Thursday

Today is our annual meeting with the company who designed and maintain our company's website, so Claire and I are heading to Manchester for the day to see them. I head out of the door to go to Euston, and at that exact moment I get a text from Claire telling me that she thought her wallet had been nicked, and that I should just go to the office. No more than 30 seconds later I get a second text telling me that she's found it. Panic over - and what is already a stuttering journey north no more than foot from my front door can continue.

The wallet-finding has delayed Claire, so I wait for her at Euston and we end up running for the train with a minute to spare. It's not too busy on board and the 2-hour trip to Manchester Piccadilly goes quickly as we collaborate to defeat my iPhone at Scrabble and discuss the issues we need to go over with the web people.

On arrival at Piccadilly we're told by phone that the best way to get to their office in Deansgate is to get the tram - which is rather exciting as, despite having been to Manchester many times in the last few years, I haven't been on the tram since I was much younger. We probably get a couple of looks as we show ourselves to be the hapless Londoners adrift from the familiarity of the tube - staring blankly at the ticket machine and the list of meaningless stops. Luckily my vague local knowledge gets us through and soon we're on our way towards G-Mex and the meeting.

The meeting itself goes well, although the lunch they regularly provide isn't nearly as good as it used to be (I get over this, though, and manage to put away several little sandwiches in the 3 hours we're there). We stay a little longer than we should and miss our stop back on the tram - meaning that once again we have to run to get the train and I take my seat a slightly harrassed, sweaty mess. Luckily Claire knows the remedy - and gets the beers in. She's a pretty great boss at times like this!

We get back to Euston at around 6, and, despite the slightly surreal feeling of having made a 400-mile round trip to stay in Manchester for 3 hours, I get on the tube and head to Wandsworth to meet Kathryn from work. She's not had the best day so we take a seat at a pub on the river bank and have a couple of pints, before getting a call from Tim to tell us that he and his girlfriend are in The Cock on Great Portland Street.

Another short train ride and tube ride later and we're with them, supping the much cheaper Sam Smith's pints and gradually getting rather drunk. Neither of us have had anything to eat yet so we leave at a decent hour - stopping to pick up an unwise bottle of red wine on the way - and grill up some lovely quarter pounder burgers for a boozy dinner.