Image027.jpg
Image027.jpg

Durty Nelly's is really old. Built in the 1600s, just beside Bunratty castle. It was too crowded, so we're going to try and eat at Tipsy McStagger's in Enis now. Wedding last night was great. Everything v expensive.









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Image024.jpg

Waiting for Dana's delayed flight in Shannon, Pablo and I go shopping and find the Fitzgerald sweater...












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Image022.jpg

Dog tracks in Galway. First euro-blog attempt.














 Just in time.
Thanks, gov't, for saving my ass just in time for the trip to Ireland. Hopefully I won't have to use too much of this, as I've recently been bleeding money. Direct deposit is just awesome.





 ROBOTS EVERYWHERE (See what I'm talking about)
Via gizmodo. Thanks for brightening my day. I know the blogging sucks over the weekend (esp. holiday weekends) - hopefully with the new phone, once I get it switched to Cingular and the unlimited data plan - that will change. We're also supposed to get blackberries at work soon. That should increase even more my moblogging capabilities.

And I leave for Ireland tomorrow. Yay.





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Image017.jpg

Pic d took of me at the horseshoe.






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Image009.jpg

Hutch's skyline dip. Left at home for 3 months.






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Image003.jpg

Commute!






 Image001.jpg
Image001.jpgNote: if you ever see a pic like this in the future, it's one that I emailed directly from my phone to flickr, that flickr auto-posts to the blog.

Maybe I'll figure out how to give it a NAME next. Hmmm.

Also, even though my new phone has a full QWERTY keyboard, it seems like email sizes are limited to SMS-length (though I can use POP email). This one will take some time to figure out. Maybe I'll be able to Moblog from Ireland! How cool would that be!?

(oh, yeah, I'm going to Ireland next week).

(also, all this text was edited into the post after it was posted from the phone. Which was pretty much immediate. I love technology. Now you can never escape me!!!!





 OLN cycling coverage schedule (See what I'm talking about)
  • March 6th Paris-Nice (France)
  • March 13th Paris-Nice (France)
  • March 20th Milan San Remo (Italy)/Tirreno-Adriatico (Italy)
  • March 27th Criterium International (France)
  • April 3rd Tour of Flanders (Belgium)
  • April 10th Paris-Robaix (France)/Redlands* (USA)
  • April 17th Amstel Gold Race (Netherlands)
  • April 24th Liege-Bastogne-Liege (Belgium)/Sea Otter* (USA)
  • May 1st Tour de Georgia* (USA)
  • May 8th Giro d’Italia (Italy)**
  • May 15th Giro d’Italia (Italy)
  • May 22nd Giro d’Italia (Italy)
  • May 29th Giro d’Italia (Italy)
  • June 12th Road to the Tour (Tour de France preview)
  • June 19th Road to the Tour
  • June 26th Road to the Tour
  • July 3rd - 24th Tour de France (France)***
  • Sept 18th Vuelta a España (Spain)
  • Oct 15th Giro di Lombardia (Italy)

* Tape delay
** Giro d’Italia coverage may be expanded to include Saturday Coverage
*** Tour de France will include daily coverage





 Lance to ride TdF this year (See what I'm talking about)
Pro Cycling :: News: "After much speculation, the Discovery Channel Pro Cycling Team's Lance Armstrong today announced his initial 2005 racing schedule, one that will include this summer's Tour de France where he will go for a seventh straight victory."

Hmm. I guess he'll wait until next year to go for the hour-record. It would be weird for him not to ride the Tour this year, but I really thought he was going to take a year off..

Other important info:
"All of the event's Armstrong will participate in will be aired on the Outdoor Life Network (OLN). Lance Armstrong Initial 2005 Schedule:

Mar 6-13 — Paris-Nice (France)
Apr 3 — Tour of Flanders (Belgium)
Apr 19-24 — Tour de Georgia (USA)
Jul 2-24 — Tour de France"





 My heat is...

No shit. No heat again. AWESOME!

Ring, ring... Hello, City of Chicago?





 Wedding Registry Ideas (See what I'm talking about)
So as most of you probably know (OK, who am I kidding, the only people that read this are my friends anyway - you all know this), I'm getting married at the end of June.

...no, you're not invited...

So the fiancee and I are busy trying to do all the wedding-prep stuff, including, of course, registering for gifts. The problem is, if you register at TOO many places, you look like greedy bastards. If you don't register at enough places, you look like schmucks who don't want any gifts (or want, say, only cookware). I wish we could just make an Amazon wishlist. Or, for that matter, a ThinkGeek wishlist... Sigh.

But I want one of these. :)

We have, however, been registering for one joke item at each place. Too bad the Squirrel-shaped pinecone Christmas ornament from Crate and Barrel was discontinued. The best, I think, is at Williams-Sonoma: we registered for a welcome mat with (soon-to-be) our last name's first initial on it. What could be more welcoming than a mat that just says "F"? :)

(and for the record: Yes, I know we CAN just make an Amazon wishlist, but our mothers would have a litter of kittens at the impropriety of doing such a thing. And so it goes.)





 Video link! (See what I'm talking about)
I'm sure most of you have seen this, but if not, it's... mildly funny. (~2.5mb MPEG)

So, here's to being mildly funny! Yay!





 The heat in my apartment is:

In the interest of fairness to my motherfuckinglandlord, the heat was fixed the same day we reported it (but it was off overnight).





 HVD (See what I'm talking about)
Seriously, we should consider getting back to our roots. Happy Valentine's Day, everyone.

St. Valentine's Day - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia: "In Ancient Rome, the day of February 15 was Lupercalia, the festival of Lupercus, the god of fertility, who was represented as half-naked and dressed in goat skins. As part of the purification ritual, the priests of Lupercus would sacrifice goats to the god, and after drinking wine, they would run through the streets of Rome holding pieces of the goat skin above their heads, touching anyone they met. Young women especially would come forth voluntarily for the occasion, in the belief that being so touched would render them fruitful and bring easy childbirth."

The stuff about Valentine's Day in non-western cultures is pretty interesting too...





 So you've decided to take a shit on the sidewalk (See what I'm talking about)
Sometimes the Craigslist "Best of" is just the best thing going. This one reminds me of the homeless guy that lives in our alley in the summer. I have seen him shitting in the alley not once, but TWICE, and the evidence of his excrement countless times. In fact, the mortar between the bricks where he shits (it's always just a nasty liquid-only shit) is melting away. Fantastic!

If anyone out there needs some nasty grout removed from their bathroom/kitchen tiles, I know just the guy. And I think he's looking for work!





 Unbelievable. (See what I'm talking about)
Seriously, is this RedNOVA for real? I've been digging around here since the last post, and found out that there's a Godfather videogame coming out that Brando recorded his voice for before he died, Ray Kurzweil thinks he's going to live forever, and this woman who hasn't spoken a word in something like 20 years is now talking again.

Wicked.

EDIT: Fixed bad linkage.





 Machine sees future.... kind of? (See what I'm talking about)
I attempt to remain healthily sceptical, but this is almost too cool to not believe. I wonder if their data are openly available (like, in real-time)...

EDIT: And, in the interest of being fair, an article at Skeptic Report shooting this stuff down..





 Tivo To Go Unleashed! (See what I'm talking about)
Here you go - how to unlock TiVo To Go files and burn to DVD (or do whatever you wish with). Yay.





 New feature?
OK, in addition to the "my heat is now..." feature added (see two posts below), I decided that another regular feature should be added.

See, a buddy of mine is out of town for a few months testifying as a child witness in some trial (or something like that), so he gave me his keys to pick up his mail and run the water, air the place out, etc.

So I show up last night, and what do I find but a week-old tray of food sitting on the counter (barely eaten - must have been made drunk the night before he left), dirty dishes not only in the sink but also one sitting next to his couch, and general filth everywhere else.

So I think I'm going to start a Hutch-Filth-o-Meter, and grab some pictures each time I stop by. See, I refuse to actually clean his place for him, so I figure the best thing I can do is embarass him enough to clean it himself.

I think it might be time to email his high school buddies who maintain a blog of their own - see if they have any good ideas for what I could do. Leaving a big old steaming pile to fester in his bathroom for a couple of months HAS crossed my mind, but I'm not sure I'm THAT evil... Perhaps inspiration will hit..





 Evilpartment, pt. 3
Wow. OK, I know there was never an official part two, and I had a GREAT rant composed perfectly as I lay shivering in bed this morning, but all creative inspiration has been sucked out my ears now that I'm at work.

So I'll do my best. Overnight, our heat went out for the third time this winter. The *best* part is, they were just over to "fix" it on Wednesday. Yes, our heat worked for a grand total of ONE WHOLE FUCKING DAY. Congratu-fucking-lations, LG. You've reached a new all-time record for the shittiest rental company ever.

You know, I've had a lot of time in the cold, huddled up with my teddy bear to analyze what, exactly, it is about the people who own my apartment that makes them so special. It's not that a year and a half after the fact, they're bringing up painful memories to the families of the people their shitty contractors killed by having the city actually SUE people who SURVIVED the porch collapse that, I have no doubt (though this is, of course, only my opinion) it's entirely their fault for hiring sub-par contractors and bribing city officials. (what? Chicago officials dirty? I don't believe it!)

It's just that I finally realized the motivating factor, here. Sure, call me naive for actually thinking otherwise, but these people rent houses because they LOVE MONEY. They don't give two shits about the actual PEOPLE who live in their apartments (which explains why they tried to EVICT us after we refused to pay rent when they literally tore the roof off our building.

Sigh. This is no good. At least when I move to Houston, I won't have to worry about the heat going out. We could sleep with the windows open and fans on year round...

(almost certainly to be continued...)





 The heat in my apartment is:





 Google Maps! (See what I'm talking about)
Seriously, google. You have to stop doing all this cool stuff. Sure, maps have been done before, but they just do everything so... soo...... well.. Now, if they do something like a9's "see where you're going" thing, then, well, Google kills all.





 Back from Park City
Yup, I'm back. And alive! Hopefully, even though my workload in the coming weeks (before my trip to Ireland at the end of the month) is going to remain ridiculous, I'll be able to post somewhat regularly. I'll make an effort to take a little break every now and then to promote my blogging endeavors.

Anyway, this is my favorite pic of the trip (you can see different sizes at my flickr account, or the rest of my pics from the trip - and some videos - at my website).





 Man pees way out of avalanche (See what I'm talking about)
Oh, just read the link. Thanks, Brian.