GASS
MINUTES OF MEETINGS PAST........
For the less technical GASS members - below is just a list of the past meetings - to see the actual MINUTES you click on the little box marked 'SEE WHAT HAPPENED'. Use the mouse and go 'CLICK'.
I mention this as I am sick of GASS members not seeing all my hard work, the photos, the videos, the witticisms, hours of graft - all wasted because half our members can't click on a link. I get that it might be because they can't read - but still click, there are lots of coloured pictures to enjoy!!
MINUTES of MEETINGS
APOLOGIES - I have fallen behind with the minutes. Partly because I am naturally lazy, partly because I thought nobody read them, partly because WhatsApp took over as the quickest method of communications. I have now realised that just maybe, the minutes and photos on a website ARE a better method of keeping a record of our enjoyment in meeting once a month and doing STUFF.
I will update the site as quickly as I can. Brian
MARCH 2024 - HUGH'S MAGICAL MYSTERY TOUR
ORGANISED BY HUGH & (MAINLY OR WHOLLY HUGH)
A "BRING YOUR PASSPORTS EVENT" so goodness knows what the amazing Hugh will conjour up!!
FEBRUARY 2024 - PUB MEETING AT THE PARK GATE, HOLLINGBOURNE
ORGANISED BY WAYNE & LEN (JUST WAYNE REALLY)
Wayne knows his stuff. Do the organising, keep it close to home, nice meal and on budget under the new GAASSS(NW) rules. Sadly I wasn't there so have no clue what happened. On the bright side we are coming out of the winter into spring and so the more lively meetings start cropping up. More Awaydays and more Entertainment meetings. So no news is good news and no SEE WHAT HAPPENED BUTTON
JANUARY 2024 - PUB MEETING IN AN INDIAN IN KINGSHILL
ORGANISED BY PETE & TONY
Once again, a weird choice, but a successful one. Pete lives on the edge of Bearsted, Tony lives in Bearsted. But they both choose a restaurant on the outer edges of the GASS orbit, in Kingshill, any further out it would be an awayday. Weirdly though it was very well attended. There were some dramas though...........
DECEMBER 2023 - A TRANSVESTITES/BURLESQUE CLUB IN LONDON
ORGANISED BY OWEN
This was our Christmas do. A really good turnout meeting in a pub nearby before wandering round the corner to the venue in a cellar squashed onto three round tables to enjoy dinner and a show provided by some tubby birds strutting their stuff to a very mixed audience of couples, hen parties and us.
NOVEMBER 2023 - THE ROSE AND CROWN - PUB MEETING
ORGANISED BY GARY & PHIL
The second meeting under the new regime. Gary and Phil take a different slant on 'staying on budget' at a pub meeting. A slightly more disciplinarian approach which ruffled a few feathers, completely unnecessarily as it turned out.
OCTOBER 2023 - BABASHEEKSHA OR 'ANDY'S BIG NIGHT OUT'
The first meeting under the new regime whereby pairs of members arrange one meeting a year each, 22 members, 11 pairs, 11 meetings. Every meeting has a budget. Pub meets £800, entertainment meets £1,000 and awaydays £1,200. You gets yer money and yer takes yer chances! Andy did a sterling bang-up job, but at a cost! He forgot to charge a surcharge and ended up treating his mates with £400 of his own cash!
AGM - SEPTEMBER 2023 - BARCELONA
Another year another AGM, This time only 11 attendees (3 ill, 2 away on hols, Len did not like the venue and Ollie thought is was way too costly. As it turned out 11 was just fine and B11 was formed!
AUGUST - HUGH'S CARS AND DINNER
We gathered at Hugh's to be shown an array of amazing cars and a one hour lecture on ground source heat pumps, followed by an equally amazing three course dinner plus CHEESE, and Hugh paid for the lot!!
CLICK HERE TO SEE WHAT HAPPENED
JULY - TEN PIN BOWLING, MAIDSTONE & DINNER
A quick trip down memory lane as we all chucked great big round stones down a wooden alley.
CLICK HERE TO SEE WHAT HAPPENED
JUNE - BLINDFOLD DRIVING AND ROCKETEERING
One of the most expensive meetings ever with a whopping surcharge - made even funnier by Ollie forgetting to bring any beers.
CLICK HERE TO SEE WHAT HAPPENED
MAY - CHATHAM DOCKYARD ROPERY VISIT AND DINNER AT KGV
A very entertaining and informative visit followed by a great KGV dinner.
APRIL - CLOSE UP MAGICIAN - ROSE & CROWN, HARTLIP
Another amazing example of just how easy it would be for close-up magicians to get rich if they went to the dark side, and simply knicked everyone's watches for keeps.
FEB & MAR - NO IDEA, I WAS AWAY AND SO NATURALLY NO BLOODY RECORDS KEPT.
JANUARY - FAREWELL TO THE KGV
A sad night as one of the GASS mainstays bit the dust. But a lovely evening was had by all, depsite the tears.
DECEMBER 2022 - 40TH ANNIVERSARY AT CHILSTON PARK
A real post-covid blowout at vast expanse. Dinner jackets, dancing girls, great food and a very funny secret Santa.
NOVEMBER - WITCHES DINNER ?
OCTOBER - KAYA MEZE - GREEK RESTAURANT IN ROCHESTER
A visit to a new Greek diner in Rochester.
SEPTEMBER 2022 - AGM SEVILLE
A lovely town with a lot to do and see.
AUGUST - SAND YACHTING RYE
A traditional 'if it ain't dangerous - don't do it' approach to meetings, arranged by an actual doctor. Just looking to see what accidents he could cause then treat I guess.
JULY - PUNTING IN CAMBRIDGE
An attempt to see if we could drown Andy and make fools of all of us, with added strange guest of Hugh's
JUNE - MEAL ?
MAY - PARTY DINNER AT HUGHS NEW PLACE
The unveiling of Hugh's new party palace and GASS HQ.
APRIL - QUADS AT WEST MALLING
An entertaining and demanding run round the hills of West Malling in Quads.
MARCH - TAPAS IN ROCHESTER
Dinner in a Tapas in Rochester, just as it says above.
FEBRUARY - WAR ROOM VISIT GRAVESEND
JANUARY - MEAL SOMEWHERE
DECEMBER
LIFESIZED MONOPOLY
Another Covid overshadowed event which while entertaining was a bit muted in an abandoned London. with almost empty streets.
NOVEMBER
HANDCASTING
We met at Stede Court for an event the involved shoving your hand into a bucket of cold slime and keeping it still for 5 minutes. The aim? To cast us giving various V signs, the finger, thumbs up and anything else you wanted immortalised in plaster of paris and then painted in lifelike technicolor. Dinner was upstairs in the GASS party room.
OCTOBER
ELECTRIC KARTING
A visit to SOAR ELECTRIC KARTING and their new venue in Gillingham. Really, really hard work as we drove round what seemed like a thousand laps of a tight twisting circuit listening to the whine, not of the electric motors thrusting us foward, but Stuart moaning about how he had been robbed of victory! Then on to the opening night (part 5) of the KGV.
SEPTEMBER
THE BEST AGM EVER!!!
PONTINS at PAKEFIELD for what was without a doubt a one off! The most unique and unusual AGM GASS has ever enjoyed! It was amazing! You really had to be there. Brian was overwhelmed with comments on how it broke all the records, how totally off the wall it was. Guys, guys, I get it. It was unrepeatable and I thank you.
AUGUST
COCKTAIL MASTERCLASS
A trip to East London to attened a masterclass in how to make (and drink) six cocktails, which ended in a masterclass in smashing the place up. On the bright side nobody cared as were all pissed as parrots,
JULY
CAR RACING
Another visit to our favourite West malling corporate entertainment venue, this time fro three driving events. $ wheel drives, rally cars and trials cars. Everyone got soaked, covered in mud - and had a fine oild time.
JUNE
PAINTBALLING
Something we hadn't done in years was a great success - for those brave enough to come and fight it out on the field of battle. Sadly a number of our number decided to make up a whole host of excuses to arrive late and drink all the beer!
MAY 2021
BIG BOYS TOYS AT GARY'S
Out come the sports cars. the big bikes, the specials, all parked up on Gary's amazing spread to be admired by all. Dining on gourmet burgers and drinking fine non alcoholic beers (a worring new trend for GASS).
The pubs re-open at last!!! At long. long last. The meeting was held at 3 tables of 6 a la Covid-19 regulations and was at The Gardeners Arms, Higham with beers and pizzas, plus the long awaited accounts.
APRIL
PUB MEETING
MARCH 2021
BUSINESS MEETING
A pre-budget business meeting to discuss the lessons learnt from the pandemic so far regarding grants, support, furlough etc.
Two increasingly badly attended ZOOM meetings during the lockdown.
FEBRUARY & JANUARY
ZOOM MEETINGS
DECEMBER 2020
TURKEY SHOOT
A great day out just before lockdown with a clay pigeon shoot 'flurry' competition followed by a genuine Turkey Shoot with bows and arrows.
October saw another poorly attended ZOOM meeting hated by all concerned, November was much better as we held a Business Meeting prior to the American Presidential Election.
OCTOBER & NOVEMBER
ZOOM & AMERICAN ELECTION
The AGM held as an outside sports day, instead of a week in Turkey.
SEPTEMBER 2020
AGM BUSINESS MEETING
An amazing opportunity to see how Spitfires are put back together during a restoration.
AUGUST
SPITFIRES VISIT
Our first visit to Ian Blackmans great shoot and outdoor pursuits set up at West Malling.
JULY
CLAY PIGEON SHOOT
Another boring ZOOM meeting with nowt to report.
JUNE
BUSINESS MEETING
The second ZOOM meeting where we all baked a cake and told a joke in a competition.
MAY
ZOOM BAKE A CAKE,
TELL A JOKE
Our first ever VIRTUAL meeting - held on the newly famous ZOOM app. 20 attendees and 4 hours of laughs!!
APRIL 2020
COROVINUS MEETING
February was held at The Ringlestone pub and after being tricked into thinking our entertainment was a male stripper, he transformed into an amazing close-up magician. In March we met at The Harrow in Stockbury for dinner.
FEBRUARY - MARCH
FEB - MAGIC NIGHT
MAR - DINNER STOCKBURY
GASS goes Greek Dancing at Ela Kendro in Gillingham. Everyone joined in with the prancing and the plate smashing.
JANUARY 2020
GREEK DANCING
At the Kent County Showground where we enjoyed a dinner and dancing with 2000 other guests.
DECEMBER
CHRISTMAS DINNER
We went to Wayne's club in Ashford for a pool and snooker competiton and dinner.
NOVEMBER
DODGEMS, SKIDWHEELERS, PILLOW FIGHTING
OCTOBER
SNOOKER POOL
We went to Wayne's club in Ashford for a pool and snooker competiton and dinner. Naturally Owne and Ron won.
Off to Palma for a lovely long weekend with a nice interlude of Quad bike riding, lunches and dinners. As usual a great time together.
SEPTEMBER 2019
AGM IN PALMA MAJORCA
A lovely summer evening at the Rose and Crown in Hartlip were we admired each others toys. Len's big new shiny Bentley being the star of the show.
AUGUST
BIG BOYS TOYS
JULY 2019
KAYAK TRIP IN LONDON
A pub crawl using kayaks! Meeting at Limehouse for a few followed by a two hour kayak in two man boats to another few pubs in Stratford and Hackney Wick. Bloody hard work!!
JUNE
DODGEMS, SKIDWHEELS
& PILLOW FIGHTS
Diggerland played host to a variety of challenges at what turned out to be a really good evening.
MAY
PRISON ISLAND
A spell in Maidstone Prison, not the real one mind you, but a great version of the Crystal Maze where you had rooms upon rooms of puzzles to solve, then dinner at The Herbalist in Maidstone
APRIL
THE ARTFUL DOODLER
MARCH 2019
BOW TIE TYING
(THE ART OF)
FEBRUARY 2019
TOBBOGANING
CHATHAM SKI CENTRE
JANUARY 2019
JEDI KNIGHT TRAINING
A caricaturist came along to the Rochester Function Rooms and drew funny pictures of everyone.
Dinner at The Three Tuns in Lower Halstow where we were introduced to the noble art of being able to actually tie a bow tie properly. The instructor was one Keith Robinson, ex RSM in the Coldstream Guards, so discipline was tight.
A chance to try out the steel urinal tray, some 500 meters long, on a downhill run to glory, then dinner.
Yup, you read it right. We added Light Sabre fighting to our wide range of martial art skills. A complete evening of roughhousing with lethal light sabers. Our teacher first broke us down (in true martial art format) and then built us up again into a truly awesome fighting machine. You had to be there to believe it, or you could see the video and almost be there (me? - I'd just use my imagination).
DECEMBER 2018
THE TWO DINNER CHRISTMAS
For reasons that really are inexplicable we had to endure each others company not once, but twice! And on consecutive days as well. Two Christmas slap-up dinners, one at Langans, one at Kits Coty. Click on SEE WHAT HAPPENED below to - well, see what happened I guess.
NOVEMBER 2018
BOX AT GILLINGHAM F.C
We had two adjoining boxes of Tuesday 2nd October to watch Gillingham V Blackpool. We had a hot and cold Buffet for our dinner and there was a bar in the box. Having waited a whole extra month for this the excitement was at fever pitch!!!! God knows why.
OCTOBER
DINNER MEETING IN MAIDSTONE
Due to The Gills changing the date of their battle against Blackpool to next month the promised excitement of watching 22 men kick a pigs bladder round a field was postponed in place of a lovely dinner and the surprise appearance of Doctor Ollie Else (Ollie! Ollie! Ollie!).
SEPTEMBER
A.G.M IBIZA TOWN
A whole week with 16 guys loose in Ibiza - what could go wrong?
Would anyone throw a paddy? Who would come out the winner?
GASS ON THE RAZZ IN IBIZA - the full story.......
AUGUST
AXE THROWING
Up to the Smoke for some mayhem. Knife crime? This is Axe crime!!! Proper stuff. You'd win any fight this way - providing your opponent stood (a) perfectly still, and (b) exactly 4 meters away. Oh, and it would be good if Graham was throwing the axes. Me? I'd still take a gun.
JULY
BIG BOYS TOYS
An opportunity to bring out the big smart cars, calssics and current models. We took over the car park at The Hook and Hatchet and then enjoyed a dinner while watching the World Cup football match of England v Belgium.
JUNE
PETANQUE MATCH
Chris organised an unusual PETANQUE match and a dinner at the Stockbury pub that is now owned by the locals.
MAY 2018
NOT WATER POLO, DINNER AT THE POWDER MAGAZINE
Tony failed miserably to organise a game of WATER POLO as no swimming pool would even consider taking GASS on a variety of spurious health & safety grounds. The alternative was for 11 members to go for dinner at The Powder Magazine restaurant in Upnor and apparently spend over a £1,000 on dinner. This is despite the fact that they all know they only pay £40 each to GASS. Shame nobody had the decency to have a £60 a head whip round. Here we go again.
APRIL
THE BUTCHERS BLOCK
Andy organised a STEAK DINNER at the Butchers Block in Burham. Great Steaks! Really good turnout.
MARCH
END OF AN ERA DINNER
The formal 'End of an Era' dinner at The Roffen to say goodbye to a fantastic club and a venue for many GASS meetings over the last 35 years. This was also the dinner where Graham said he "was bored with the meetings in 2017".
That did not go down well with the Obergurppenfueher.
FEBRUARY
DINNER AT THE DUKE OF WELLINGTON
A pleasant dinner at a lovely gastropub. Sadly no photos, but we did at least agree to go to IBIZA for the 2018 AGM so something good came out of it.
JANUARY 2018
BURNS NIGHT DINNER
GASS honour the famous poet in fine style at The Roffen Club, complete with piper.
