to scale the heights to the top of the Shard, the highest building in media city via an unnerving rickety and vibrating lift that upon arriving to the summit, everyone exited with haste and a somewhat sense of relief. The rewards were great though, I could even see Glossop where I live in a little cottage for three days and also the hills of the Peak District, great views. I saw a couple of fmukers looking a little queezy, their eyes momentary looking at their feet for some reason and then suddenly looking straight ahead with rigid intensity. Curiously I looked downwards towards my feet too, then wobbled. I realised why they had such a reaction. The "floor" was a thin series of grates which you can see right through them to the bottom of the building, holy crap. I decided to walk down the stairs for "fun"and Chelle also had the same idea at the time. Upon reaching the bottom, I found the doors locked, I pulled and pulled and it wouldn't budge. Neither Chelle or I were exactly ecstatic at that point and so we clambered back up god knows how many flights of stairs, around two or three flights from the top, we met steve1981 on his way down. As the other Steve wasn't around, I was free from evil influences and so angelically I told him the doors were locked, instead of just letting him continue all the way down. Steve1981 thought it was quite tragic that he had to climb back up three flights of stairs. Chelle and I looked at each other with a clear regret that we didn't let him continue all the way down.

Having reached the summit and taken the lift down, we noticed that people were coming out of the exit doors at the bottom of the stairs. Curiously I looked closely at the door signs and it said turn handle and Push...uh push oh oh. Chelle didn't talk to me for the rest of the day, justifiably, having also robbed our team of top prize too!

We then explored the Imperial War Museum that exhibited war artefacts from WW2 tanks to wow, Harriet bombers. There was even a simulation of the blitz using sound effects, light and shadows. Once again another very dynamic presentation museum. Also on exhibit was a huge couple of twisted metallic frames...remains of the The World Trading Centre. It was exhibited as a somewhat of a centre piece attraction but something didn't feel right about it, and as Suel3288 also approached nailed my niggling feeling, saying "this isn't a war piece, its a remnant of a terrorist attack". Completely agree. However, they probably displaying it for the sake of the stupid terming of "war on terror"...so a little political debating thrown into the convention, Steve also adding interesting views on old Manchester regiments.

Diane than summoned us to the Lowry to catch the last 10 minutes of the gallery. Although there was much more to explore in this grand mini city there is of course only so much one can fit in a day trip, but it was certainly enough of a great taster to come back again.

With a few of us now departing for trains back to hometowns, steve led the remainder of us to the city pubs with Diane keeping a careful watch on him and the route he is leading us on, with the odd definitive "no you are not taking them in there" and so we had another nice group chat and then ended the day eating at Picaddilly station where our numbers had now dwindled down to about 8 until I was the only "guest" left as I could take any train back to Glossop. Diane, Steve, yogi+OH, kindly kept me company but I told them to go home, as they looked so tired, even Diane was unable to override my mutinous command to retire. Diane started hosting since 7am so it was well overdue to now relieve them of their hosting duties regardless of how much they enjoyed doing so.

Now this was an fmuk con to remember. Thank you so much Diane, Steve, yogi+oh, suel3288 and clxo for being such fantastic and charming
hosts and organisers and for allowing me to join in the hosting services briefly for Friday's trip to Glossop even though bizarrely, it was really my landlady that took the centre stage.

After sleeping over another night in Glossop, no telescope viewing this time as the cosmos decided to finally shut its doors on me too almost as if to say, mate enjoy your stove fire in the cottage and go to sleep. So I did. On my third and final day, after bidding a farewell to my awesome landlady who gave me a lift to the station as she had done on my arrival (how many landlords do that?), I decided to spend the last several hours in Manchester rather than Glossop. So I explored the city again and took a trip to awesome Media City but having had such great company previous day I felt a little lonely in not sharing the experience so i decided to watch a movie, Noah. In the Lowry shopping centre. Awesome film but that's for the film thread....

....bloody hell you read this far?!?! Thought you would have fallen asleep on the first paragraph.

Forget Comic Con forget Empire Big Screen. FMUK CON in the greatest city in the world according to Professor Brian Cox is where all things rock !!


Looking forward to 2015 FMUK CON Edinburgh :)

[Sunny Saver]

Ahhh, I wondered what the landlady, jacket potato business was about. Glad you explained.

I feel knackered reading on everything you did. After that eventful reading, I have to go to bed!

Edinburgh... Can't wait! I hope it coincides with our annual trip there.

[baty]

Got back at about 6:30pm today, would like to say how much we appreciated all the effort from Diane, Steve, Yogi (+ his OH for being my carer during the long walk), the amazing MrG in 'his' cottage and his landlady julie, who made an excellent job in feeding us all. Pity about the clouds but OH did manage to point out some stars outside our TL. We thoroughly enjoyed the the Friday outing.

Meeting everyone on the Saturday was fantastic and had a great time especially on the quiz, got some answers incredibly wrong. Had such a great time with everyone. Also acquired more reading material. SorryI didn't go on the media city tour, I'm afraid as I needed to rest up a bit.

Would like to say thanks to Steve9872 for the tutorial and for finding that I still had active account to use.

Rode the free bus and talked to people who where very friendly and that seemed to be the theme of the weekend. Went to an Ale pub where we talked to 'city' fans and had a bit of banter with them, all friendly stuff.
This morning we were given a ride into Manchester Piccadilly from some Status Quo fans who were staying in the TL. We will definitely be up for visiting Manchester again.

Thanks to all again for such a friendly time

[Beate]

And someone once told me MY holiday write-up was "overblown" - ha!
Btw, who is steve1981?

[steve]

Well I had a truly awesome 2 days with the wonderful company of the United Fmukcon in the Midlands!

WHAT! why didn't someone tell us North Westerners we would've come down.
First the cap, then the short walk, then the stairs and now this. Mr G you really do have a death wish.

[Diane65]

And someone once told me MY holiday write-up was "overblown" - ha!
Btw, who is steve1981?

Our mysterious new friend
Thanks so much to everyone for a fabulous weekend and for making it so special. I love the write up MrGlass it is just perfect.

Thanks so much to Jeanelle for inviting myself and DD for breakfast this morning it was delicious - I started off with fresh coffee a vast array of fruit and natural yoghurt plus my first ever experience of eggs benedict followed by a Danish pastry and fruit juice
We then headed off on the free bus to the Museum of Science and Industry (we did the other side to where we went last week Beate) where we had a fascinating talk by a very enthusiastic gentleman about how steam engines work to power the mills learning about the governor https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rct=j ... rz8_DznpoA luckily Jeanelle and her OH share my love of engines and love learning about how things work followed by an underground visit of the sewers in Manchester. I also learnt the reason we have an airforce blue post box outside the aviation building in the museum is because that is where you had to post airmail letters and there is just one more in the country outside Windsor Castle. We then finished our sightseeing at the Cathedral (they arrived too late for yesterdays visit) and it was lovely to see it set out for the choristers from Chetham's school of music next door ready for the evening service.

All in all I for one have certainly had an amazing weekend and still seemed surreal this afternoon when I was back to food shopping and ironing. Roll on Edinburgh 2015.