General stuff

I am currently sitting in bed on what i thought would be the first morning in a long time that i would get to sleep in. But as I unwillingly suspected, I woke like clockwork at 8 a.m, not helped by the bells of both St. Patricks Cathedral AND Christchurch!! Still, its good to have a lazy morning in bed and I can't complain.

Things are moving along nicely now in college. I only have a week left of lectures in college so I have that feeling of excitement I used to get in primary school when you knew the summer was about to start, except its February! We've planned an impromptu 'Primary School Style' party for our Business Policy class on Wednesday so it'll be lots of buns, Tayto and small bottle of Cadet Orange (remember those!!!). I know its a bit of a contradiction saying a planned impromptu party, but the lecturer doesn't know about it so it sorta counts?!?



We've also planned, booked and paid for a house in Galway for a week after our exams. It sleeps 19 and so far there are about 30 odd going!! Not everyone will be there at the same time I don't think so it should be grand. I've seen pictures and I can pretty much guarantee that it wont look like when we leave!!

In other news, the Smurfit Kappa Graduate Programme I applied for, and had high hopes of getting accepted into, has been CANCELLED! DAMN YOU ECONOMY!!!!! SO its back to square one. Although I did apply to the IBEC Exporters Programme so fingers crossed on that one!! If i get that one I get to work abroad for a year which would be deadly!!

Ever since the recent closer of Road Records i've started moving away from the bigger stores and online stores for my music. Its a shame to see great small independent shops like that closing. If it wasn't for them, a lot of new emerging bands would never get a chance or somewhere to sell their music. I've started going to a shop in temple bar, City Discs. They have a great range of new and second hand CDs and vinyl and friendly staff who don't remind you of Jack Black in High Fidelity! I can't stand that know it all mentality! My latest purchase was Katie Kims album ,Twelve. Its kind of hard to describe what genre her music is. She puts it nicely though:

"new old school fantasm blues folk revival yodalik rock post mccarthyism drone noise phsyk horse tail blowing old wave eastern western style wicker stringed indian high pitch glam metal sometimes dub butnever reggae salsa cuban rave indie shoegaze alternative psykadelic shadowistic breakbeat old style needle rippin round chord scratchin up underneath sampled covertunes with dutch americana underlying bass house techno whistling classical guitar trench beatnick revival downtempo eclectic popsure galant freefolk bollywoodesque 70's grunge glass bottlecore hard range fast slowjam boroque noirscreeching howls of epic sandpits over the top egorock with softblend unfunk soul jazz experimental type leghopping on micleads overtures blended amongst yogurt samples jumping over kraut style accapella ecstaticism brass horn string teasing drunk gospel choir vocals drowning in sounds of bigdrum appreciation type gold recording on leather squeeks punching heels water plops above ambient chinese traditional concrete disco french fusion bossa grindcore industrial lyrical lounge religious tape music which brings punktrance and visual zoup type undertures into a world of ever the expanding."

Those are her words not mine!! I particularly like 'over the top egorock with softblend unfunk soul jazz experimental type leghopping on micleads overtures blended amongst yogurt samples jumping over kraut style accapella ecstaticism'. Rounds it up nicely I think!! Check her out at her myspace and listen to the song called 'Radio". Its amazing!!!

Other than that I dont have much more news. A neighbour from home is heading to Australia in a week or so, so we're all heading out for dinner in Patrick Guilbauds tomorrow night hopefully (yum!).

Trocaire 24hr Fast

While having lunch today, the college chaplain Sr. Mary came up to me and the lads and asked us if we were interested in doing the Trocaire 24hr Fast, kind of ironic seeing how we were stuffin our faces!! I had done it a few times in school so I thought 'Why not?' and signed up. For those who don't know, Trocaire is an Irish charity who do pretty much everything in most developing countries. They cover everything from tackling the HIV AIDS crisis to building a reliable way of life for people in the third world so they are a very worthy cause.

A new part of the fast is an online service that lets people sponsor you online by credit/debit card. So here's my sponsorship website so you've no excuse!! It only takes a minute and there are so many ways your money can make a difference. For instance, €35 would provide seeds and trees for a family left impoverished by the conflict in Uganda. This would help them to grow food and provide wood for construction and fires. Any amount is useful no matter how small!!

I know this is a Christmas ad but the massage is still important.

Another One For Good Measure

Sex on Wheels!!

Need I say more?!?!

Twitter??

Does anyone use Twitter?? I understand what it does but why? With everything else out there, why a service that lets you write a sentence? Facebook and most other social networks have similar features built in so why? I'm not saying I dont like it, just curious why!

Anything to add?

Song de Jour

Here's some classic Fonejacker!!!

Druids Glen

I spent the weekend with the family down in Druids Glen Hotel in County Wicklow. It was Dads birthday so we decided to take him away for the weekend. It was great to get away for a bit and see the brother.



While we were there we made a quick trip to Greystones to walk on the beach. Wicklow is a part of the country i've never really been to much before and it was nice to explore it a bit.




Also, on the way back we had some time to spare so we made a slight detour and visited Glendalough. Glendalough is monastic site built in the 6th century by St. Kevin which was destroyed by the English in 1398. What's left today dates from around the 10th century with the round tower as the perfect example.






Overall it was a great weekend. I was glad of the rest and some good food and drink. Back to the grind stone!!

Its been a while!!

Back again!

Its been well over 6 months since my last post. It was a busy summer and my blogging duties slipped somewhat. Or altogether would be a better description. A lots happened since then! I worked with Dad in Castlecool for the summer which was fantastic. While I was there I got the opportunity to redesign the logo and company image. Well I didn't design it myself but I found a great agency to do it. They're called Dynamo and when we finally sign off on it i'll give you the grand tour. Aside from that, I was also given the role of contract manager for Lindt chocolates and was responsible for ensuring that shops got their chocolate orders on time (there was more to it than that but I could be here all day). It was really busy but great experience!

In September I started back to college in the final year of my Marketing degree and now i'm half way through. Its REALLY different from my last four years with much more case based learning and at least two presentations a week! I used to get anxious when I had two a year but its amazing how used you get to something when you're forced to do them every week. So at the minute i'm just working away at college stuff. My dissertation is slowly but surely taking shape and I only have six weeks of class left till my final exams. Its hard to believe that in four short months i'll be done with college (well for the immediate future anyway).

I moved back into my old apartment complex in Christchurch lat week after living in Stonybatter for a year or so. Its good to be back because there was feck all to do in Stonybatter. Don't get me wrong, it's a grand place to live but compared to the city centre it's quite slow and there's not a whole lot to do in the evenings. I will miss living so near to Pheonix Park but you cant beat a 5 minute commute to college in the mornings!!

So things are pretty much the same as always but I will be posting a lot more often now so watch this space.

P.S. This is one of the funniest things i've ever seen!!!

Stains the Australian Shepard