The next SOUK meet is happening this weekend, on Saturday 2nd April. We’ll be meeting up at The Knights Templar in Bristol, a brief walk north from Bristol Temple Meads train station – feel free to arrive whenever’s convenient, I’ll probably be there from around 1pm onwards.

As those of you keeping track may have guessed, the Winter 2010/2011 meet has had to slide for a few reasons (mainly down to confirming peoples’ availability and my lack of availability during this time). However, the March 2011 meetup is most definitely on, marking the 20th anniversary of the Shining series on the 29th, and will be held on either Saturday 26th March or 2nd April. Chances are this will be held somewhere in the Bristol area as previously planned (still need to confirm a venue), though this is still open to negotiation.

This may also mean a slight shuffling of meets later in the year. Plan is to have a London meet sometime in the summer (i.e. June/July/August), and the Liverpool meet may be shifted to sometime in November. Again, these are open to negotiations at this time.

Oh yeah, I found I had a photo from the last meet (Liverpool 2010) lurking on my camera phone earlier this week, and have added it to the media page (along with some follow-on comments on a couple of Walchy’s pics). Click here to see them.

- We’re looking into the possibility of holding events in Bristol so folks in the South-West have convenient access. We need to decide whether or not to do so now or later in the new year (i.e. probably March 2011); the alternative would be The Willow Walk, London (i.e. the usual venue).

- A date hasn’t been decided, but would most likely be sometime in December or January.

Knowing which weekends would be ideal for anyone wanting to attend will help with deciding on a date that suits as many people as possible. It would also be very helpful to know whether or not you’d prefer a Bristol or London meet (or if you can make it/feel indifferent to either) for deciding on a venue.

And yes, I know we’ve yet to get a follow-on to the September meet added. In brief, it was pretty swell, not least because of it being our biggest turnout yet and led me to getting the SHF3 cover of GamesTM issue 100.

Plan is for it to be another Northern meet – probably at The Ship & Mitre in Liverpool if we don’t decide on a different venue beforehand. As for dates, the 4th and 11th of September are the pair of jokers we seem to be deciding between.

Although I still need to sort out overnight accomodation for myself (which I can’t do until we’ve confirmed a venue), I am planning on driving up to the meet, so any Southern members who are interested in coming along and are prepared to spend a few hours in a car with a “P” plate may want to get in touch (i.e. reply to this post).

General discussion were had by the three of us on various Shining and non-Shining things, and it looked like the turnout was a record low with the three of us… until around 6pm when things started getting busy again in preparation for the England match. We decided it was time to move on to somewhere else to eat, then Kazgaroth finally turned up in the nick of time!

The four of us headed down to the Founder’s Arms, a restaurant Gately knew near Waterloo (the others initially had somewhere else in mind, but I misunderstood the plan and got the wrong tube ticket >.> ). It was a nice bar and restaurant (albeit pricey… luckily Walchy offered to pay – to a limit!), and although it was a touch cramped we were able to get an outdoor table so it wasn’t a problem. We were also able to catch the England v USA match – or at least guess what was happening from the oohs, aahs and cheers!

I had to head off a bit early (having the Falklands memorial service in the morning), but I gather the others headed on to Gately’s lodgings for a bit of an afterparty!

Pub details: http://www.jdwetherspoon.co.uk/pubs/pub-details.php?PubNumber=1169

More info can be found in the thread at Shining Force Central: http://forums.shiningforcecentral.com/index.php?showtopic=16070

There was some discussion at the last SOUK meet about holding one in May, around the time of SFC’s anniversary. Also, I gather there were thoughts about alternative venues, as not everyone was too keen on London anymore.

Feel free to post suggestions for dates and venues that’d work out for anyone hoping to come along. I’ve also set up a thread on Shining Force Central’s GC forum to discuss the topic: http://forums.shiningforcecentral.com/index.php?showtopic=16070

I hope to see you there!

Looks like we’ve pretty much settled on a date for the meet next monh, so I’m putting forth that the next Shining Only UK meet will be on Sunday January 3rd at The Willow Walk, London (i.e. the same place as previous London meets, more info here: http://www.beerintheevening.com/pubs/s/48/489/Willow_Walk/Victoria).

I’ll take this opportunity to add that, as stated in previous posts, this will also be a send-off bash for Alpha before he moves overseas, and a thanks for the work he’s done to set up this site and help getting the meets started and arranged.

As it’s a Sunday, and I’m not entirely sure how long they’re open until on Sundays, I’m going to suggest we start the meet-up from around 1-2pm in case we have to leave earlier than usual (from my experience Wetherspoons are open for a while into Sunday evenings, but I’ve never been there long enough to know their Sunday quitting times). Of course, don’t feel obliged to be there that early feel – free to turn up at whatever time’s convenient for you!