A Christmas Carol..

Every year I do a little blurb on my favorite Christmas songs. So far on the list: Fairy Tale of New York (The Pogues), Last Christmas (Wham), Little Drummer Boy (Bing Crosby and David Bowie), & of course Do They Know its Christmas (Band Aid). I wanted to do another one of these posts in proper detail to continue on with the tradition... however, Ive run out of time because Im actually flying to the Philippines in 12 hours for this years Christmas Break (Almost 16 years in the making). Im in the middle of packing right now actually. So unfortunately I wont have time to do it right and prepare a decent introduction then frame it within a conceptual context that is somehow hopefully interesting (at least thats always my intention). So Ill just be simple and say it plainly and add Happy Xmas [the war is over] (John Lennon) to the list. Great great song, never loses its appeal, and unlike another xmas song from his former band mate Paul, it has a greater repeat playability appeal, the hallmark of any truely excellent christmas song.

Merry Christmas everyone. or er Happy Christmas, as everyone says over here.... which still sounds funny to me.

I might catchup with you again when I have 4.5 hours in the Heathrow British Airways lounges tomorrow. (I really still hate Heathrow, because, you know its a shambles)

Thwarted in Helsinki...

Santa Claus is Finnish... I never heard that side of the story before, but apparently according to the Finland literature, its true. Its a bit thin in terms of claims, the Dutch and Coca Cola can equally protest this quite convincingly, but at any rate I was in Finland this past week to go find Santa... (and do some work on the side on my way back to Russia again).

Was pissed about how this trip turned out because of 3 reasons though. 1st Reason: Heathrow lost my bags. Again. (third time this stupid airport did it this year!! Ive got to stop flying through London. Its a shambles).

2nd Reason: it Rained the last few days. Not impressed. When you go to Russia and Finland in December, you expect snow. Its like white on rice... I dont want no other rice. And fair enough, it was snowing when we arrived... and it was the good crunchy fluffy stuff, too, that really I miss so much so. Expectations were set Yao Ming height, and there was delivery. But the last two days it rained. Rain... the exact same stuff I get plenty of in Ireland... I didnt come to Nordic Europe for rain.. Ireland has plenty of that already, and especially since Rain mixed with Snow equals slush, which in my books, is just a few steps up from the sky raining feces. See? Global warming y'all, so I blame all you SUV V6 - V8 motherfuckers... (My future Infinity FX45 wont count.. cuz I recycle my canning jars, brush and pee in the shower and use energy saving light bulbs)


Finland in December is suppose be white, and not look like this.

3rd Reason: On Thursday, because of a late return flight to Dublin, we pretty much had all day in Helsinki to see the sights and *ahem* shop. Helsinki is absolutely brilliant for shopping, because of all the funky cool fashion here that I like the best. Not only that, but the scandinavian gadgets and trinkets are bloody deadly. If I had my way, all my house wares, furniture, appliances and whatnot would be from here. So Thursday was my day. Was staying at a modern boutique hotel too right in the middle of the city, with a room that looked like this..

So it was all lined up perfectly... all ducks were in their proverbial rows. No one told us though, that the only free day we had was actually Finish Independence day, a day where apparently nothing goes on and everything closes. EVERYTHING. Made no sense, like it was a waste of a valuable day in Christmas Shopping season. The big event for the day is some gala that everyone in Finland goes home to watch on TV. So rain, and no shopping It felt like a kick in the balls, with steel toe boots.

For revenge I decided to eat some Rudolph for the first time ever, Filet cut, medium rare, with mash potatoes and a funky spicy gravy. Rudolph tasted real good that day, let me tell you.

The List

So its Amerricun Thanksgiving week, which means the Oprah My Favorite things show is out, which marks again another year of the female audience jumping / screaming / crying insanely, displaying unreal "overacting" levels of spasm, like a baby who just spat out a pacifier, all really for something stupid like oprah gifting a panini press (you know the story, because all women are lunatics). And to be honest, this years list was pretty shit too. High Fashion Mu-mu fat people clothes? Uggs? A fridge with a LCD screen? Well let me backtrack, that actually is cool. but.. Josh Groban CD? Comeon... I truly was expecting more quality. Its sounds to me like a injury plagued off year for Oprah, must be the South African school scandal that has her not on her 'A' game.

What it means then is that its a good time to publish my annual Christmas wish list. And mine is better than Oprahs. Even though I wont be in Vancouver this xmas, just buy these things for me anyways, and Ill manage to pick it up sometime when Im over next... not to worry...

Also this is an active growing list. Things might add to it as I think of them.. like for example when I decide which next pair of shoes I want...

-Bodum Bora Bora Tea Press . Ive been living in Ireland for almost 4 years now, where they have tea 4 times a day. So I need a cool ass tea pot. And this one is double wall.

-Adagios Tea, Rooibos Cinnamon Apple. I need tea for that pot too. Gourmet South African Tea.. its the only way I roll.

- Banana Republic Cashmere Earmuffs. If you are going to get earmuffs... might as well get cashmere ones. I could rock these.

-- Paul Smith Dog Cuff Links. Actually what i really want is a Pimp "Spinners" cuff links, but I dont think they exists, or at least google says so.

-30" Apple Cinema Display. Ill even accept a 20" one, so I can marry it with a wall mount and a track ball, and install it beside the toilet, for safe internet use, while dropping a deuce.

-Kryptonite.

-Bose Quiet Comfort 3. I already have pretty good noise cancellation Sennheiser ones, but I cant let Jill have a pair and me not have them. No way...

- Luggage. By Tumi.

- Tee Shirt. A sweet ass t shirt that hopefully wont be dated anytime soon.

- The newest Lady Killer.

- The best Stand up arcade game of all time

- Karate Kid Special Edition DVD

- New Camera. I want this so bad. Along with a Canon 24-105mm f4/L IS USM Lens.

............

Eventually...

A bit late but below I have posted some of the pictures from the Greece Italy trip 6 weeks back. Remember how I explained how my computer was missing for 2 weeks? So thats why its late. And as for the 4 weeks preceding that, lets just say I was lazy as expected and well known for welching on blog promises, yet somehow, to my credit, made up for it by posting quite prolifically during that month. Temporarily I refound that elusive writing passion, a passion which during that period was almost as strong as my super-crush on Alicia Keyes (Im attracted to geniuses, and isnt she just lovely with straight hair and red lipsticks?). Lets try to keep it up...

So here we go.. and if you wish, again click to enlarge.


This is one of the greatest and one of my most favorite things about Italia.. Italian Cafes. Even better scene at night.


Rome shopping.


Spanish steps at midnight.


Mykonos Mill


Mykonos Locals candid


Positano Italy


Three years ago i posted Santorini photos. This time I went a little new, and took pictures in a different light.

Im back mac..

-No one knew this, but Ive been without my trusty macbook pro laptop for the last 2 weeks almost. I pulled a cheeky move, by sending the mac in for repair, only for the sole reason that my year warranty was about to expire and it was my last chance to get some thing repaired for free, even though there was nothing really wrong with the computer. I called em up, I made some trumped up complaint about the hard drive sounding "funny". The auth. mac repair crowd in dublin picked up it via courier, ran a few diagnostic tests, and actually found that the hard drive ran a tad slow on a few "sectors" and although only a minor concern,decided to replace it. Class... Por Pree.. dats por pree.. I had to suffer for it little bit though, regulated to the work laptop extended use at home... small sacrifices but Im back

-I have been a big fan of www.ngtv.com this past year... one of the better more entertaining things to come from the internet since all those secret websites that organize streaming tv and movie links. Its like Entertainment tonight / Extra, but except totally fucking cool instead... its unique its raw and fun, has a hot bimbo blonde host Carrie Keagan, she asks celebrities funky stupid questions that are the complete opposite of banal, and its unedited uncensored nature has done for entertainment coverage what south park has done for cartoons. And seriously, nothing is funner than listening to your A list celebrities like Robin Williams and Topher Grace repeatedly say "cock" and "motherfucker". "No Good TV", Good times. So Im glad its back, cuz I couldnt check that shit on my sterile work computer.

-One of my biggest pet peeves is when you find a toilet seat thats kinda like, you know, loose and wiggly. The seat moves around on you as you sit down, I hate that, cuz theres always the potential for the disaster situation of butt skin touching ceramic bowl (arghhh). My favorite toilet stall at work was like this though and I always had to be extra careful (my favorite because hardly anyone uses this one, low traffic and quiet). I filled in a few maintenance facility complaints to get it repaired, all the way back to January and have been frustrated because if it just got fixed, itd be the best work toilet Ive ever experienced. Its warm, clean, and it even smells good in there, like a 5 star hotel bathroom with potpourri. This week though, to my surprise it not only got fixed, but it got replaced by a new Gucci toilet seat... all shiny n blinging. Yep, these are the type of things that excite me ...

Destroyed..

Disaster. Ive destroyed my day. Ive never woken up to start my day at 830PM before...

Neww first, 6am Drunk..

Hav yo ever started drinking 5:45am in the morning? Like not in Denmarkk time when you are actually in North America, but woken up that early and ocompled to drinkg?

Tadgh did it too me... he woke me up at five and a bit, and forced drink into me... friggin irish.. and now its 9:15am and |Im loaded... whaththe hel ?

Im going back to bed... the irish are trying to kill me... Bushmills too... whisckey. Why would you call a whiskey after a mill with bushes... and its protestant whiskeys.. goooods times... ohhff to bed... have to stpp now..