Ciaran's Blog

There Isn't Enough Time

2006-01-09T21:25:00.000+00:00

I dunno, but I never seem to have enough time to get things done. For the last while, I've been really busy, even though I'm not that busy, if you get me. Even though I think I don't have that much to do, I still can't get around to doing it all.

A perfect example of me not being able to do everything I want to do, is keeping my blog up to date. When I come home from work, the last thing I want to do is spend another while browsing around and blogging. I get home from work at about 6pm or so, and stay awake until at least 12am, sometime even as late as 2am, but I still can't do everything I want.

I guess the biggest thing that I'm not getting done is reading. I have a big problem when it comes to books. I CANT go to a bookshop without buying a new book. Even though I know I have about 15 books at home ready to be read, I still buy more. And I'm not even making a significant dent in the books I already have.

I'm actually joining the gym at work tomorrow. When I first started work in July, I had a month where I could join with no joining fee. I didnt join then because I knew I wouldnt have anytime with hockey and all. And since then it's been £100 to join, on top of £22/month for off-peak membership. So as it's New Year's resolution's time and the gym recently changed management, I figured that there is probably some deal to encourage more people to join. Last Friday I enquired about the fees, and what do you know, the joining fee has been waived until this coming Friday. Am I a genius or what?

I've made a health screening appointment tomorrow for 3.30pm, so as of then, I'm a member. It's handy because I can join with a months notice. If I find myself not using it, I can just quit. It'll be nice to be able to go for a swim or hop in the jacuzzi during work if things are getting a bit much. I work on the 2nd floor and the gym is on the ground floor, so it's really convenient.

I also want to do some weights on top of my fitness I get through hockey. And I can try my hand at squash too. The lads I live with and those at work all play it, so I can now play. The courts are free to members.

Anyway, I am confident of making a go of the gym. While there are loads of people joining the gym around now as part of their new healthier lifestyle, I am not one of those to pack it in after a week.

So it remains to be seen how I fit in the gym too, but I should be able to work it in.

Its Almost Christmas

2005-12-23T13:50:00.000+00:00

T-2 days (or so) Things here at work are really slow. Firstly, there's practically nobody around. Most of the people on my team are on holidays or are working from home. Of the few of us around, we're just waiting out the clock until it's time to go home. It's the first time I've been around an office on the last working day before Christmas, so I'm not sure when I can take off.

The stock exchange is already closed, meaning that a huge chunk of people are already gone home. It just feels like everybody here is already on holidays, except they're physically at work. Added to this holiday (as in time off, not in a "Happy Holidays" sense) atmosphere, it was the Children's Christmas Party today at work. Loads of people brought in their children and had them running around the office. This totally made me do no work.

Anyway, just researching the best way to Stansted airport tomorrow. I'm going to get the DLR to Stratford and then a bus to Stansted. I'll have to be leaving my apartment at 8.15am tomorrow to make the 9am bus, which will get me there for about 9.45am or so. My flight isn't in until leaving until 11.30am, but there's no way I'm missing my flight home for Christmas (unlike my diaster going to Chicago, which I still have to blog about). Stansted is probably going to be mental, so its a good idea to get there early and relax. Based on my experience with airports recently, something is bound to go wrong!

So Merry Christmas to all my readers. I'm probably not that sad to blog on Christmas Day, but you never know! (Depending on how long I'm at work today, I may blog again)

I already know my New Year's Resolution: Blog more frequently!

The rest of Chicago

2005-12-19T17:27:00.000+00:00

My holiday to Chicago was really good. I had a great time there, even if it was freezing everyday. Seemingly it was one of the coldest starts to December Chicago has had in quite a while. Funny thing is you actually get used to it. Just put on about 3 layers, a scarf, gloves, a hat, a jacket, a good pair of waterproof shoes and you're laughing. The killer is when it's snowing and driving into your face, but other than that, it's all good.

On my way home, instead of sleeping as I should have, I thought about the things that stood out from the week. Things I noticed in Chicago and the holiday in general are as follows:

ATM machines in Chicago say "Sure" and "No, Thanks" instead of Yes and No
The Chicago Bulls are a crap team now
Ice Hockey fans are great fun and love shouting abuse at players
Chicago is cold (did I mention that?)
The Museum of Contemporary Art is worthless and not even worth the $1 donation I made
Penny's Noodles is a probably the best take-away I've ever had (I recommend the Red Curry and Chicken Satay)
American Airlines can be real idiots at times (more later)
My hockey team don't really need me (they won both games while I was away)
I sat next to a really nice guy on the way home, who is a full-time bingo caller!
I bought more presents for myself than everyone else combined
Ice-skating is quite different to rollerblading
The architecture in Chicago is amazing
No one recycles in Chicago
I saw Dublin city from 37,000 feet on my way home, which was cool

Overall, I had a great week with my friend Kellie in spite of the cold. I'd highly recommend going to Chicago, but going in summer is probably a good idea!

It's Happening Again

2005-12-19T17:17:00.000+00:00

I'm letting my blog slip. Its been quite a while, almost 2 weeks since I've updated my blog, so I'm going to try and bring you up to date by posting a few smaller blogs, instead of one huge one. Maintaining a blog is actually requires some discipline, which I seem to be lacking recently.

Well, its true!

2005-12-07T21:11:00.000+00:00

Chicago in the winter time is cold! Well, let me rephrase, bloody freezing actually! I don't think I've ever experienced such severe coldness in my life ever! Bolivia came close, but considering I was at my coldest in Bolivia at 5am and 5,000m up and Chicago is just as cold, if not more so during the middle of sunny day, Chicago wins it on the coldness front.

Besides the weather, which has supposedly been one of Chicago's coldest starts to December, I'm having a great time. I've done some touristy things and went to a Chicago Bulls game against the Detroit Pistons (which was actually a little disappointing as there was no atmosphere). But I'm having a great time here in Chicago with my friend Kellie. I'm off to an ice-hockey game tonight, so that should be good.

I'll post more when I have time.

Where Do I Begin?

2005-12-02T13:59:00.000+00:00

It's been a while since I've posted here, so apologies to my regulars who've missed my cutting humour, excellent journalism and all round great blog!

Since I last posted, things have been really busy. On the hockey front, I've played 2 matches and won 2, so cant complain. In our game on the 19th against the bottom of the league team, we won, but did it the hard way. We were 3-0 up at half time. But due to some "questionable" umpring, their 1st and 3rd goal shouldn't have been allowed. So 3-3 with about 10 minutes to go, but thankfully we pulled it out of the bag.

Our game this past weekend, we also won 3-1 which I was very happy about. We only had a bare 11 players for this game that was played in sub-zero (well close anyway) temperatures. It was a bit of a trek away to the game, but it had to be done. I was hoping that it would be postponed so we could re-schedule and play with a full strength team. But we didn't need it. One of our player's girlfriends came along to watch and was "encouraged" (read forced) to umpire for us. We all played excellently and won comfortably. We should have won by more, but a win is a win.

As most of you know I play volleyball (well not currently). I've played with UCC Volleyball Club for a number of years and even though I'm in London, I still stay in touch with everyone. Since I joined the club in 2000 I have been to 5 intervarsities, which is the main tournament in Ireland for all the university volleyball clubs. They run from Thursday to Saturday in mid to end of November. They're always great fun.

A few weeks ago, I got an e-mail from the club captain asking was I going to the intervarsities this year in Galway. I told him I couldn't as I was playing a hockey match that weekend, and as I'm going to Chicago tomorrow for a week and missing 2 hockey matches, I couldn't afford to leave my team down. So with great pain I told him I couldn't go.

But it doesn't finish there. Because they're so much fun and I know so many people from the universities, who themselves are leaving university this year, I began to think about why I should go. It'd be a great night in Galway and I could say hello to everyone in UCC and the other universities. I'm good friends with the organiser in Galway so also wanted to see what he pulled off.

So Thursday morning I texted 2 friends in the club saying that if they could spot me a few pints and a bed, I'd fly in for the Saturday night. I could fly from London Luton to Galway with Aer Arann and out of Shannon Airport to London Gatwick with EasyJet. It'd cost a chunk of change, but not too much. They called me back and it didn't take much convincing of me to say I'd go. So I booked the flights and all was good.

However, the game I was playing was up by Stansted airport which would have been really handy, but I had to go back to my apartment, get my gear, drop the goalkeepers gear back to the club and get a train to the airport. My flight was at 7.25pm and I needed to get a 6.03pm train fom Kings Cross. I got there at about 6.03pm, got my ticket, and ran to the train. Thankfully the train was a few minutes late so I ran on. It didn't end there though. When I got to the train station, I had to get a taxi to the terminal. But I didn't have any money. So I had to run into the terminal and get money and run back in. (I did the exact same thing in Miami when I was rushing for my flight to San Francisco which I also nearly missed)

When I got into the terminal, there was no one at the check in desk for the flight to Galway. Now I knew that they close the check-in 30 minutes before the departure, but it was only 6.52pm when I got there. So I found someone and they got someone to come down and check me in. I didn't relaxe until I was on the plane.

Things got better from there though. Once on the plane I relaxed (even if it was a propellor plane). We arrived into Galway 25 minutes ahead of time into probably the world's smallest airport with a shopping conveyor belt as the luggage carousel. I called people who were at the hotel for the big dinner as part of the intervarsities, and the thing was only starting.

So a quick beer in the car on the way to the hotel and things were very much looking up. I arrived with a few minutes to spare before the main course was served. I was greeted by loads of friendly faces and immediately someone was dispatched to the bar to get me a pint! Talk about service with a smile.

I also was in time for the awards cermony. I even got a thank you from John, the tournament organiser, (a good friend of mine) for travelling all the way over from London for tonight. It was really nice even if half the people there didn't know who I was. But the people I came to see did, which was fine.

Unforutnately neither of our teams won anything, although our ladies team lost the cup final to UCD by 2 points in the tie-breaker. That made it 5 in a row for UCD ladies and the 3rd time of those 5 that were against us. As before, our ladies got a bigger cheer from the other universities than the winners. Guess people don't like to see that domination, but you have to appreciate a good team.

Also as part of the tournament, they announce the Most Valuable Players (MVP's). They give an award to best setter and best hitter for men and women. The UCD setter won the best setter (for the 3/4th time in the last 5 years), even though everyone on our team said that our setter deserved it. Tough to topple someone who's won it for the last few years.

But UCC had our time. Another Megan on our team won the best hitter award. When I heard it, I actually jumped out and left out a big "YESSSS!" Thankfully everyone else in the club joined it (0.5 seconds later) For 0.25 of those seconds, I thought I had made a fool out of myself by being the only one to shout out, but I was safe.

Afterwards we had a great night and left the hotel at 2am and went back to the hostel. I hadn't a bed, but just walked straight past the reception, no questions asked. I ended up going to bed for 6am and woke up at 10am. Nice!

So without wanting to write a book on the weekend, I'll fast forward to Sunday afternoon. My flight was from Shannon at 8.20pm and I got dropped by the team at 3pm on their way back to Cork. Usually the team would go to the beach for a bit of a drive, but everyone was so tired, they jsut wanted to go home. So I had to amuse myself for 5 hours before I left. Bought myself some duty free. It wasn't too bad actually.

I got home to my apartment at about 11.30pm and collapsed in bed. The end of an amazingly busy weekend, but it was totally worth it.

Now roll on Chicago! I'll do my best to keep you posted.

Can't Beat A Bit Of Friendly Banter!

2005-11-18T16:19:00.000+00:00

Banter is an essential part of any sports club, and my club, Wapping Hockey Club is no exception. A perfect example is what happened recently after my last hockey match.

Last Saturday, my team, Men's 6ths, of which I am captain played against the Men's 5ths of Wapping Hockey Club. Both of us are in the same division, so it was a very big intra club match. The M5 were pretty confident of a victory. They even brought a stereo to play "Eye of the Tiger" as they warmed up before the game. Compare this against us, the M6's who were playing in only our 3rd game together. The M5's haven't lost a game in over a year.

To cut a long story short, it was a big game and it ended 2-2. We were winning 2-1, but they pulled it back. It was a very good result for us, even though we should/could have won it. In the pub afterwards, everyone was in great form, all taking part in a good bit of banter. I guess 2-2 was the best result, as both teams can hold their heads high.

During the week, I posted a match report here giving my biased view of the game, purely just to stir things up. And it worked. The M5's posted this report completely trying to mock us. Even if you don't know any of the background, they're worth a quick look.

I especially like this bit:

Side effects may include overconfidence, an Irish accent, and an inability to clearly remember things that happened on Saturdays.

It's better reading the M6 report first, followed by the M5 report. Hope you enjoy! I did.

I Love My Company

2005-11-15T15:50:00.000+00:00

I got an e-mail yesterday, which was sent to the entire company telling me that I can take a half day to go Christmas shopping! I can take it anytime from now until December 16th. Talk about a sweet deal! And then today, my manager who's in NY for the week, e-mailed me encouraging me to book the half day soon!

So it's a long weekend for me 16th December. I'm taking the Friday afternoon off. But obviously I'm going to go shopping.....online shopping from my bed that is!

It Pays To Complain!

2005-11-15T11:15:00.000+00:00

A few months ago I set up a bank account with my flat mates to pay bills and stuff. They got their debit card within a week, but it took about 2 months to get mine. It took so long because of a load of mess ups on the bank's part.

I wasn't just going to let this one slide, without finding out why. So I wrote them a long letter telling them how they had screwed up, and if they didn't give me a valid explanation, I would "re-consider my relationship" with the bank. I got a letter back from them a few days later saying they would look into it and get back to me soon. But they never did.

However, when I logged into my account last week, I was nicely surprised to see an entry for £50 with a description of "Compensation"! I still haven't received a letter from them explaining it, but I'm assuming they gave me £50 for my troubles!

Nice eh? I guess it does literally pay to complain!

Sport yet again......

2005-11-09T17:38:00.000+00:00

Most of my blogs recently have been about sport, and this one is no different. On Tuesday I played yet more cricket with people from work. It's a great way to hang out with people from work outside of the work setting. There were 4 teams of 7, so we had a little tournament.

Anyway, if you've read my previous posts about indoor cricket, you'll know we've always lost and at times gotten beaten really badly! But all changed on Tuesday. We won both matches quite comfortable, scoring 180 runs and conceding about 60 runs in total between the 2 games.

In the first game, we managed to win in spite of the umpire's best attempts to completely and utterly screw up the scores and also his changing of the rules for our fielders to try and even the game. On a few occasions, we had the batsmen out, but because we hadn't thrown or caught it with our left hand, he didn't give it out!

The second game was much better. We scored 98 runs, almost our first century, but we just missed out. The best thing about the second game was when were fielding. Towards the end of the game I tried to make a catch, but it only deflected off my hand. But Ben a team-mate caught it. A few balls later, the exact same thing happened, except Simon caught it. This was beginning to get weird, but got even worse when I did it again and Ben caught my deflected catch.

I just started laughing when it happened the 3rd time. It has never happened me, and then within about 3 minutes, it happened 3 times! Even the opposition even clapped us for that play. I had calls of "Butter fingers" thrown in my direction, but I feel I actually pulled those catches out of the bag and deflected them upwards for a team mate to make an easy catch!

Billy, my flat mate was playing against me in the second game, so anytime we played agains teach other, the play had extra meaning. It was all good fun though. Afterwards we went for a few beers with the other 3 teams. A great evening all around, and more importantly we banished our cricket demons!

We Kicked Ass

2005-11-06T13:29:00.000+00:00

What goes around, comes around as the saying goes. It was never more true than yesterday, when my hockey team dished out a fair beating to Romford Hockey Club, by beating their 4th team 6-1! We hockeyed them off the pitch, you could say, a total turnaround from last week.

In what was essentially our first real game (because last week we only scraped together 5 players), it was critical that we play well. And thank God we did. We scored early in the first half, but only went into half time 1-0 up. We had a hatful of chances, but couldnt finish them. I had two real chances, one of which shaved a layer of paint off the goalpost. I really should have scored. Next week maybe!

In a vast improvement from last week, we had 14 players, so we had a good squad to choose from. We did have the graveyard shift, playing at 4pm meaning it was dark by the time we finished. Yesterday it is was Guy Fawkes day so there was loads of fireworks going off which was cool. But, I think the fireworks going off around the pitch were actually celebrating our victory!

Not surprised really!

2005-11-05T02:25:00.000+00:00

He just seems to attract attention no matter where he goes. Ol' W himself is in Argentina these days trying to set up the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) but is meeting resistance from all quarters, including Maradona!

I'm not going to get into a political debate about it all, but I'm following the story quite closely, mainly because I've been in Argentina and enjoy reading about the wonderful country. From my travelling around there, it comes as no surprise that they're protesting. When I was in Buenos Aires, there was a protest every second night. My grasp of Spanish isnt the best so I could never make out what they were protesting about, but they sure as hell made enough noise.

It must be a hobby at this stage for some people: "what are you doing tonight?", "oh, I'm going on a protest march again tonight" Nice way to spend the evening I guess. Out walking in the fresh air! The only downside of this hobby is the tear gas and batons of the police, but I guess that adds to the enjoyment of the hobby!

Argentines (or Argentinians, never sure which) have had a rough time of it recently. I was reading the country profile on The Economist and it makes interesting reading. The countries history is quite interesting and the article on Wikipedia is worth a read if you get a chance. The map of the Argentine territory includes the Falkland Islands and part of Antartica. Which reminds me of something else I need to add to my wishlist of things to do: go to Antartica. I can do it after my trip from Alaska to Tierra del Fuego!

Hockeyed at Hockey

2005-10-31T19:04:00.000+00:00

For the regular readers amonst you, you will probably remember my Hockeyed at cricket blog a while back. In case you don't understand the expression hockeyed, it basically means getting the crap kicked out of you at a sport. I surprisingly found definitions of it on the internet here and here.

Anyway, I recently became captain of the new 6th team at Wapping Hockey Club. They decided to enter an extra team in the league because there are so many extra players in the club. And they asked me to captain it, to which I said yes.

So our first game was away to Clacton 2, in Clacton-On-Sea, Essex, about a 2 hour drive from London. Not an ideal place to start your campaign. Nor was it ideal that we only had 5 players available, in spite of our squad supposedly being 19 strong. The club in general was short players this past weekend, which had a knock on effect on us. So we borrowed some players from the 5th team to make up the difference.

The game itself was pretty uneventful, except for us conceding 2 fast goals, before we drew level, before we conceded yet another goal. And all this before half time. They got 3 more lucky goals in the second half before we got one goal back near the end. Ended up 6-3, even though I thought it was only 5-3.

There was one funny bit though. There was this little kid, about 15 who was quite handy and managed to score a few goals. I was doing a bit of defending and ended up marking him. Just to let him know I was there, I walked next to him, and kind of got my legs tangled up in his. He didnt fall, just stumbled a bit. He wasnt too happy about that, but nothing major.

Two seconds later he got the ball and I tackled him, putting the ball out over the sideline. Straight away, he flipped. I thought it was hilarious, this 15 year old getting annoyed and trying to stand up to me! I just walked away, knowing I had done my job: piss him off! He got spoken to the referee for retaliating, which was a bonus.

At this stage we were losing 6-2, so I started to amuse myself other ways. And yes, I chose to pick on a little boy. But it was fun! I had to amuse myself somehow to take my mind off the score!

After the game, he didn't shake my hand, but I annoyed him even more, by going out of my way to shake his hand and prove that I am an honest sportsman!

I need to keep my trap shut

2005-10-24T20:29:00.000+01:00

My last post was about the consultancy industry and about my ex-employer who is in this industry. Following my last post, I've received a few comments and an e-mail about the content of my post. I had another post about them too, which wasn't all praise.

So, I would just like to set a few things straight. Thing is, I was only working for them for about 6 months and left because I got a better offer. I was happy staying on working for them for the forseeable future. An opportunity that I couldn't pass up came my way. I didn't leave for any other reason.

They (I wont say who. This is for the benefit of people who read the last post, when it had the company name in it) are actually a really good company and I enjoyed my time there. I don't want to bad mouth an ex-employer because I don't usually say bad things about anything.

I would like to say though, that consultancy isn't for everyone, me included. A number of the comments that I've received have come from recent graduates thinking of working with them. If you are interested in working in the consultancy industry, then they are one of the best companies going. They are really good at what they do (well, to a certain degree!), they pay you well and everyone there is really nice. I had a great time working with really nice people. They do have their problems, but so does every company. It is the consultancy industry in general that I don't like.

If you like what you see, then go for it. I wouldn't like to be reason for anyone to decide not to work with them.

Well that's it. You can ignore this post if you haven't a clue what I'm on about. But I think a few people will make sense of it.

What A Ripoff!

2005-10-19T17:40:00.000+01:00

When I was back home, my Dad showed me this book, which he was reading. Its called "Rip-off!: The Scandalous Inside Story of the Management Consulting Money Machine" I'm going to read it after him.

I was talking to him last night and he mentioned the controversy about the HSE project which is after costing upwards of €165 million, €50 million of which has gone on consultancy fees. I hadn't heard about it, but when I searched for it, I found loads of articles (here, here, here and here) Turns out it was Deloitte that is ripping off people, but I wouldn't have been surprised if it was my beloved ex-employer, another consultancy firm.

Having worked in consulting, and didn't think very highly of it, I can totally understand what happened though. I heard that my ex-employer were charging about €2,000/day for my services. Now I can assure you, I wasn't earning anywhere near that. It's crazy that a recent graduate can command that cost, considering I knew crap all.

My Dad was saying that people were earning that same amount a day, so God knows how much they were charging the company for their services.

It's projects like this that give IT a bad name. When really it's just stupidity of the project owners in not realising what the consultants are charging for. Consultants are very good at exploiting weaknesses in the companies and telling them how great the result will be, and then leaving them very short of what they said.

In my one project at the consultancy firm, it was about 3/4 weeks late, when the total project was only about 5 months. I could explain in great depth why it was a total sham, but I won't. I'd be here all day. It was just one of the reasons I left the industry. The money is great there, but I couldnt sleep well knowing my work was a complete joke.

P.S. I love my ex-employer, and I think their legal department is one of the finest in the world. But hopefully I won't get a call from them!

Ever wondered.....

2005-10-19T14:40:00.000+01:00

....why when a lift arrives at a floor it "dings" once for going up and twice for going down? Did all the lift manufacturers of the world sit at a table and make this decision?

Next is a car!

2005-10-19T14:26:00.000+01:00

Recently I bought a pair of rollerblades, which is great when it's dry and sunny, but as we head towards winter, it's becoming an increasingly dodgy proposition. The slightest bit of dampness on the footpath is enough to send you flying.

So, in order to get to hockey I bought myself a new bike at the weekend. I love it. It's a really nice bike, but man it's expensive. And then you have to add accessories on top of that. But I think it's worth it. Its a great bike and should last me for years (assuming it doesn't get nicked, but I got insurance just in case!)

I have a number of forms of transport, so all I'm missing now is a car, but I think it'll be a while before I get one of those!

Things To Do In My Lifetime

2005-10-10T18:13:00.000+01:00

Ok, this is something I've been meaning to do for a while. I've seen a couple of books that tell you what you should do before you die, but I think it's better if I figure them out for myself. I'm going to start the list now and add to it as I go along. If I manage to complete any one of them, then I'll let you know.

So here goes:

Go into Space, or at least 20km up, which is lower space and you can still see the curvature of the earth, possibly with Space Adventures or Virgin Galactic

Travel the length of the Americas, starting in Alaska and going all the day down until I get to Tierra del Fuego, Argentina by the Cape Horn

Go on a expedition to Antartica

NYTimes Do it again

2005-10-10T17:40:00.000+01:00

I must say, the New York Times is one of the best, if not the best newspaper around. Today I read an excellent article about the melting of the ice caps in the Artic Circle. It's a long article, but very well written and very informative. There are actually some positives from the melting of the ice caps, including opening up new and shorter shipping routes.

I'd highly recommend reading, not only this article, but registering with the NYTimes and reading it everyday. Thing is, they're after introducing Times Select which is a subscription for some of their content, which is annoying. But you still get a number of good article for free.

Ikea & Swiss Army Knives

2005-10-08T20:14:00.000+01:00

So, for anyone who doesn't know me (which is probably most!), I recently moved into a new unfurnished apartment. This meant that I had to buy all my furniture, and where else would I go, but Ikea. It was really expensive, but you have to hand it to them, they really do good quality stuff and they have such a range. I've been to Ikea before in New Jersey when I had to furnish my apartment there too, so I knew what to expect. But I still can't get over the scale of it. The amount of money they must make is amazing. When I went most recently, it even prompted me to research the history of the company to see where it came from. It's worth a read if you have some time.

Sidetracking a bit, before I went off on my holidays to South America I bought a Swiss Army Knife from Victorinox. It was probably one of the handiest things I brought with me. Myself and my flat mates also make good use of it when we first moved in and didn't have any bread knife (we still dont, but we got a really sharp knife Ikea one that does the trick). The Swiss Army Knife is so handy, I gotta hand it to the person who invented it.

So, back to the present where the Swedish and Swiss combined forces to allow me finish building my chest of drawers. I was going to bring them back to Ikea, but turns out I have so much clothes I actually need it. But when I went to build it on Thursday night, I didn't have any tools with me. The ones I used to build everything else were taken back by my flatmates brother. So, I turned to my Swiss Army Knife to get me through it. And low and behold, the ease of assembling an Ikea item and the genius of Swiss Army Knife allowed me build the thing really easily. I was missing a hammer though, and as great as the Swiss Army Knife is, it was no substitute. I had to improvise.

In summary my point is, you gotta love Ikea and the Swiss Army Knife. Just goes to show Sweden isn't just good for it's good looking women and Switzerland isn't just known for stashing money and gold to avoid the tax man!

Hockeyed at Cricket

2005-10-05T15:50:00.000+01:00

As I've said before, cricket is actually good fun. Well, it's also bloody hard. The actual cricket tournament was on last night and we were blown away. We played quite well last week amongst ourselves, but playing against the other teams was a different story!

I was batting first in our first game, which I didn't mind. I didn't know at the time, but opening batsmen usually face the best bowlers, so they bowling team can try and get a few early wickets. My God, were these guys good. They were bowling at an incredible speed. Luckily, we didn't manage to go into negative figures (as our team did later for a time before we went positive again!) so it wasn't too bad. They were just so much better.

We ended up losing both games by quite a decent margin both times, but it was good fun. Most other teams had a number of people who regularly play cricket, so we were at a huge disadvantage when we had one guy who played a few years ago! He was still our best player though.

It was a fairly good indication of how good the team was, by the number of people wearing cricket whites! We had none, so my my theory, we were crap. And we were. So therefore, my theory holds true.

Even though we were well beaten, we all enjoyed ourselves. We stayed behind after and had a few pints, so all's good. We would have won an award for most spirited team (if there was one!)

Downright Weird

2005-10-03T19:55:00.000+01:00

You know the way, you can never remember any dreams you have. Well last night I had a really weird dream: that a Concorde crashed outside my home in Ireland and I saw the whole thing happening. It all felt really weird, but very real and couldn't believe it was happening.... that is until I woke up!

Now that's just downright weird! Not sure what it's mean to mean. Prize for the best explanation left in the comments!

My name catches the world attention....yet again!

2005-09-30T16:21:00.000+01:00

It's amazing what comes out of blogs. A while back my blog ALMOST got me a mention on CNN This time, something just as weird. Within the last week, I have got 2 e-mails as a result of my blog asking questions about my name. The first one was someone who had seen some actor who's first name was Ciaran, and she wanted to know how it is pronounced. But last night, I got another email from a couple who are expecting a son and want to call him Ciaran, but were unsure of how to pronounce it. They're from the USA and so didn't want to call their son Ciaran, if they didn't know how a "real Irish person" pronounces Ciaran!

I e-mailed them back, and it kind of feels they're naming him after me, but they're not at all. It just happens to be the same name as mine. But Ciaran is a rare name so I feel some attachement! If you type"Ciaran" in Google, my blog comes up as the 9th result, which is kind of cool!

I just looked at my blog stats on StatCounter.com and turns out the couple searched for "pronouce Ciaran", which came up as the second result (because of the CNN post, see above link) The funny thing is, that that actor dude comes up as the first result (see here) with this quote included

"Does anyone know how to pronounce Ciaran?"

and

"Anyone for a Ciaran fan club? No, seriously. He's so tremendously cool."

Unfortunately, it refers to Ciaran Hinds the actor, not me :( But I could have a fan club....somewhere!

On a side note, I'm up to 8,844 hits on my blog. Cool!

Gaelic Football for the PS2

2005-09-30T15:07:00.000+01:00

I normally hate getting e-mail forwards because usually they are just stupid chain letters, but this one I just have to share. It was a link to an ad for a new Playstation 2 game; "Gaelic Football" I find it hilarious that they're making a GAA game for the PS2.

Anyway, the ad is a classic and can be seen here If you're Irish, then you'll totally understand the ad, but if you don't know about the GAA, then it might be lost on you a bit, but you should appreciate the genius of it!

There's quite a bit of stuff about the game online too, on ElectricNews.net and Irish Abroad. Turns out, the software company, IR Gurus Interactive that made it, based it on an Aussie rules game made previously. Still good to see the game being made though.

Cricket is actually fun!

2005-09-30T10:44:00.000+01:00

Last night I went playing indoor cricket with some people from work. There is a company wide tournament on next week in Lords so we went down last night for some practice on how to to play the game and actually allow me hit a cricket ball, something I've never done before! The rules are a little different too, so it was good to try it out.

So, myself and another guy went batting first. I could try explaining the rules, but they're all here But basically, 8 people on a team. 4 sets of 2 batters and each set of batters face 4 overs (6 or 8 balls in an over) Lee and I scored 30 runs which we thought was quite good. So everyone else went to bat, and our total score was 26! So the next 6 batters managed to score a total of -4! Quite funny really, but I enjoyed it. The real thing happens on Tuesday.

We also got challenged to a a match by another team at work, so that should be fun! I'm not sure is it because England won the Ashes recently that there are loads of people playing cricket now, but all 5 courts last night at the venue were all cricket. Last time I was there, it was all soccer. Typical of the English to jump on the bandwagon!