Bubbly, chocolate and bingo...

This week I have been mainly attending Christmas events - well two anyway, and both very relevant to library and information.

On Tuesday, I attended the University College and Research (UC&R)  London section and Colleges of Further and Higher Education London and South East (CoFHE LASEC) Christmas quiz in Holborn. As the two groups will merge from January to become the Academic and Research Libraries Group, it was a chance to meet up with fellow committee members. We will hopefully know more about the future of the committee once the minutes of the UC&R AGM have been written up. I would still like to continue to be part of this special interest group and ensure further education, as well as higher education in further education and the issues librarians face in these roles are still supported and represented by CILIP.

On Thursday, I attended the London and Information Knowledge Exchange Christmas meal. The evening was lovely and the people were exceptionally friendly and welcoming as always. The evening started off with a glass of bubbles, shortly followed by a game of Mingle Bingo. This was a game where we had to match up a list of talents or facts with the people in the room. I spoke to lots and lots of people - asking 'have you had a bumper grape harvest this year?' proved to be a great opening line!

We then sat down and ate our Christmas dinners, pulled crackers and opened our Secret Santas. We had all been requested to spend £1 on a gift  - I received a Thornton's chocolate Santa so was very pleased and I gave a pink Santa hat with the word 'Princess' emblazoned across the front - very fetching!

I then won a box of Hotel Chocolat as 1st prize in the Mingle bingo!

So not only did I come away with a lot of chocolate, but also with the residual feeling of having experienced a great atmosphere and the names and 'interesting facts' of lots of people. I intend to continue attending LIKE events, they are always interesting and informative. I have learned a lot from them in the year that I have been attending their events and they have become so popular that there is now also a Northern version. I'm hoping to use some of their magic dust on the ARLG in the New Year.