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Revolving around late nights.

There are times I hate Ireland and today is actually one of them. It’s the assumption that when you go out to meet people, it’s normal that they’ll write off half the following day because you stay until some crazy hour.

I can remember, some years ago, going to a hen party and bailing at around 1 or 2 am – which is way late for me anyway – so that I could get up the following morning to go surfing. I live in Dublin. Surfing is not something I get a regular chance to do. Everyone else thought I was nuts to get up to go surfing, into the cold wet sea. None of them had ever surfed before. I don’t think any of them have tried since. Anyway, when I got back up from the surfing, a few of them had surfaced enough to go to the hotel to get coffee where they do a roaring trade in post-surf hot chocolate (in my experience) so I met them there. They were all utterly shattered, completely hungover, and complaining about how tired they were. I must have been their worst nightmare because I’d just be surfing, along with how utterly great that makes me feel – just the pure wave catching action, even if I fall off the board immediately, changes my life – and I was in great form. Plus, I wasn’t hungover because I hadn’t been drinking because I knew I was getting up early to go surfing.

I know people who regret their hangovers. But no hangover is without an element of choice.

I was out late last night. Not too late – something like 1.15 when I got home. But I was tired, and I am still, this morning, very tired and I’m not running on all cylinders at all. I knew this would happen but occasionally my life does crash into people for whom socialising means going out for a drink and staying out late. But that whole scene slows me down a lot and I really don’t like it. I remember when I lived in Belgium, it didn’t really happen all that much. You want out at a reasonable hour, like around 8, and you were at home at a reasonable time – 11 or say 12 at the outside. And you got a lot more done. I went swimming and skating on Saturday or Sunday mornings, I read a lot more, I did a lot more cooking, a lot more shopping. I got far more done in my life rather than recovering because I’m so shattered. And this is pure tiredness – I wasn’t drinking so I don’t even have a hangover to contend with.

I don’t know. I need coffee right now. Maybe it will all be a bit clearer after breakfast.

2011 06 18 windsandbreezes living in Ireland Comments (2) Permalink

Green fingers.

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I grew these.

I am very happy about this. They are still there, stilll fighting their way, still giving me hope. I love them.

Please please let them not ripen till I get back from my holidays on Monday.

2011 06 07 windsandbreezes Uncategorized Comments (1) Permalink

THSM’s Wannabe bruschetta starter.

While you are making Jamie’s risotto and lazily allowing it to suck in the water without spending hours stirring it, you can make a high speed starter. You will need the following items, all of which you can get in your local Tesco and some of which you can, if you’re flaithiúl enough, get in TK Maxx much more stylishly.

  1. the toastable/reheatable ciabatta bread
  2. Some small tomatoes, preferably the deep red ones that are abit elongated and look like small – natch tiny – peppers. But which are definitely tomatoes. They will have Tesco Finest on the label and some Italian sounding name. If you can’t find them, other small tomatos will probably do but I haven’t tried them yet.
  3. Some rocket lettuce. Meant to grow this myself this year.
  4. Some Parma ham. The one I use costs about 2.87 and has a Tesco Finest label stuck to it. I think it’s the 14 month one, therefore less expensive than the 18 month one. The cheaper option anyway. I have not tried this with Spanish equivalents so if you decide that you prefer Serrana to Parma, that’s entirely your call. I’m not guaranteeing then…
  5. Some olive oil. I go for either the Supervalu extra virgin or the Tesco extra virgin. Mainly Tesco lately. I like the bottles which is almost definitely the worst possible reason to choose a particular type of olive oil. But I never said I was rational about these things.
  6. A decent sized clove of garlic per ciabatta roll. You will definitely need a garlic press too. I’m not going to go around chopping this stuff.
  7. that pink peppercorn pepper stuff which is definitely in Tesco, and definitely in Superquinn and occasionally in TK Maxx for five times the price but in a huge really sexy pepper dispenser that belongs in the sort of Italian restaurant you go to for significant birthdays. The last one I saw there was 16.95. I entertained the notion for a minute and then said sod it, I already had some from Tesco and I was nowhere near runnning out. We are in a recession, you know.

Okay. That’s what you need. Here’s how you do it.

  1. Slice the ciabatta roll lengthways.
  2. Toast both halves of the ciabatta roll.
  3. Shove the garlic cloves through the garlic press. Spread half of it on one half of the roll, the rest on the other half.
  4. Dribble a sensible quantity of olive oil on the ciabatta stuff. When I say sensible, I mean the objective is to get olive oil in there without making the stuff soggy.
  5. Decorate each ciabatta half thingie with a slice of parma ham. My advice is to tear each slice into little bits because parma doesn’t cut cleanly when you’re trying to eat it. At least if it’s in small bits already, it should be easier to consume.
  6. Arrange some rocket on top of the parma ham. Make it look healthy. Do not under any circumstances even entertain the notion of substituting a different type of greenery. Only Rocket qualifies here.
  7. Slice/quarter/render smaller into bitesize the tomatos. Arrange on top of the rocket salad.
  8. Sprinkle some of the swank pink rosy pepper. Don’t over do it if you’ve got guests – they may be a little more reticent on the subject.
  9. Eat. I served it today with freshly squeezed watermelon juice but water or some nice Italian red wine may be nice too.

Happy eating.

2011 06 05 windsandbreezes food to woo me with. Comments (0) Permalink

it’s got me.

So I have an iPad a few weeks now. I am really happy with it. It has had a key impact on my life – my laptop is switched on very rarely now; in fact only when I want to do something with iTunes on it (which reminds me – I need to do something on iTunes on it) or when I want to write something which will require a keyboard. Like half a dozen blog entries. I sometimes wonder if I am talking to myself on that front though but Daren’t Risk It.

Anyway, I bought the iPad because I wanted to be able to read on it. I have a shocking number of books, and a shocking number of boxes of digital art magazines. And while I was strong enough to recycle surfing and kitesurf and photography mags, I tend to keep the Photoshop and digi-art related ones. I came to the conclusion that the best thing to do would be to read them electronically. That was a drag on a laptop so now we have iPad, Kindle and Zinio software. The books come in through Kindle and although a key contributor to this was to reduce my outlay on technical books I have read some “normal” books there as well. I have, for example, started re-reading Bernard Cornwell’s books about the Arthurian legends. As well as books about user interface design and how to write Python (not getting so far there).

The magazines come through Zinio, and currently I have subs to Digital Arts, Computer Arts Projects, Kiteboarder Magazine, .Net Magazine, Interweave Crochet, Islands, Outdoor Photographer. I will be adding some surf stuff and NatGeog to that. When the site loads up correctly for me.

But I’m using it in ways I didn’t expect to use it. It is turning into a real Filofax and tool for me. I use some of the planning and ideas software in a way that I’d have never used a notebook and Autodesk SketchBook Pro is having a profound impact on my art work. I’m really happy with it.

From the point of view of reading broadening my mind, both Zite and especially Flipboard are changing my life. From reading practically no news a few weeks ago, I now regularly dip into Forbes and other related magazines and I feel a lot more in tune with what’s going on in the world. On the plus point, I don’t go near the Independent’s website or, indeed, any Irish news media. It leaves me a lot freer in terms of knowing what is going on in the world. I know who Michele Bachmann is. That I can customise Zite and Flipboard to pick up some specialised stuff in the surf, environmental, photography fields only ads to their attraction. Having died under the weight of stuff on the web, I’m finding that these are bringing me closer to the stuff I’m interested without me having to plough through too much drivel. In a way, I wish something like Flipboard existed for the web – it would be terrific.

I will put my hand up and admit that when the first iPad was announced, I thought Apple were crazy. All I can say in my defence is at the time I did say that I would probably only use it for things like magazines and books and that is exactly what I am doing with it. It is working a treat. An expensive treat – and if I had one thing to say to Apple on this front, it would be “Half the price of the damn thing”. But there is no way they would listen to me.

2011 06 05 windsandbreezes techynerdstuff Comments (0) Permalink

EWAC – Shortbread from the kitchen gifty book.

Shortbread made from butter, some sugar and a lot of flour, and because I felt evil, quite a lot of ground ginger. Then I used a heartshaped cookie cutter to make them. If you use the smaller heartshaped cutter, you wind up with far more cookies than the recipe says you will.

Think they look quite cute however.

2011 06 05 windsandbreezes experiments with a cookbook Comments (0) Permalink

EWAC – Donal Skehan’s fishcakes

Donal Skehan’s television series is about 4 deep at this stage. I have the book for a while and have done a couple of things out of it. It’s coming to be a very, very useful cookbook. I think I’ve done two things out of it at this stage.

I bought it and Jamie Oliver’s 30 minute Meals in short order and both of them have lists of stuff you must have in the kitchen. Donal’s list is shorter and more accessible so frankly I think if you’re going to start with someone, go with Donal’s. I don’t have everything in Jamie’s list and I seem to do okay. Also, if you watch Donal’s series, you’ll notice that much of what he uses can be got in IKEA.

Anyway, on my list of toys I want to know how to make are fishcakes and Donal has a recipe for same in his book/series. In fact, I find RTE have helpfully put the recipe here in case you want a look. I wish to say that 1) they are easy to do and 2) mine wound up slightly on the way-too-mushy-side when I made them. As a result, I added “extra flour”.

Other than that, however, they were a doddle to make and so this gets a thumbs up from me in terms of preparation.

Following that, they were very nice to eat as well. I loved them. So that gets a double thumbs up. The one thing I would say is if you can grab the television episode where they are made from Player, it might be worth doing as he does the preparation in a different order and I suspect the telly order leaves less mess in the kitchen which is alwasy a good thing in my view.

2011 06 05 windsandbreezes experiments with a cookbook Comments (0) Permalink

Knitting and stuff.

Knitting hurts. There. I’ve admitted it. Unfortunately I have a lot of it to go because I decided yesterday (rather unwisely) to start knitting a tanktop in DK cotton. It’s going to take a while. I’m three rows in I think.

Yesterday I went to Springwools in Walkinstown with two friends. We all spent money. I need to stop buying yarn. I don’t need any more and I have any number of WIPS in progress. But I found this pattern book and now I’m doing the lime green tank top in it. I may be some time. Between it and the long running crochet thread skirt and the Jean dress….I probably need time off work to do this.

2011 06 05 windsandbreezes crochet Comments (0) Permalink

uhem…

I’m not sure that code locking my phone was such a good idea. I’m getting sick of having to unlock it every time I want to check something on it.

in really good news, however, I got my new passport yesterday. The photograph sucks but I don’t care. It’s valid which is all I care about.

2011 05 24 windsandbreezes Uncategorized Comments (0) Permalink

Mamihlapinatapei

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This is just a piece of art I based off a recent photograph taken in Clare. I wanted something to bring a little colour to this piece.

Via Lonely Planet’s twitter feed which Flipboard serves me on my iPad from time to time, I happened across this piece. It caught my attention because I know – to some extent – what it’s like to be able to express somethings in one language, but not another. It’s disorienting when the blanks are in your native language, and the gaps are filled by second and third languages. French, in my case, can be a holy terror for being more expressive for me than English.

I’m good on Age-otori – the art of looking worse after a haircut than before – it’s a common feature of having my hair cut in Dublin. Irish hairdressers just are not as good as their French counterparts. Mokita is another one. The truth everyone knows, but no one says. The elephant in the corner, in local parlance, you might say.

The one which hit me like a freight train, however, was Mamihlapinatapei. Even typing the word is a bit of a killer and I am having serious problems remembering it. I’m not good on Amerindian languages and this is from the Yagan language from Tierra del Fuega. Pretty remote to me, it must be said.

So sublimely contained that it’s apparently been named the world’s most succinct word by The Guinness Book of World Records. Wikipedia says it’s ‘a look shared by two people, each wishing that the other would initiate something that they both desire but which neither wants to [initiate]‘.

When you look at it rationally, logically, it seems so crazy. We both want something, but we neither of us want to start it. It seems so very sad in a way. I sometimes wonder how much societal norms has to do with that.

Buried not too far been the surface, however, is the memory of that look. It doesn’t come alone – it comes lined up with hope for company. And it leaves a bittersweet taste that pervades your mind for a very long time. And the heartbreaking thing about it – I think – is you often don’t recognise it until after it’s too late.

It’s nice to know that somewhere, someone, thought it was a concept worth labelling.  Most people in the world have probably been there.

2011 05 24 windsandbreezes beautiful things
personal Comments (0) Permalink

on a past life….coming back to haunt.

I graduated Applied Languages in Dublin City University more than ten years ago, and on the basis of some of that course, I was recommended to look at interpreting courses. Specifically, the interpreting course at the Polytechnic of Central London was recommended.

When I eventually got there, it had already become the University of Westminster and I fought my way through the course. I was told not to work part time because it was so intensive. I ignored that because otherwise I couldn’t afford to do the course. I was sick the day of the final exams. One of the examiners afterwards told me they thought I was going to faint. But I passed.

I found out – via the wonder of LinkedIn – that the course has been cancelled. Changes to funding for third level education in the UK and the fact that the course is not profitable have killed it. I have some regrets about this. It’s 10 years or more since I did anything related to interpreting – but deep within me there’s this vague disappointment that it’s gone. I worked very hard for that diploma and I do honestly believe that improving communications between cultures is important.

that being said…I don’t now work as an interpreter.

2011 05 18 windsandbreezes annoying me since 1874 Comments (0) Permalink