I've just woken up. Am sitting on my bed in Bewleys. John is fast asleep across the room. My mobile is beside me. Mum has just woken up, and we're texting each other. She wants to know about the web awards, but I not telling her a huge amount because I want the first retelling to be on Trust Tommy.
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John had been iffy about going, so when I came home from CentreStage, my first port of call was his room. It was decision time. Dad had said to me that if John didn't take me, he w uld. I should have been happy at the ticket to go, but I didn't want to drag him up to dublin. He'd only be going for me, and it'd take up a lot of his weekend, so I said that if John didn't take me, I wouldn't go. We talked about it. John didn't want to go because he wanted to work, so Dad suggested the train. Genius! So we agreed to get the five-to-four-train to Dublin. It was 15:06 at the time
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The train went via Limerick Junction, before we alighted and hopped on the Cork-Hueston train. I sat down in more comfortable surroundings (i.e with a table) trying to estimate to the nearest thousand how many times Mulley has made this trip.
John on his iPhone and the Twinkle app, found that there was another Twinkle user on the train. He wanted to try some sort of wacky scavenger hunt for the dude, but I convinced him not to, citing that "sure, we'll see the guy getting off the train". This mollified him.
Though the twitter-ers tweets, we identified him as Conn, and offered to share a taxi. We saw him getting off the train, and I put my first face to avatar. We jumped in a taxi outside Houston and made the 10 minute journey to the Radisson. I remember being outside the door and thinking "5 minutes from now, I'll have met Damien Mulley". I make ya sound like some celebrity, don't I?
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In the door I met the man himself. Dressed simply in white t-shirt, jeans and -wait for it- camouflage converse shoes. He was smaller in real life. I don't mean that in a height sense, but his reputation really proceeds him. It's like that poster for Star Wars episode one, with young Anakin walking in Tatooine, with the shadow of Darth Vader against a wall. Did I just liken Damien Mulley to Darth Vader? No, I didn't. Damien, please don't send your ninjas out!
He left to change into his suit and we mingled with the guests. I met the first one or two -of way more than I expected- people who read the blog here, and I enjoyed my first meal since breakfast. The queue started forming so we said we'd join it. Who was behind us? only Enda Crowley, also known as "endac" on twitter, and 'contrar'. With him was someone who we thought -but wasn't- his brother, Alan.
We get to the front and it comes to light don't I love making big things out of little things? I say it as if he was Bertie in front of the Mahon Tribunal!! that he hadn't booked. I guess for someone who only decided to go half an hour before the train left could maybe be excused. Never fear! I'd booked last week and there I was. I got "Tommy Collison" printed on a label (I'd later take another one, stick "(@tommyxkr)" on it and place it underneath) and I was ready to go.
I also met Alexia Golez. She's lovely, and a great laugh to be 'round. She was there with a friend and had been delegated the task of fetching the DJ's food, so our meeting was brief. We went inside another room (The IWA had booked 3) which had a free bar! They were selling all sorts of beer, wine, spirits, cocktails....Kidding Mum!
We spent a happy hour drinking Kidding Mum! and chatting. I got two friendly punches on the arm. One exclaiming "I trust Tommy!" and the other saying "It's the pancake dude".
Which reminds me, I had no idea I was so well known for pancakes. As in, I knew it was one of my traditions on the blog, like drumming (speaking of which, to my enjoyment, I did have someone come up to me and say "you're a fucking savage drummer!") but I had no idea it was as big a part as it was. I was talking to someone at the (free) bar and he said that "I love your blog and all, but I hate the way I always leave it feeling so hungry!" ... you can't wait for the video then, can you? :)
Or when Mulley introduced me to Rick O' Shea (presenter, more on him in mo). "This is Tommy Collison. Y'know, the pancake dude!" It was about this time that I really got the full scale magnitude of it all. O'Shea is a great dude as well. I mean, award ceremonies aren't what people think are usually exciting, but Rick O'Shea made it so entertaining. And yes, I did tell him he looked like Hagrid, he's still gonna shave it off. Dang.
Then again, being known for pancakes can be a good thing. John introduced me to Niall Harbison who complimented me on them, and said that once the video was done, he'd help promote it. Cheers dude!
Another cool part of the night was being mistaken for Patrick, and this happened alot. A mother of two approached me and asked me to explain about Auctomatic so she could get her sons interested in technology. Another wanted my photo for his tech blog. Me!? You're humble blogger!
In short, a great night, one of the coolest of my life. We left at about midnight and got a taxi to Bewleys in Ballsbridge.
I'm not on my own computer atm, so the video's of Rick's opening and closing speech will follow.
