Meeting people is easy

There's a school of thought that says that bloggers are self-pitying self-centred loners who can't face the world and who blog in order to create a simulacrum of social contact whilst clinging to the Sartrean mantra "Hell is other people".

What a load of bollocks.

I spent last night with several fellow local bloggers - given the prior arrangments and organisation, I think the occasion could be justifiably dignified with the label 'blogmeet' - and can report that not only were we unafraid to expose ourselves to daylight but we also had a thoroughly good time in each other's company.

I won't deny I approached the evening with something akin to apprehension - what if meeting people in the flesh destroyed the online personas I've come to love reading about? Thankfully, any fears were completely unfounded.

The designated venue was George's on Broadway. This was the first time I'd been there, and I defer to Alan's description of the place except to add that I've never before drunk anywhere that's had marshmallows rather than peanuts on the bar, and two disgruntled cherubs and a large grandfather clock painted on the wall. To be honest, any place with a lax attitude towards closing time secures my approval immediately...

When I arrived Buni, Alan and Mish were already at the bar. We soon retired to the sofas in which you can sink never to return, and the wine (and beer and gin) flowed like water while the conversation flowed like wine. Predictably, of course, politics and philosophy were off the conversational agenda whereas the joys of Nottingham, the phenomenon of reality TV and the imagined contents of the Diva Towers cellar were not. A few long-held secrets were spilt, and I took the opportunity to continue the current SWSL mission to convert everyone to the Church of The Futureheads by recommending them to Mish's "young man" Martin when he complained that punk did away with harmonies.

Then, demonstrating his dedication to the cause, Mike turned up unexpectedly with K, despite the fact that they'd just arrived back from what sounds like an intermittently torturous holiday in Peru and were suffering from severe sleep deprivation. More beer was drunk, more shop was talked, more secrets were divulged, more snippets of gossip were exchanged - and numerous photos were taken, at least in part to prove that it all really did happen.

It being a school night, the party disbanded at around half midnight with George still merrily dishing out the shots behind the bar. We have to do it again (though not, as Buni suggested, more sober), not least because I never got the chance to speak to Mish or Buni at any length.

Looking forward to it already...