Merry Christmas

I hope this picture turns out alright. It's a composite of pictures I took yesterday in town. It's the Galway Cathedral and middle arch. As you can see things are lookin' exceptionally festive as this year in Ireland it was, indeed, a white Christmas! The cheeky cherub in the bottom right is Fiona after getting the last of her shopping done in town before heading up to Mayo for Christmas eve with her Dad on Inismacatreer.

My Blackberry's not working!

This is hilarious! For those of you unfamiliar with the Two Ronnies, you owe it to yourselves to look them up. This is the remaining Ronnie up to his old tricks.

Our trip to Ireland

We made it! Compared to some of our travel companions who'd be en route for days on end we had it pretty easy. Even so we had a hell of a journey but in the end arrived safe and sound in Moycullen, Co. Galway.

A little list of laughter

I know a post composted entirely of pictures I think are funny isn't everyone's cup of tea, but it is mine, so I take it with milk and no sugar.

It's all you need!

Peace, Love and Star Trek, what else could a person ask for? How about Star Trek on demand anywhere in the world?!?! (well it works in England at least) Check this out....

http://www.allstepisodes.com/

It's the most amazing thing I've found on the internet since Chap Hop! (Which appears on my blog only a couple of posts ago but, based on the amount of surfing the web I've done, is actually a significant time ago!) In fact, this has really blown my mind! Think about it, you've got the original series, The Next Generation, DS9, Voyager, and Enterprise all at your fingertips!!!!! Even as I type it my enthusiasm boils over!

I know I'm not the only Trekkie out there, so don't judge, just enjoy!

Art for arts sake

I saw this and though it was very cool, I hope you do too. The only thing I find dismaying is all the paint left on the red brick wall at the beginning of the clip. Check it out...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uuGaqLT-gO4

The site I found this guy on was very cool as well. Have a look see and see for yourself. Poke around a bit. There are enough items on there that you'll need never again feel uninspired.

http://dornob.com/best-of-blu-famous-stop-motion-graffiti-artist-in-action/

I look good!

Go to faceinhole.com and have a browse around. Although I doubt you'll find anything quite as disturbing as this one!

The Chap-Hop war wages on!

It seems that the rap scene in England is a more diverse platform than I had hitherto believed it to be! It seems that there's a war waging in the relatively new genre of 'Chap-Hop'. A chap, for those unfamiliar with the movement, is a very particular type of gentleman. If you'd like to learn more you can find all the information you'll need at The Chap, a local English publication of note and of no small influence.

As Chap-hop is a burgeoning musical tradition there are only, as far as I can tell, two artists vying for recognition as England's preeminent gentleman rhymer. The first is Mr B The Gentleman Rhymer (yeah, I've appropriated his name for rhetorical value) and in this short clip I hope you'll get a good sense of his style, although he does have a rather sizable body of completely original material as well.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6t28COxEp2k

His competition is Professor Elemental. In this clip he's responding to Mr B's presence in the chap-hop scene in a rather eloquent but in no way convoluted manner. It was actually this video that first peeked my interest in the Chap Hop scene, and I'm only including it second as it references Mr B explicitly and I had hoped to avoid any confusion or ambiguity regarding the song's subject.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0iRTB-FTMdk

So, now that you've familiarised yourself with the Chap philosophy, and with the works of both Professor Elemental and Mr B the Gentleman Rhymer, I shall leave it to you, the reader, to discern for yourself who is the most deserving of England's recognition and admiration.

Despite my best efforts

No matter how hard I try, or how long I go without trimming or shaving, I will never beat this cheeky little bastard!

Well played sir monkey, well played indeed!

My flippin' phone

The title of this post would be more apt if, in fact, my phone were a flip phone. It is not, but it is annoying me. It works well (most of the time) and has a lovely camera. Sometimes when I don't have my actual camera with me it's nice to be able to snap a picture on my phone and capture the moment. Sadly, and despite my best efforts, I'm unable to transfer the pictures from my phone to my computer. I have a connector cable and drivers but it won't recognise my phone. My phone has blue tooth but my laptop does not. I have 100mb of free internet use that includes e-mails sent from my phone but I don't have a phone that allows me to send e-mails.

I'll keep at it and we'll see if I can eventually sort something out!

Words to live by

Travel light - preconception and prejudice are unnecessary luggage.

Road trippin`to France!

Why not? I've been living in Reading for about 6 months, haven't been anywhere outside the home counties yet, and the cost split 4 ways for petrol and the round trip ferry ticket made it too good an offer to pass up! We're gonna hit up Lille the first night and then off to Paris for the 2nd and then back over to the UK for the 3rd. Not a trip I would fly for, but taking a car somehow works for me!

I've contacted friends in both cities that I made a few years ago when I first passed through France, and hopefully the 4 of us will be able to find a couch together but who knows? I'll take lots of pictures though, and post, perhaps, the best 3 or 4 of them!

Hallowe'en 2010 - National Stereotypes Party

This hallowe'en we partied with the Couchsurfing community in Reading. Danielle was the good intentioned Canadian lass who hosted the fete and imagined the concept. Said concept simply put was two fold...

1) You must have a costume to attend the party.

2) You must dress like a stereotype of your nation of origin.

As you can see we leapt at the creative opportunities these rules afforded us! Fiona donned her finest Leprechaun outfit while I sported the rugged attire of a hearty Lumberjack!

Fiona did get a bit carried away with all the jigging, but it was much to the amusement of the other party guests and especially it's host. Some of the other national stereotypes we bore witness to were...

Spanish bulls

English farmers and teapots

Hungarian porn actresses

German tourists and Bavarian milk maid

Romanian vampires

American cowboys, hicks, gangsters, Nascar girls and the statue of liberty (there were a lot of Americans at this one)

Lebanese suicide bombers

Brazilian surfers

There was also our hostess who donned the noble attire of the Inuit. This is a picture of the two of us together, the Canadian contingent, making merry with a little maple syrup! You know how antsy in your pantsy you can get after gulping down a few swigs of the sweet sweet sap of a Canadian sugar maple!

Truer words were never spoken!

`Every Time You Shave, A Moustache Dies` by Dead Cat Bounce.

I think it pretty much speaks for itself!

Now that you`ve heard their argument, go out and grow a moustache!

Seeing double

Inspired by a picture taken a few years ago but recently remembered, I thought I'd make an attempt of my own. I'm quite happy with the results!

Jamie likes to be bad abroad!

Jamie recently came to visit and he brought the devil along with him. Together we tread the cobbles 'neath bow bells seeking neither fame nor fortune, instead just having a good time. In London we hit up the portrait gallery where we each worked in pastel to reproduce some of the modern art in an impromptu artist lead exercise, checked out Camden Market and took pictures of some of the city's main attractions.

At first Jamie found the whole experience somewhat surreal, but before too long he got excited!

Then he just got carried away!He's home now, in Canada, and England can breath a sigh of relief. I, however, will miss the guy.

Quick update,

So here's the craic...

Yell Adworks has decided that it was time to set myself, and a few others from the office, free to explore other opportunities. Not having loved the job in the first place this wasn't the end of the world, but loving the people that I worked with, having no savings left and needing some sort of steady income does make it a bit of an issue.

Thanks to sick days and having had my pay staggered by a week means that I now have 2 weeks of paid time which I can use to find a new job. I've been looking into the areas of hospitality and tourism because, at the end of the day, those are the industries that I think I'd like to work within. In that vain I struck out this morning, on my bike, to have a look around at what options I had in Reading city centre. My search was depressing. Reading is a renowned 'clone town' which I find disheartening in many ways.

T'was at this point that I decided to head to my little beacon of non-clone comfort, the Workhouse Coffee Company for a cup of Joe, a seat atop the sacks of coffee in the bay window and a read of my book. T'was also here where I got chatting to the proprietor who asked where I was working. When I informed him of my situation and my interest in eventual entrepreneurship, he said he was keen to make me a part of this team. I expressed an interest and will drop of my résumé later this week. The catch is that the money stinks. The upside is that they're willing to teach me everything involved in running the shop. The better news is that they're willing to have me work another job to earn a good wage and then work around my schedule in order to take me on board!

I don't know yet how this will all play out, but it certainly seems promising!

Is it just me?

... or is this the same guy?

My diabolical tea scheme

Each morning I purchase, from the coffee bar downstairs, a large cup of tea for 40p. But unbeknownst to the establishment I have, over the weeks, amassed a selection of teas in my desk drawer. For herbal or green teas I reuse the café’s paper cup and all I have to do is add hot water from the coffee machine before I can enjoy a steaming cup of bliss.

For a cup of PG Tips I have a far more sinister tactic. I reuse the café’s paper cup, pop in a tea bag and hot water and head for the elevator. Once in the lobby I make my way over to the café but instead of going to the counter I aim slightly to the right and walk up to the carafe’s. It’s at this point that I adopt a nonchalant aire and casually milk up my brew ‘till it’s colouration indicates the perfect timing for delicate application to my pallet.

Minor infringement or massive disgrace? Have a look at the math and you be the judge …

Black tea

40p x 2 cups a day x 5 days a week x 16 weeks = £64 total savings

Herbal/Green tea

50p x 2 cups a day x 5 days a week x 16 weeks = £80 total savings

Please note that the only real cost to the café is a splash of milk which probably only measures a cup every 2 days. The rest is just good economics!

Ah ha ha

I was inspired by someone at work who was checking out her friends profile on facebook. I know it would appear that I seem to post only things that in some way IMMEDIATELY refer to myself, but what's another self portrait between friends?

H-U-W-A-K-K

This was sent to me today by a college at work. I have no idea what it is but I love it!

Kyle Smith

This is a picture of my good friend and yours, Kyle Smith. In reality it's William the Conqueror (or William the Bastard, depending on your particular historical preferences) but I know that Kyle Smith secretly longs to be like him!

Canada Day in Trafalgar Square

Yesterday we went to Canada day in London! We saw a load of great Canadian bands including Radio Radio, Hawksly Workman, Sarah Harmer, and Jully Black! We ate bison burgers and had a Tim Horton's Doughnut! We had our pictures taken with a Mountie and I signed up for a Canadain social club in London and the mailing list for Canadian music in Europe! I also bumped into this guy...

But he wasn't as scary as he looked, and after a few beer, and one accidental bomb scare, we all lived happily ever after! Oh Canada, what a great day!

As it turns out

Well, it would apear that I've been pfaffing around with the HTML of my blog for the past 5 years (sweet Jesus! It's been 5 years since I started this blog!) when low and behold, I could have just abandoned the whole thing and picked a new template from blogger.

I'd known that was an option for a while, but I didn't know I could make something look as cool as I could! I'm still going to try to personalize my blog a bit, but I decided that it was time to upgrade a little. (hopefully everyone can read the text on this blog!

So in addition to that, Ayden has been over to visit England and it was great to get a chance to hang out with him! It's been 3 years since we really hung out, and even before that, with me living away at University, the time we spent together was limited! It was good to see him and I'm going to miss him now that he's gone back to Canada!

The pictures I've posted were either taken by or of Ayden on our bike trip out from Salisbury over to Stonehenge! Because we took the old byways we ended up spending a great day together and seeing a lot of countryside in the bargain. I hadn't realized how much I'd missed being outside and breathing the fresh country air! (I mean that literally! It's not a figurative reference to the wafting scent of bovine feces!) I'm going to make a point to do this more often! Fiona is keen as well, so I think we'll be railing and trailing on weekends in the near future!

It's a small world...

... but there's a LOT of it to see!

visited 19 states (8.44%)

Create your own visited map of The World

A new London

So yesterday Fiona and I took the train into London to visit Ayden and I was introduced to Camden market! I think forever more, it will be my absolute favourite part of London! It's likeMarket! Needless to say it's worth checking out!

After that we went down to Brick Lane for a curry and then pints in Bar 1001 and the 10 Bells.

In Camden I bought a brown bowler very impulsively and then found I was very dissatisfied with it! Ayden and Fiona were both surprised by how quickly I bought the hat and then immediately regretted doing so. Despite my worst fears and fortunately for me, the man I bough the hat from allowed me to return it!

The whole experience left me hesitant to spend any money, and thus for the rest of my time in the market I didn't. Now I regret not buying a proper brown bowler from another shop we'd passed, but at least in future I know where to get one, and the price I should be looking to pay for it!

About a boy

And the boy is me!

I've been back in Ireland now for almost a week, and then I head over to Reading again tomorrow morning. It's been good to be back! It makes me a little homesick for the place!

There's a magic about this place. Something that gets inside you and leaves you always longing for more! It's a laid back nature of the place, the easy going attitude of the locals, and the likelihood of a walk down shop street ending in a random party on the beach where you meet a man who lives in a hole in a tree and paints teapots for a living! Its just that kind of city! You're allowed to be yourself here, and so long as recreational drinking and random adventures are your thing, you'll find a home in Galway.

It's going to be hard to leave the place, but leave I must! For now...

How 'bout this one?

Blast from the past?

Lego my... lego?

So... the profile pic above or the one below? Which one do you like?

http://www.reasonablyclever.com/?page_id=31

Mashup

These are all great songs on their own, and DJ Dain has done a good job of mashing them all together. It's a bit long, but if you're just listening to it, it's a lovely, gentle song.

http://soundcloud.com/dj-dain/dont-worry-im-yours-mashup

Hope everyone likes it.

Once again

I have again stumbled upon a random jem off the internet. I have no idean what it's about nor do I know what it means, but I am open to suggestions from my loyal and caring readers!

So... that laptop...

The laptop is not a Mac, it's a Toshiba.

It is also no longer in my possession. I returned it when the track-pad didn't really respond well and the model on display had the same problem. I did however lose $150 on the deal because of labour BS. But I guess that's my own fault!

Sorry to leave everyone in the lurch about that! I know you were all probably on the edge of your seats and checking back 2 or 3 times a day to find out how the whole thing concluded!

Heavy Petal

Hey, check this out! I haven't really looked through it myself, so, if you wanted to kind of give me a summary, that'd be cool!

http://heavypetal.ca/

And if you feel the need of a diversion, check this out... (no summary needed!)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KmjLqddPqZQ

New Laptop!

So yeah, I got one! A new laptop that is! In fact, it's what I'm typing on at the moment and updating the ol' ColourCircus with. I'm still unsettled about the purchaise. It's a big expense but it's something that I want and it's going to make my life easier.

I think.

But I have 13 days remaining to decide if I want to keep it before Father Time makes the choice for me.