It's been some time since I've enjoyed the movies even more so when you consider that the last film I watched, The History Boys, stimulated my homophobic glands as no other film has ever done before. The comeback to the cinema could hardly have been any better when last Friday I went to watch The Departed (review - 93%) directed by Martin Scorsese.

The story is set in South Boston where mobster Frank Costello (Jack Nicolson) is the most wanted criminal by the local police force. A team of police lead by Ellerby (Alec Baldwin) set upon the tracks of Costello and amongst them there is Colin Sullivan (Matt Damon) who as a child grew in graces of Costello, and now is a mole in the police force for his old mentor. Billy Costigan (Leonardo Di Caprio) is the other hot-shot who graduated with Sullivan however because of his dirty family history, he is sent as an undercover agent with Costello's gang to incriminate the Irish mob leader.

As the main actors settle in their respective roles the two cross each other's paths without knowing the identity of the respective opponent, and the plot soon turns into a race of who'll manage to outwit the other. This keeps the suspense of the film sky-high while the two struggle with the psychological consequences of their chosen paths, and a shared girlfriend Madolyn (Vera Farminga).

While the cast is great and all the actors are outstanding I couldn't help thinking that Di Caprio's role would have been better suited for somebody else. Without taking anything of his performance, which is arguably the best one in the film, I think his face is too babyish for the role of tough undercover agent.

What I liked most about the film was that it's not the usual gangster film with gangs shooting each other. The idea of two rats on either side of the playing field is so good that you'd wish that you were the one who came up with it. Towards the end there are a couple of twists peaking in the elevator where the whole situation is resolved. I didn't find a boring minute from the 149 that make the film and I think this film well deserves a rating of 90%+ on rotten tomatoes. 4/5 stars.

Click on image to view account

Found via Stumbleupon.com

I've created a photo gallery for my New Zealand photos. Photos are going to be added with new articles in the travelogue in the travel section. You can find links to the first two galleries here in the table of contents.

You can comment on the photos in smugmug.

Come on I need some replies on this. I'll tell you why later.

• Name your favourite color and 3 words to describe why?
• Name your favourite animal and 3 words to describe why?
• Name a body of water and 3 words to describe why?
• Describe how you would feel if you were locked in a white room with nothing in it but a simple wooden bench on which you were sitting naked, waiting?

Word: gloat
Meaning:

1. To feel or express great, often malicious, pleasure or self-satisfaction. (The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language)

Synonyms: crow, brag
Usage: Don't gloat over your rival's misfortune.

This concert was probably the least anticipated from the others lined up this month (Slayer with Children of Bodom and Inflames, and Opeth with Paradise Lost) but it did a good job into turning on my concert mood. The crowd at the sold out Olympia Theatre was varied with a fair share of screaming teenage girls, elder metal-heads and even some general public. I never expected to see mammas in the crowd, and I'm not talking about mammas like the one I saw this morning which could have made the playboy centrefold.

The first supporting band was Moth Complex which played some mainstream rock with decent enthusiasm. It wasn't that bad considering they're probably still are in the early years, hopefully they'll manage to get at least half the success of Lacuna Coil. The female vocalist was wearing a girlish pink skirt which was paled by the shocking pink jacket worn by the lady with the French barrette if front of me. She was the epitome of dress code stupidity. There's not much more to say about this band, [in fact you said nothing], but I appreciated the effort they put in and I'd fancy supporting the Irish Scene.

Poison Black a Finnish Gothic band had to be the second supporting band but didn't make it because of some sort of accident, so after Moth Complex, the stage was prepared for the main act and the curtains drawn closed. At 9.00 my built up curiosity wasn't satisfied because there was nothing to hide except the formation of masked musicians that kicked off the concert. After the intro Cristina and Andrea came rushing in, both dressed in punkish white shirts and black ties. Initially I was a bit disappointed that Cristina wasn't wearing one of her sexy gothic outfits but she was forgiven soon after. All the other musicians were wearing the same matching clothes; black pinstriped shirts and black trousers. This matching attire and the formation on the stage with the drummer placed on a higher platform in the centre made the stage appear symmetrical.

The selection of the songs was from the new album Karmacode. Some of the songs played were Fragile, Fragments of Faith, Close, To the edge as well as some from their previous albums Comalies and Unleashed Memories. Without any encouragement the crowd was responsive but as soon as the main duo gave their least bit of encouragement the agitation multiplied. Probably best songs based on audience judgement where Heaven's a lie and the Depeche Mode cover Enjoy the Silence. This is where the crowd went mad, and with good reason as the both singers topped their already strong presence on stage got the crowd really going.

If I'm not mistaken this is the only Italian band that made it this far in the genre which is a good sign knowing that Italy has much to offer in the underground scene. At the end, without all the anticipation it was a great concert [didn't you promise not to use the word great] and I enjoyed it.

Your browser's homepage can be the web equivalent of tying a knot to your finger to remember something. Each time you open your browser the homepage is the first thing you'll see so if you set your homepage to something you've got to do, say the airline's website if you want to book a flight, it will act as a reminder. It's also a good way to learn about special offers. My work mate got sold-out rugby tickets when unexpectedly some seats were advertised on the club's website which was set as his homepage.

Part of Tip a day project

I'm off to Birmingham this weekend.

• For the next 31 days I'm going to write a technology related tip
• The tip has to be less than 100 words, brief and straight to the point.
• By the 17th of November there must be 31 tips
• The aim of this tip a day is to learn a small thing every day and revive the technology section of the blog
• All these tips will be posted in the technology section.
• Will I manage this? The bet is on …

Do I look like a terrorist to you? The Delta queue attendant thought so and she wouldn't even take my word that I'm working in Dublin. As if not even potential terrorists have the right to live in Dublin. The solution to this problem was providing her with an Irish bank card and a business card, however convincing the US immigration officer took some more work. I was held for further investigation in the 'staff only' office of the US customs and questioned by a Californian lady who once visited 'the dot' so everything was hunky dory. Thankfully Abdul Aziz Ahmed Iswed Laden didn't give me the explosives for this flight, but now I know the correct immigration answers for the next try.

Click on the picture for packing list

11.10 am Dublin – Atlanta 2.55pm / Delta Airlines

Lunch: Chicken pesto
Snack: Pizza Quattro formaggi
Movie: Mission Impossible 3 (2.5 stars)
Book: Kafka on the shore

At least by clearing immigration in Dublin we avoided the long immigration queues in Atlanta. The only thing I had to do here was to collect the luggage to claim it and then put it on the transfer belt to get routed automatically to LA.

4.58 pm Atlanta – Los Angles 6.28pm / Delta Airlines

There was no food served on this flight and there was nothing worth mentioning. I can rant a bit on how stupid, ugly and unfriendly LA airport is. We arrived in a terminal and the only source of information in the terminal was the baggage conveyor belt. It took me about half and hour to figure out that the terminals are divided according to the airline you're flying on. Around the airport there are signs with the airline names and you need to go to the airline terminal. This sometimes means taking a bus to the airline terminal, and again the buses are according to airline. Easy, once you know what you're supposed to do, but I've never been in an airport that operates this way.

While waiting at the standby desk I met Magda Adams and as she seemed approachable enough, I started talking to her. It happened that she was Irish and she arrived in LA with the flight I would have flew on if I didn't buy the Delta ticket. Fortuna trying to prove her repents. However, this isn't why I'm honouring this feeble humanoid, she deserves a mention because she inspired me to start playing the "I've got a boyfriend" game. All you need for this game is the ability to count. When you start talking to somebody for the first time count how many sentences it takes her to tell you that she/he has a girlfriend. Ms. Adams, whose only physical appeal was her gothic look, came second in this game managing approximately 20 sentences before mentioning her boyfriend. Sometime they really go out of their way to mention their boyfriend, I wonder whether I've got "I want to fuck your brains out" written on my head. [Face it, sometimes that’s true, but then most of the time you wouldn't have the courage to face her anyways.]

9.40pm 18th August Los Angles – Auckland 5.10am 20th August / Qantas

Movie (on demand): Thank you for smoking / Review (4 stars)
March of the penguins / Review (4.5 stars)

Half way through March of the Penguins the person sitting next to me introduced himself and asked me where I was heading to. After polite introductions I learned that Fredrick, 57, from Wyoming, was heading to Antarctica for the next six months to work as a maintenance and support handyman in McMurdo Base - the American Research Centre. This is the seventh year he's one of the 3,000 people who work in Antarctica.

He explained that the conditions aren't as bad as one usually imagines and that nowadays there are modern facilities for everybody living there. He stressed that they try to have the minimum possible impact on this fragile continent. They make an effort to recycle everything and those things that they can't be recycled, like human waste, get frozen and sent back. He also explained that when they need to build a new facility they reuse one of the existing places or else remove a building and replace it, in order to keep a low footprint on the place. Fredrick explained that sometimes researches present their research to the other people working in the research station and amongst the latest research they're studying the ways marine mammals keep up with Antarctic temperature, ozone layer research and the impact no daylight in winter has on the thyroid condition which affects people working in Antarctica. The pony tailed bearded American was flying to Christchurch because this is the closest place to reach the American research station. Curiously on the plane there were also a group of people from part of the USAP – United States Antarctic Program. [These cheats stole this year's penguin logo from the Linux guys. And by the way I managed to get a business seat on the flight you Auckland - so much for your intellectual pursuit with the Antarctic Santa Claus!!]

The New Zealand immigration is weird. It doesn't matter whether you're Escobar's successor or a North Korean smuggling nuclear weapons, as long as you don't introduce any meat, fish or fruits in the country. You'd better not mess with these people because I saw dogs sniffing apples from backpacks.

8.30 am Auckland – Christchurch 9.50am / Jet Connect - Qantas

Arrived at last!

My old ones, as I affectionately like to call them, came over for a visit this weekend. The excuse was that they had to courier my home PC here, but I like to believe that was just a plausible excuse. They arrived on Saturday morning at 2am just in time to pay for an extra night in the Twelfth Lock. Considering that the hotel is quite far off Dublin centre I was pleasantly surprised with the elegance of the place. The room was spacious with a large bathroom and a king sized bed, and the place was quite elegant.

On Saturday I toured them around the city centre making our first stop at Fox's Cigars for his shortness to spend 65 Euros on 4 cigars. Then we went up Grafton Street to St. Stephens Green Shopping Centre, a stroll around St. Stephens Green park and down Dawson Street with a stop over at Hodges and Figgs, ending up for a cappuccino in Starbucks because Bewleys was closed due to a plumbing problem. After the short tour we went for the threat of the trip - to watch a play in the Abbey Theatre called Empress of India. "Empress of India is a major new play where the profane, the comic and the anguished combine to shattering effect - to ask uneasy questions about faith, belief and abandonment." The play had absolutely nothing to do with India but we all enjoyed it very much.

After the play we killed some time at a pub for a taste of Irish pub culture, and we watched the first few minutes of Ireland getting thrashed 5-2 by Cyprus. At this rate even 'the dot' can bet Ireland. Mum must have been really thirsty because she drowned her half pint of cider before I even sipped my Guinness. In the evening we had a cheap Chinese buffet dinner in some place whose name I can't remember.

The weather on Sunday was a textbook example of Irish weather, it was raining all day. The highlight of the day was showing them around my house which says everything about the rest of the day. They were impressed with the size of my room, considering that my room at home was 3 times the size. I also showed them my New Zealand photos to officially make them the first people to see the whole set. A privilege for bringing me to the world. In the afternoon one of my work mates drove us around the coast of Dublin to Howth, Portmarnock, Malahide and up to a castle I can't remember the name (it's not Malahide castle). It was too rainy to enjoy the scenery but we tried to make most of it. In the evening we had some spaghetti Bolognese at my pal's house.

Everybody likes some encouragement sometimes and I admit I was fishing for some in the last post, and yes I liked it that there were at least 4 comments by my loyal ones. [I'm still waiting for another though ... hint sti]. As I was saying yesterday I've got this book bug at the moment and today I decided to try out Amazon Marketplace. You know when you go to amazon.com you get that "used and new from <usually by not necessarily cheaper price here>", that's Amazon Marketplace, a second hand alternative to new books. (See also half.com). The catch with this is that they only deliver these books to a select number of countries of which you, some of my loyal minions, don't qualify for. But since you made my day, [ok that's stretching it a bit now], I'm going to make you an offer you can't refuse. If you're interested in getting books from Amazon Marketplace vendors then I can get the book delivered to my house and then I'll send it over to you. Just send me a mail if you're interested.

This blog is becoming a boring, I haven't updated anything proper in ages and the last posts were all of about books. The last time I was ranting that I'm not updating the blog enough I had the excuse that I wasn't writing but I was never at home, this time this excuse doesn't hold anymore. Are there any people still reading this stuff, or have you gave up waiting for new content to arrive? [By definition I understand that if you're reading this you're still reading which this makes the question rhetorical and spurious. This doesn't mean you cannot answer it, after all if you can't answer such a simple question how am I suppose to ever find a comment in this blog.]

Sidenote 1: If you want to know when the site is updated use the RSS feeds in one of the left hand boxes, they're meant to be used by RSS Aggregators to deliver website content when it is published. Using news readers you don't have to visit the site to check whether it has been updated. That said I've overcome the aggregator buzz and nowadays I use Firefox's "open in tabs" feature to visit the blogs I want to read. I feel that newsreaders weaken the blog reading experience by turning blogs into just chunks of text as if you're reading e-mail. This is usually true for personal graphically appealing blogs. I still access the more technology focused geeky stuff through the Outlook News gator which is currently exceeding any human processable limits. [Does this mean that I'm not accessing these blogs at all?]

Sidenote 2: One of the other reasons I'm not blogging is that I'm writing personal e-mails to friends about what's going on. I know that from a purely functional perspective it's better to write a blog post once and point everybody to it, but that's not how it's working out. I still like to express myself in that vulgar language of ours. What I'm thinking of doing is to start storing these e-mails in a new folder called diary so that they'll serve as a diary for the future.

So, what's up with me? Since I arrived from New Zealand; yes, I am aware that I haven't wrote a proper sentence about my holiday but I will hopefully come to that soon. Restart. Since I arrived from New Zealand I've been preparing myself for the Irish winter. This essentially involved setting up my room to provide an inhabitable environment that facilitates more involving activities other than sleeping. The first and most critical improvement has been getting a desk. Now I can use the laptop without worrying that its heat will melt the mattress, and I haven't got to endure Bangladeshi fishy aromas when working in the kitchen. The introduction of the desk involved moving around the rest of the furniture of the room, but since you don't know how the room was before this doesn't mean anything to you. Trust my word, I moved things around. Other secondary introductions were a desk lamp, a keyboard, a mini stereo which I won from work (it's true), and the most importantly for its implication rather than usage - a telephone. I had to get a telephone line installed in the house because the wireless Internet Service Providers don't provide a service in my village (see Getting an internet connection in Ireland). Now that the cold dark nights are at the corner home internet is a crucial requirement.

This new room setup has already been tested with a positive result. I've edited all my New Zealand photos at home, whereas before similar work had to be completed after hours at work. [Does my boss think I'm working less now?] Now that this chore is ready I'm evaluating web photo albums to share the photos with you. The main requirements I have are; loads of space, flexibility, customizability, possibility of storing videos, blog integration and loads of space. The two contenders are Smugmug and Picasa web album. Smugmug has all the features I want; unlimited photo loading (the quota is on bandwidth per month), great GUI, easy uploading, blog integration with automatic picture resizing and external links, customizability and video storage, however it isn't free. On the other hand Picasa has a good overall look and feel, excellent photo management and integration with Picasa desktop, Google support and it's free, but you can only store 250MB. Any suggestions for alternatives please?

As you may have noticed from the last few blog posts I've been reading a bit recently, or rather I've got the reading bug. On my bed side table I've got 4 Euro Crime fiction books (amongst them the one I'm reading by Carlo Lucarelli), Effective Methods for Software Testing(which takes half of the bedside table by itself), Wrong about Japan (which I read last weekend), Practices of an Agile Developer, Labyrinths of reason(which I got today), and 3 small books on Latvia. Apart from this I'm watching Season 1 of the series 24, which if you've never watched before and you want to keep a hold on your social life you'd better keep away from, Rurouni Kenshin and some episodes of American Dad. Are you still wondering why I haven't been writing the blog?

[Sheamus Lives!!!]

If you go to the Irish Government Broadband or the ISP Association of Ireland websites you'll see dozens of Irish Internet Service Providers (ISP) listed but don't assume that this means that all of them are available in your area. I spent about a week researching internet providers only to find that 3 out of the 4 providers I was interested in didn't provide a service where I live. For the record I live in a larger village in Dublin so we're not talking about a sheep farm in the middle of nowhere here.

Since I haven’t got a phone line in the house I was looking for a provider which includes a phone installation fee in the broadband cost, so I short listed digiweb, smart telecom and perlico.

Digiweb claimed that their broadband doesn't use a telephone line instead they install a receiver on the roof, which I'm assuming means this will be a wireless internet connection. Nonetheless they supply you with a telephone set and free phone calls, which again I'm assuming means you're using some sort of Voip but I'm not sure. Make sure that you have got permission and access to the roof, before you even start considering Digiweb.

Smart telecom use the same lines as Eircom do, but the phone fee is included in the broadband package and compared with the Eircom package it works out to be free. Interestingly enough today in the news they mentioned that Eircom restored smart telecom's lines after cutting them earlier cut off this week following a billing dispute.

After evaluating the different packages and options from these providers I was informed that neither service is available in my area. Before I started looking at the perlico options I made it a point to check its availability, to learn that it isn't available either.

The remaining options considered were BT, Eircom and Net Source. Eircom have a good telephone sales service, great website, and fully facilities which make them a potentially reliable option, however the prices are way too high. BT have good deals and potentially the best value for money packages but the customer service and sales team doesn't do much to help with queries, and I found problems with bill payment flexibility which left me with only one option after all, Net Source.

For more information and suggestions about broadband in Ireland visit the boards.ie broadband forum.

P. S. This exercise evidenced one of the advantages of living on 'the dot'. Full coverage is a foregranted commodity.

Confederacy of Dunces is such a great book that I feel unworthy of trying to describe it. This is a description by Alix Wilber, which will hopefully lure you into reading this classic comedy masterpiece.

This book was originally written in the early sixties but was only published in through the persistence of the author's mother after he had committed suicide in 1969 at the age of thirty two. A confederacy of dunces work won the Pulitzer Prize a year after it was first published in 1981.

This wasn't a book I was likely to pick up in a bookshop but a work pal handed it over suspecting that it will remind me of a hero of mine. If I ever have the pleasure to meet Seth MacFarlane this will be the first thing I ask him: Where you ever inspired by this book when you created Stewie Griffin? It's a pity that John Toole isn't with us anymore; Ignatius J. Reilly deserved to live longer than the Disc World Series. 5/5

As much as it deserves it, it would have taken too long to retype the whole book here, so these are just few quotes to give you a teaser of the book. (References to pages are to the Penguin Books edition)

Some Quotes

[Part of the letter sent by Ignatius to Abelman (Mongoloid, Esq.)] We are a busy and dynamic organization whose mission needless effrontery and harassment can only hinder. If you molest us again, sir, you may feel the sting of the lash across your pitiful shoulders. Pg. 89

… I avoid that bleak first hour of the working day during which my still sluggish senses and body make ever chore a penance. I find that in arriving later, the work which I do perform is of a much higher quality. Pg. 99

… my mother's cataclysmic intemperance has thrust me into the world in the most cavalier manner; my system is still in a state of flux. Therefore, I am still in the process of adapting myself to the tension of the working world. Pg. 100

Social Note: I have sought escape in the Prytania on more than one occasion, pulled by the attractions of some technicolored horrors, filmed abortions that were offenses against any criteria of taste and decency, reels and reels of perversion and blasphemy that stunned my disbelieving eyes, the shocked my virginal mind, and sealed my valve.

My mother is currently associating with some undesirables who are attempting to transform her into an athlete of sorts, deprave specimens of mankind who regularly bowl their way to oblivion. Pg. 101

I do admire the terror which Negroes are able to inspire in the hearts of some members of the white proletariat and only wish (This is a rather personal confession.) that I possessed the ability to similarly terrorize. The Negro terrorizes simply by being himself; I however, must browbeat a bit in order to achieve the same end. Perhaps I should have been a Negro. I suspect that I would have been a rather large and terrifying one, continually pressing my ample thigh against the withered thighs of old white ladies in public conveyances a great deal and eliciting more than one shriek of panic. Then, too, if I were a Negro, I would not be pressured by my mother to find a good job, for no good jobs would be available. Pg. 123

… deriving from a history of our nation as written from the perspective if a subway tunnel. Pg. 126

[Part of the letter sent to Dr. Talc] Pray to him, you deluded fool, you 'anyone for tennis?' golf playing, cocktail-quaffing pseudo-pedant, for you do indeed need a heavenly patron. Although your days are numbered, you will not die as a martyr – for you further no holy cause – but as the total ass which you really are. Pg. 130

Apparently I lack some particular perversion which today's employer is seeking. Pg. 156

'So that's who that obvious appendage of officialdom was. He looked like an arm of the bureaucracy. You can always tell employees of the government by the total vacancy which occupies the space where most other people have faces. Pg. 208

However, various small bones and ligaments are beginning to wave a white flag of surrender. My physical apparati seem to be preparing to announce a truce of some sort. My digestive system has almost ceased functioning altogether. Some tissue has perhaps grown over my pyloric valve, sealing it forever. Pg. 211

… the more alert of the reading public will benefit from my account of that abysmal sojourn into the swamps to the inner station of the ultimate horror. Pg. 212

This liberal doxy must be impaled upon the member of a particularly large stallion. Pg. 216

This, I should have known, was too much for his literal and sausage-like mind. … We lunged about in the garage like tow swashbucklers in an especially inept historical film for several moments, fork and cutlass clicking against each other madly. Realizing that my plastic weapon was hardly a match for a long fork wielded by a maddened Methuselah … Pg. 230

Like a bitch in heat, I seem to attract a coterie of policemen and sanitation officials. Pg 232

'Filth!' Ignatius shouted, spewing wet popcorn over several rows. 'How dare she pretend to be a virgin. Look at her degenerate face. Rape her!' Pg 293

… My respiratory system, unfortunately, is below par. I suspect that I am the result of particularly weak conception on the part of my father. His sperm was probably emitted in a rather offhand manner. Pg. 298

… your type isn't even in the psychology books. Pg 359

[To his mother] 'It's not your fate to be well treated,' Ignatius cried. 'You're an overt masochist. Nice treatment will confuse and destroy you. Pg. 367

'Mother, I must attend to my bowels. They are revolting against the trauma of the last twenty-four hours. Pg. 368

Fortuna had relented. She was not depraved enough to end this vicious cycle by throttling him in a straitjacket, by sealing him up in a cement block tomb lighted by florescent tubes. Fortuna wished to make amends. Somehow she had summoned and flushed Myrna minx from a subway tube, from some picket line, for the pungent bed of some Eurasian existentialist, from the hands of some epileptic Negro Buddhist, from the verbose midst of a group therapy session. Pg. 389

She's out somewhere failing her blood test at the moment. Pg 390

Hostage Rescue Team agent Web London has had his worst day of his life after seeing his team members brutalized under submachine gun fire in a drug bust operation, while he stood paralyzed behind them. The best member of the force is now under pressure to prove to everybody that he hasn't turned traitor on his former colleagues and uncover what happened during that night in the alley. How did the enemy know about this secret operation? Why did London freeze before springing to action, and who's the boy he met in the alley before the attack and what was he doing there? Last man standing is an enjoyable fast pace Baldacci page turner, great narrative and great characters but this time the story is rather common predictable. 3 out of 5.

Unholy Alliance over Europe 2006
Slayer, In Flames, Lamb Of God, Children Of Bodom
Date: November 05, 2006
Place: Dublin (IRE), The Point

I'm down 55 Euros!!!!!!! but this will ROCK ... COB, Inflames & Slayer ... WOW

National Geographic now has it's own podcast. If you haven't yet hopped on the bpodcasting bandwagon this is a great chance to try out this new internet fad. You'll find the expected National Geographic topics here like travel, geography, wildlife, and Science News.

If you've never read anything by Murakami then Kafka on the shore is a great book to check the author out. If you've read Murakami before then this is more of the same greatness. The story runs in parallel between the life of a runaway fifteen year old Kafka, and the life of an old illiterate Nakata who has experienced a strange traumatic experience in his childhood and somehow is able to talk to cats. Amongst other things there's a mysterious brutal killing which the protagonists seem to be connected to. Like his other books sexuality is prominent this time venturing into more taboo subjects like the Oedipus complex, brother-sister love and elder sex. From this scenario you already start to appreciate that there's something intriguing about the situation, something that keeps you turning pages rapidly.

What I like about Murakami's books is that he creates strange surreal scenarios like people conversing with cats, fish falling from the sky and WWII soliders appearing from forests, which make you question the meaning behind this symbolism, if there is any at all. This was the best book from the other four under review. 4.5 out of 5.

Some Quotes

"Not to boast or anything, but I can't write either," the cat said, licking the pads of his right paw. "I'd say my mind is average, though, so I've never found it inconvenient". (pg 49)

"… Symbolism and meaning are two separate things. I think she found the right words by bypassing procedures like meaning and logic. She captured words in a dream, like delicately catching hold of a butterfly's wings as it flutters around. Artists are those who can evade the verbose. (pg. 262)

"Listen every object's in flux. The earth, time concepts, love, life, faith, justice, evil – they're all fluid and in transition. They don't stay in one form or in one place for ever. The whole universe is like some big FedEx box." (Pg 309)

"Perhaps most people in the world aren't trying to be free, Kafka. They just think they are. It's all an illusion. If they really were set free, most people would be in a real pickle. You'd better remember that. People actually prefer not being free". (pg 339)

"Things outside you are a projection of what's inside you, and what's inside you is a projection of what's outside." (pg 379)

"Why does loving somebody mean you have to hurt them as much? I mean, if that's the way it goes, what's the point of loving someone? Why the hell does it have to be like that?" (pg. 432)

Hello people of the world, I know you were missing me but I have returned. Like all good things the New Zealand holiday came to an end. I had a good, no, a great fantastic, wonderful, awesome time and everything went according to plan (how could it have been otherwise? I didn't have a real plan). Now I'm back to work severely jetlagged with a totally screwed up sleeping and eating schedule. I'm writing this at 6am. As usual after the holiday I'm left with more holiday work, I've got the sort out the video, and this time also the photos. This time I'm not going to bother with a complete travelogue but hopefully will write some notes on the places I've been to.

Yesterday I went to watch my first football match at Lansdowne Road Stadium in Dublin. The title in this morning’s Irish Independent was "Ireland suffer worst defeat at Lansdowne Road in 40 years". Since I’ve been here we had the wettest march, the driest summer and the worst soccer defeat. Hope Lord Mayor is not reading this blog lest he decides to chuck me out of here.

We arrived 10 minutes late and we had to collect the tickets from the ticketmaster stand at the other side of the stadium. By the time we got in Ireland we already loosing 1-0. The game ended 4-0 with 2 goals scored in each half. Pretty bad for my first game but then I’m used to it from back home. The last score I remember between ‘the spot’ and Netherlands was 0-8, so we’re half as bad here.

On a better note, tomorrow I will be finally leaving for New Zealand. This time I’m pretty much guaranteed to at least arrive to LA after I (this is a bit of an overestimation) paid for my first transatlantic ticket with Delta Airlines. I will be spending three weeks in Kiwi land then back to Dublin, so the blog will be pretty quite during this time.

Just my luck!!! When did the damn Islamic terrorists decide to bomb planes? Why should you ask a question which such an obvious answer? The day before I was flying to the US, of course.

Yesterday morning my father woke me up by an early phone call from home to tell me that any hand luggage must be stored in clear plastic bags because there was a terrorist attempt in Heathrow. Partly because I was still a bit shaky from the previous (birthday) drinking night, and partly because I was still asleep I didn’t register any major concerns and went to work as usual. It soon hit me that the situation was disastrous as everybody in the office stared at me as if I just turned white as I opened the office door. Flights from Ireland to London were being cancelled as well as several flights leaving from Heathrow. To cut a long story short I spent the whole day deciding whether to risk flying to LAX on Friday or not. The problem is that with cancelled flights on Thursday people will need to be reallocated on the following days which leaves no chance for flying on standby. At the end I decided that the least risky path to avoid remaining uselessly stranded in London was to delay the trip to NZ by a week. A very very shitty day indeed.

This means that I’m going to spend my birthday in Ireland after I celebrated it prematurely last Wednesday. It’s probably going to be one of the worst birthdays to date. At least I’m getting some birthday boy treatment at work having my mates singing happy birthday and taking me out to lunch. I took a chocolate gateau in return.

Some stories for future reference:

• UK raises threat level to critical
• Passengers face disruptions
• Travellers braced for day of woe
• Agent infiltrated terror cell

I've been living more than writing these last couple of weeks so I've neglected the blog quite a bit. These last few weeks have been a good mix of work and fun. At work I had to work fast enough to make up for the three weeks I'm going to be missing and the rest of the days I felt the urge to enjoy the good Irish weather while it lasts.

In the same way that May was the wettest May in the last couple of years, this summer was the driest summer too, in fact farmers in the countryside were panicking that there wasn’t any rain. We're not talking months without rain here but a mere two weeks. The weather is too hot of a topic here, whether it's cold, rainy, cloudy, sunny or humid rest assured that someone is going to complain. I must say that I enjoyed the Irish sun without the thermometer hitting the 30 degree mark so it was all great. In fact thanks to the good weather I pumped up my fitness level cycling and jogging.

Work is all good, and the best indicator of this is the fact that I don't feel the need to touch anything related to computers after work. It means I'm having a healthy dose of technology during work hours which decreases my geekiness. I've realized that since I've come to Dublin my technology page has never been updated which probably suggests that I'm working at work.

The last weekends were purely social events. Three weeks ago I went to Donegal and met some very nice people at the hostel I was staying at. Two weeks ago I had a birthday party where I had the opportunity scavenge a partly nibbled appetizer table. And this weekend my old school friend from Birmingham came over for a visit. All good fun!

The rest of the story is all about New Zealand. At last the time has come to see this country. I've done lots of reading but little planning for the holiday so I basically know what I want to do but not how. This will be a new traveling experience particularly because I'm traveling alone for a longer period of time. In these last couple of weeks I've started to rethink my self perception of being a social scarecrow considering I've been mixing quite well with new company. Let’s see what will happen in Kiwiland.

I'm leaving for New Zealand next Friday so most probably this will be the last post for the next couple of weeks. This time I'm note going to promise to upload a full travelogue of the journey on the blog because I've never managed to do so till now. Although I can't deny that I'm secretly hoping that because I've not promised to do it, I will manage to write it all and upload it here.