Notnem

I still have plans to bring new life into this blog. Don’t hold your breath, but some day soon, I’ll just start catching up on the last year. I’ve just set up a Flickr Account.

While I still have plans to bring this blog back to life… this post is more an experiment than anything else. I rank 9th for Free Travel Content on Google, and I want to see what this link will do to that serp.

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I know I have been promising to update the blog for the last while. I have about 10 blog posts in my head that are dying to get posted once I have / make time. This isn’t one of these posts, but a topic I have been reading about recently. Today we are going to be talking about Social Bookmarking, but first I’m going to ramble for a bit
Part of my job is to spend time reading everything I can get my hands on that might be relative to my industry. There are probably 3 sites (1, 2, 3) that I focus my reading on, so if you have any interest in this topic, or other related topics follow the links.

Back to the point… here are some of the social bookmarking tools I’m playing around with:

1. Del.icio.us
2. Ask
3. Reddit
4. LinkedIn Profile

Last day of my 20s today. More posts on the topic coming soon…

Chris got toe the apartment for about 0400 and within 15 minutes we were on our way. Myself and Damo had already unpacked and repacked to make sure we were going to come in under the 20kg limit. The plan was to be at the airport for around 0415… and as it turned out we were the first BMI customers to check in that morning. Things seemed to be going well, but then we got news our flight was delayed. Heathrow was fogged in, but we were assured that all outgoing flights were also delayed. The problem was that we only had a 2.5 hour window in Heathrow to connect to Doha. We were delayed twice more and moved to 2 different different gates. The problem was that no matter what gate we moved to, there was no plane there. No plane no fight.

Eventually we took off over an hour and a half late and landed in Heathrow with 47 minutes before the flight was going to be taking off. As it tuns out, fog only effects incoming flights and not out going. The fog of Heathrow was incredible. We could see out the window of the plan and we knew were descending for landing. The clouds looked to be very low. We entered the cloud thinking that once we get through this we will be landing… then out of no where, in the middle of the cloud wee saw the runway. Visibility was somewhere between 15 and 20 meters at the very most, but even at that you could only make out shapes.

One the plane stooped and we were allowed off, we ran from our gate in Terminal 1 to Terminal 3. Damo and Chris set the pace while I struggled with Asthma and the several cups of coffee I had already had that day. We got to the Qatar airlines desk but we were told it was too late and they wouldn’t check us in… but worse yet, Qatar Airlines were refusing to endorse our tickets and told us there was nothing they could do for us.

We decided to head back to BMI to see what they could do for us. As it turned out the timing of that decision was crucial. We got into the very long queue for the help desk at BMI. I decided to head back to Terminal 3 to check the other airlines to see availability of flights that could get us into Asia before Christmas. The only options were to Singapore on Christmas Eve or to Hong Kong that day, but with no connection onwards from Hong Kong.

BMI told us that Qatar had to honour our tickets and got us on standby for the next 3 flights to Doha. If we made any of the flights to Doha that day, we would have to overnight in Doha because we would have missed our flight to KL. At least this option had us going in the right way, and had Qatar back honouring our tickets. We headed back to terminal 3 and to the standby list. There were already 13 people ahead of us on the list, so it wasn’t looking good. They took our tickets off us and started checking in the others. We were still in play. As luck would have it, we got on, and even better we were sitting beside each other. We got our tickets and ran… taking all the short cuts through security we could to get there. The flight must have been delayed by a few minutess so we were ok and they were only just getting ready to board the plane. We had no idea where our luggage was. BMI had told us it was in Heathrow waiting to be claimed while Qatar said it was on the way to Doha.

The flight was fine, helped along by the fact we all took sleeping tablets. Our attention had to turn to what we were going to do in Doha. Any flight to South East Asia would do for us. We landed and got through security and went to the transfer desk. We already knew we had missed the flight to KL, so we asked to get on any flight going to either Singapore or Bangkok. The guy took our tickets and started working on them. He talked for with a few people and made a few phone calls… we didn’t actually know where we were going, but we new we were still in play. He took us up to the departure gates and hand wrote us tickets, as it turns out to get us on the flight to KL which had been delayed by an hour because it was late leaving KL on the other leg. If we had of misssed this flight, information we later learned, we would of been spending Christmas in Doha. This flight was the last flight between Doha and KL till after Christmas. After landing in KL, we went to see if our luggage had managed to keep up with us. Not surprisingly it hadn’t.

We checked into our apartments, had a shower and went to the Mega Mall to get some essentials to get us through that night and the next day. Mum and Dad were having a BBQ later on, but we needed non air plane food now. The plan had been to have breakfast in Heathrow,  but that plan had gone out the window. Mum and Dad’s house is fantastic. It was the first time I had seen it since it was a building site. They are obviously enjoying it a lot. We headed back to the apartment… and to bed. What a day.

After 12 or 13 years, I’ve put back on my football socks and my shin pads. It is really strange, and I am a bit anxious about how my body will deal with a 5 a side match that is taking place in 59 mins from now.

Thrifty FC are playing in Division 6 of the Astro Leagues, having been promoted from Division 7 last month. The standard wil be ok I imagine… and I’m sure I’ll catch up and get used to it all very quickly, but this is a pretty big step into the unknown. Squash and even the few jogs I do will be nothing compared to this…

AFTERWARDS

I made it through playing over an hour of competitive football. The standard is actually very good, and while I’m off the pace, and will be for a while, I’m happy enough. I had a few good passes, and a few good saves (rotating goalie), and while I did drift out of the game for a while, I’m happy enough.

The first match is on next Tuesday. I’m going to be well down the pecking order, but I’m sure I’ll get a run out if not in this game, soon enough. I’m really surprised how the body took the physical activities, and it was my concentration and the fact I’m rusty with a ball at my feet were my problems.

I know people reading this may / will be thinking, what is he on about. This is only a kick around on a small pitch. I can see their point, but for me this was a big step . It’s like a squash, I’m ranked near the bottom in my club, very near, but I don’t care because I love it, and because I’m just happy to be able to do it and just push myself.

THE NEXT DAY

I woke up at about 3am with awful pain in my wrist. With the help of some pain killers I was able to get some sleep. At lunch time the next day Ais made me go to casualty to get it looked at. As it turns out I have a suspected broken sceptoid. I won’t know more till next Saturday because this bone is very difficult to diagnose, but right now I’m in a half cast. The first competitive game of the season is on tonight, but I won’t be able to play.

I have kinda being letting the blog sit there for the moment. It isn’t that I have nothing to put up on it, I have tons of stuff, its just that I haven’t gotten around to putting it up yet….

I will tho… soon.

Its been a while since I’ve updated the blog, not because I don’t have much to put it, but because I haven’t really made the time to sit down and write. I’m back from Malaysia now a few weeks, and it is time to get back blogging.

Since I’ve landed in Dublin on 22 Jan, I’ve been keeping pretty busy. Work has been going well and I really feel like I am getting on top of it at last. The goals that have been set are withing my reach, and I’m looking forward to the days going by so I can reach these goals. I’ve pretty much committed myself to Thrifty for six months, but right now that is working well. What I’ll do in six months has yet to be decided, but the long term goal is to go to college in September 08.

Marco picked me up from the airport, and we wen for a few pints. It was great to actually chill out with Marco again. That is the one thing that I miss more than anything else when I’m in Malaysia. The next day I called into Thrifty to let them know I was back in the country and would be returning to work. Everything seemed ok, in so far as that they still had space to put me somewhere.

During the first weekend back I went to Stephen and Irene’s engagement party. It was a good night and I enjoyed it, although near the end I was really fighting the jet lag. I actually slept in the taxi back to Mark and Julie’s. I spent most of the night chatting with Anita, and it was great to be back among close friends.

Last weekend I went to a poker classic with BJ, Shane and Damo. BJ’s company had sponsored a table, and nobody was using the tickets, so he kindly invited me along. I really enjoyed the night an was happy with my playing performance. While I had the opportunities, I made money, and eventually got knocked out because of a couple of amateur errors… as in never bank on two pairs in a high stakes game.

On Tuesday I met up with Chris, and we went to the Ivy House to have a couple of pints and catch up. I hadn’t seen Chris since he left Malaysia, and we had a bit to talk about. We ended up playing backgammon and I really enjoyed the evening.

Today Dad got home from Malaysia for 2 days, so we went to dinner in the Independent Pizza Co. in Drumcondra with Mary, and then back to the apartment to meet Malachy. I finally got a chance to use Mark and Julie’s fantastic whiskey glasses with a nice drop of Glenfiddich.

In chronological Order

1 - New York for Stephen and Elke’s wedding

- A fantastic week in the US with Mark topped off by seeing one of my best mates get married

2 - Spending some time with Niamh

- Niamh move back to Europe after finishing school. I hadn’t seen her much in the last couple of years so it was good to spend some time hanging out

3 - Mark’s Stag

- A great weekend in Galway topped off by getting shot to bits by paintballs

4 - Mark & Julie’s Wedding

- Everything from the week before the wedding till I went back to work was fantastic and I couldn’t of enjoyed it more

5 - Ailbhe’s 21st

- A fantastic weekend in Oxford with all of the Europan based members of the Menton family

6 - Holiday in Malaysia with the guys

- Despite the rocky start with Qatar Airways, we made it to KL on schedule… and had a great 3 weeks.

7 - Seeing My Perant’s New House in KL

- When I last saw it, it was a building site. Now I don’t know how to describe it.