Angry Morning

I woke up angry this morning.

Not a particularly pleasant state, perhaps induced by not having a big enough dinner last night perhaps by wasting time over the last 24 hours or perhaps by some sort of dream, which I now can't remember. Anyway, here I am awake at 8am and pissed off... what am I going to do with this?

It's tempting to roll over and go back to sleep till 2pm and forgetting about the world for a little while longer but that's probably not the most productive solution. Getting up, getting some breakfast and doing something with my day would probably be the most sensible solution...

Right off I go...

The year in Fencing so far...

A new year... a golden year (I get to use the lounges with Air France now)... going to finally update what has been happening at comps so far this year.

There Will Be Blood... Oh Dear

I've just come back from watching "There Will Be Blood" in the UGC in Les Halles. It's a truly bizarre movie in a lot of respects but thoroughly, well if not enjoyable, then definitely worth the price of admission. It's quite a long movie and follows one man over the course of his life - that's Daniel Day Lewis' character Daniel Plainview.

Like I said though thoroughly enjoyable and I thought it was a great movie but what is left me slightly worried is how much at one time to another I identified with the character Plainview. Anyway, go see it and then you'll probably think twice about talking to me again.

Good Morning World

The birds are singing, the sun is shining, all is as it should be...

SSSSSSSCCCCCCCCCHHHHHMMMMMMAAAAAACCCCKKKKK!

And this is life.

I'm A Fidelista - Where Do I Get My Tracksuit?

I really really want one of Fidel Castro's Adidas tracksuits! Does anyone know where I can buy one?

Since July 2006, the last time the leader of the Granma invasion, was seen in public he seems to have only sported the most astounding array of Adidas Cuban tracksuits the world has ever seen. My suspicion also is that every time he has been seen on camera since then his tracksuits have been getting more modern. This suggests to me that Adidas have been sending him new ones all this time.

Anyway, I want one... people haven't seen me in public (outside of fencing competitions) in a similar length of time... and my rhetoric on the bourgeois Yankee devils is just as relevant!

Who doesn't love the Onion?

Nation Of Andorra Not In Africa, Shocked U.S. State Dept. Reports

A stop-gap solution to a lack of posting

Amusing perhaps, if you play guitar...

Enjoy!

Copenhagen and Getting Out of the Rut

The Universiades, despite being a fantastic and unforgettable experience, had been a disappointment in terms of fencing. This had been mainly because of a lack of training in advance of the competition. It wasn't from lack of searching that I didn't have training but with my own club closed and the international teams which I approached not particularly bothered with allowing me into their squad training. Anyway, that's something I'll go into in more detail when I eventually get round to updating that whole chapter of last year.

This was the culmination of a tough season with a lot of world cups where, while I felt that my fencing was improving massively, I had failed to transfer that into results in competition. So between that and whatever was going on in my private life from August and the months following, I hadn't been in the best of form and was finding it very difficult to turn things on at competition time. Moreover I was beginning to be frustrated by this situation and really pushing things to much while on the piste, which was only making things worse.

As I'd mentioned in previous entries I was feeling pretty down after a great christmas to be heading back to Paris but I was determined to make it a good year. I arrived back on the Wednesday 2nd and had a training session on the 3rd before leaving for Copenhagen on the 4th.

The trip to Copenhagen was to be uneventful. Copenhagen is quite a strange airport - it's more like a giant shopping mall that plains happen to take off from. I got into Copenhagen central station reasonably late. Stephen made up the other 50% of the Irish team for this competition and I was sharing a hotel room with him very near the venue.

We got a reasonably early night before the individual comp the next day after failing to be able to hook up my Ipod to the TV.

...

The next morning, we met the Finnish team at breakfast, and made the short but nonetheless freezing journey across to the venue, which was a nice modern sport centre maybe 100 metres from the hotel.

The first round of poules went all right for me (practice round anyway) but I dropped one fight against an Austrian. Woke up in the second round and won all my matches and was seeded second going into the tournament proper.

This gave me a buy through the first round. As it happened I was to fence the winner between Stephen and the ex-Scottish international Stewart Watson, who now lives in Copenhagen. Stewart was at 14-7 or something like it before Stephen mounted a miraculous comeback... but only to 14-all. Stewart took the last point and I was to face him in the last 16.

I suppose it's only fair to mention he was a bit ill but I was able to beat him in the 16 without too much fuss and book my place in the last 8. In the last 8 I was against a young Turk and while the match started well, I went to pieces after the break - the problems of the last couple of months crept back in and I was snatching at attacks from way out of range and wasting my preparations.

So I finished 5th overall (got my 1 FIE point - woop) but I got some good advice from Stewart during my quarter final match which I've really taken to heart since. He seems to be becoming an excellent coach. We agreed to fence the team competition the next day together - not that I was to be much use to the team as it turned out...

...

Going with hair-gel rather than a hat that night turned out to be a mistake. I don't know where that wind was coming from but it was cold.

We all met up in... ugh... an Irish pub near the city centre (I vaguely remember spending a very drunken night there two years previously). There was a good crowd out with the Dutch, Islandic, Finnish and erm... the one Scot and two Irish that there were in attendance.

After a couple of drinks there we went next door to a nice indian place. More beers... and curry! Fantastic!

When we finally left the Indian it had been snowing but for some reason I was feeling the cold as much...

First half-hearted snowball fight of the night and on to a small rocker bar nearby. I remember declaring "sausage factory" upon it and we didn't stay there that long. Maybe only one or two drinks. Ugh...

Another walk to another Irish bar... a real Oirish Irish bar aswell... another snowball fight on the way, I think. Straw on the floor, long benches and tables... the worst cover band of all time at whom I became more and more incensed as the night went on. Lost track of drinks, of what I was talking about. Met some Irish people I think. More drink. Talking pure crap.

Talking to some Danish girls. I think. Inability to walk at this stage also ruled out dancing but Stephen was well on for it. God knows what he was dancing to with that terrible band.

Left at closing time and embarked on one of the longest and coldest journeys home of all time. There were snowball fights, but not sure of much past that.

...

Woke up the next morning at around 11ish with my alarm. For several minutes was very puzzled as to the location of Stephen... until I remembered he'd left for the airport several hours earlier. With the serious business of the individual competition out of the way, the friendly competition was today.

I managed to drag my carcass over to the venue. My reactions were unfortunately slightly dulled that day. We were generously donated a absolute muppet by the German team, who couldn't fence. Between these to factors and Stewarts sickness the righting was pretty much on the wall.

Less said about the team comp the better although the final result probably flattered us that day - I can't remember what it was.

...

So, in summary, a competition with perhaps a slightly lower standard than French domestics and certainly proper world cups gave me the chance to see that I was capable of beating people and also gave me an opportunity to let my hair down a bit.

Sitting eating a steak in Copenhagen International Airport/Mall I felt a thoroughly content with the weekend.

Copenhagen

Just back from the satellite competition in Copenhagen.

I finished 6th (seeded third after the poules) in the tournament and was reasonably pleased with my performance. It certainly was a boost to my confidence which I'll admit has been flagging somewhat lately.

Now though I'm absolutely shattered and need to go bed before I collapse on the computer.

A full report to follow shortly and don't think I haven't forgot about those missing months either...

Post Christmas Blues

I don't think I've been as sad to leave Ireland in a good while.

I'm determined to make this year a good one, in my fencing, person life and profession but I feel like I'm starting from square one again leaving the majority of my friends here. This feeling is not unfamiliar to me. Normally when I go back to Paris after a few days in Ireland it takes a few days to readjust.

Everything is up in the air all over again. Will I be able to find a marketing job? How will my season progress? How long will I stay in France? Do I want to stay in France?

I was told that there's an ancient Chinese curse - "May you live in interesting times". What I did to be so cursed I'm not certain but I'm determined to enjoy the results as much as I can anyway.

A New Beginning?

The first sunrise of 2008. A friend's sofa overlooking Sandymount strand. Uncertainty is scary and the past brings no real comfort right now. At this point I'm not reveling in the thought of the return of this introspection in only 366 short days.

Happy new year! Time to make the most of it.

I was nearly that guy...

I arrived on the RER platform at Nation this morning to find a packed train waiting there already unloading passengers. I scurried down the platform a bit in order to try and find a carriage that wasn't so packed. I saw a space and casually squeezed in, my bag trailing behind. What i couldn't hear was that buzzer for the closing door was already sounding as my iPod was up too loud.

The precise moment i stepped on the train i felt the doors closing; my backpack still trailing behind me. I pulled it inside as the doors scraped it's sides.

Phew! I relaxed and let my bag drop down to the side... Only to realise that a rubber tab hanging off my bag was stuck in the door. Even more alarming was that I knew that the doors on that side of the train wouldn't be opening again before i got off. <Queue dramatic music>

...

So, I suppose what I've illustrated with this story is that things have been relatively quiet. Training is back to full speed and work is keeping me busy. It's still on my mind to fully update this blog for all the time I missed from May to August. It was a busy time with the Europeans, Cuba, the universiades and holidays in Thailand.

I certainly might have a different perspective on some of the events of the last 12 months now but I'd like to have a record of them somewhere. So, interesting times ahead, I promise, even if it means dredging up the past.

A+

I Hate Ikea...

...My first experience of the Swedish mega-store leaves a taste of MDF in my mouth.

'I need a set of drawers' I thought to myself. 'Furniture' I thought, 'Where does one buy furniture?'. Four years of being bombarded with case studies about the behemoth of fürni left only one name in my mind. Added to this I happened to be teaching (did I mention I started teaching?) in a centre not far from a modest sized Ikea store (only a couple of square kilometers) - the stars were surely all aligned and pointing me in the direction

Once I finished work at 4 o'clock I got a bus to the Ikea store about ten minutes away. To enter the place is like entering another world - a yellow and blue one. I'm apparently too negative a person but the trouble started nearly straight away. Having headed the warnings about people being lost for days in the place and nearly starving to death before reaching the café, I had the piece of furniture selected well in advance of my visit. Aneboda, or some such, was the name of this modestly priced chest of drawers but where the hell was it?

The showroom section snake on for ever before I came to the sprawling storage space area. All of a sudden there it was - the chest of drawers of my dreams. So this piece of furniture could be collected in the warehouse section of the building; row 25 dock 48.

Another twenty minutes of walking through beds, wardrobes, TV units, wardrobes, kitchen storage, shoe racks, kids bedrooms, kitchen wear, crockery, plastic tress and baskets and I finally found the warehouse section and with a small jaunt through the warehouse I located my chest of drawers.

They were heavier than I though. At 30kgs it was going to be a long hour long metro ride back to my apartment at rush hour but I assumed that a magical solution would present itself; perhaps I could buy this small yellow trolley.

Firstly though I had to deal with the check-out. I'm sure I've posted previously about the speed of service at any french check-outs. This ranges from a man buying a loaf of bread taking 10 minutes to a jar of pickles taking 5 hours. Imagine then French people having to check through hundreds of kilos of furniture. A long wait was in store as my flimsy yellow trolley (with a max load of 30kg) began to buckle. When I eventually paid for the drawers, I was told I could not bring my branded trolley any further. So I had to drag the box to through to the delivery area - stopping to get an ultra cheap bulk produced hot-dog on the way.

It was becoming apparent to me that Ikea did not want people without cars shopping with them as they didn't want people placing small orders and clogging up there delivery system. I was looking that my small set of drawers was going to cost €50 to deliver and that having already paid for it, I had no other option, save for giving myself a coronary trying to carry it on the metro. €100 for a chest of drawers that will probably barely last the rest of my time hear, no matter how short of long that is.

Bah, so there you go... that's how exciting my life is these days apparently. Without being directly exposed to the incompetence of Irish fencing I'm left to get angry at harmless multinational corporations (albeit ones with bizarre tax dodging religious status). I'm sorry Ikea, it's not you... it's me being negative...

No more whiskey after training...

I Miss My Extra Kilos...

It's freezing in Paris at the minute and I'm only writing this entry to put off walking to training (see previous entry on strike).

Losing a stone over the course of the last year, I've obviously lost considerable insulation as well. I've never been much of a hat and scarf wearer but this is definitely hat, scarf and gloves weather. Anyway at least my figure tips have been warmed slightly from typing.

Discovering Paris By Foot

... In freezing temperatures.

For the second time in as many months Paris is in the grip of an RATP strike. I know, hard to believe that the French would go on strike (some info here) but it's happened. I'm certainly not going to debate whether the reforms are needed or whether the concerns of the €68,000+ a year train drivers are valid. Far be it from me to propose theories as to the moral imperatives in question but Goddammit this is a pain in the ass!

I walked an hour to work yesterday, after getting up at 6am only to find that my class was cancelled because my student couldn't get there. I was half-way to work this morning when my student cancelled leaving me with an additional two hours wait after my two hours walk before my next class. All the while we are experiencing the coldest days of the year so far - it's fantastic.

The strike seems set to continue I've heard talk of it lasting till Sunday at least. It's going to make my trip to the airport this weekend a nightmare not to mention trying to get back home on Sunday evening. After all that I have classes in Roissy (the town in which CdeG Airport is located) on Monday and Tuesday - I might as well stay in the airport if I want to have any chance of getting to those classes!

Ugh... I'm not digging this at all!

One year on... (Warning: Introspection Ahead)

It's exactly one year and a day since I've been living in France. Perhaps it's time for a stock-take. I'm tired of writing more or less about subjects about as tangible or relevant as the weather so perhaps it's time for a more personal confessional entry about my life so far in France and where it has lead me.

Tonight I celebrated with my friends and team-mates at my club my birthday (which happened two weeks ago) as well as, more importantly, my being in France for exactly one year. I arrived in France on the 6th of November last year - with the basic idea that I would spend a year in France to improve my fencing.

On paper I perhaps haven't really faired that well. I've lost a girlfriend. My world ranking has slipped where my focus on World-Cups and Grand-Pris has lead to a lesser involvement in easier competitions. I am pretty much completely broke but have finally found a job, to which I am quite indifferent to, which will do little except maintain my position as broke. My level of French while massively improved is still nowhere a level where I would feel comfortable working completely in French.

So... where have I performed memorably?... Hmm...

Why carry on? Why not end it all?

I suppose, I feel I am finally living. I have autonomy, freedom and no restraints emotional or physical. While my world ranking has slumped I feel like a far superior fencer and I feel that with even more work I could finally make myself satisfied in terms of results and achievements. I live in what I believe to be one of the most beautiful cities on Earth. I'm in the best shape I have possibly ever been. I am determined to become fluent in French if it is the last thing I do.

I'm generally enjoying life and continuing the path I have actually chosen to do and I suppose that is worth more than anything. While the call of a serious career is certainly beckoning I am enjoying this time and growing as a person. It's possible that both could continue in tandem and certainly that would be my ideal state - we'll see.

...

Well there it is. Confessional, heart-rendering, as ridiculously pious and self-inflated as any piece you will ever see for public consumption on the inter-web. Enjoy it or not... I'm glad to get it off my chest.

Á plus...

Best Worst Dive Ever

Brazil now have a contender to topple this hilarious and infamous dive by Rivaldo in the World Cup. Seen at around 00:45 in this dive compilation -



Dida the Brazilian goalkeeper deserves a lap of honour all to himself for this one. The mantle has been passed...



His initial reaction is to chase after the fan to give him a kick... then he remembers his training and goes down like a ton of bricks. It would be tragic if Celtic get punished for this in terms of their result, hopefully it will just be a monetary fine.

Which do I hate more?

... this week: dog-owners or smokers?

In what may turn-out to be a regular feature, I contemplate to of the most ignorant groups of people on the planet. Don't get me wrong I know plenty of smokers who are good friends of mine and likewise plenty of friends of mine own dogs but as groups they have certain ignorant and infuriating traits.

I'm working from a sort libertarian / utilitarian outlook whereby people should be free to do what they want as long as it doesn't do harm to others. I've spent the last twenty minutes cleaning dog-shit off my shoe because someone saw fit to use the footpath as a toilet for their dog. All my clothes stink like shit and my chance of cancer has increased because smokers still enjoy the right to smoke indoors in Paris.

Hmm... the jury is still out on this one...

It's Official... Apple Are Now Bigger Wankers Than Microsoft

A thinly veiled threat by Apple that if iPhone users use the mods now available to unlock their phones from AT&T that future updates they release will disable their phones. Article from Wall Street Journal

Getting Up Early / Sleeping In Late

Hmm, it's been an odd couple of weeks. Training is painstakingly slowly getting back to ordinary levels but the majority of the last two weeks of training has been taken up with football. Which is fair enough if you're coming back from a long break from training and you want to ease yourself back in. I on the other hand am coming back from a position where I've been dying to train all Summer in preparation for the Europeans and the Universiades but haven't had the oppurtunity. My form dipped correspondingly to this lack of training, culminating in an uninspired and disappointing tournament in Bangkok (which I'm sure I'll get round to writing about in some time).

Added to this, frustrations in my personal life, the majority of my friends from the Irish College having returned home and the tedium of trying to find a job, I'm left swinging like a pendulum between restlessness and a pensive aggression. As if I needed it, on top of it all the under performing Irish rugby team are bringing me down even further.

...

I'll fill in some of the blanks from the last 3 weeks...

Since my return to Paris on the 31st of August, were it not for the sparse entries to this blog I'd barely be able to remember a single thing I did. For two weeks though I got back into some serious training in the gym. Managed to get 5 sessions in for both those weeks, which I was pleased with and I was feeling good for. Aside from that, I watched the start of the Rugby World Cup and the early warning signs of things to come as Ireland struggled past Namibia.

I began a serious of interviews with 5 or 6 different English teaching organisations. Since I'm still involved in the interview process with some of them I won't say much more about that. It was good practice at my interview technique at the very least.

Last weekend, the 14th September, I returned to Ireland. I was briefly cheered up on the Friday night by watching England being massacred by South Africa with friends in town, only to be brought back down again by Ireland's performance against Georgia. Sunday's All-Ireland final was a predictably dull affair but I went to see Knocked Up in the evening - which probably made the day a draw but a moral victory. Monday, I'd had to return some things left in my apartment by a friend, so at least my bag was lighter returning to Paris.

As if by magic, Tuesday I was back in Paris. None-the-wiser for my short stay, I longed for a longer stay at home even before I boarded the plane. The rest of the week I slept. And slept. And slept.

I woke up Friday, since there was some sort of match on. Got absolutely buckled for a good 12 hour period. Stumbled home at 7am Saturday and have spent the rest of the weekend recovering until now. Just what the next week will bring... It's already 8 minutes old at the time of writing and I don't know if I care.

...

I face into the unknown. I should be well familiar with that by now; having not known what I wanted to do in College, not knowing what I wanted to after college and my not knowing eventually leading me to my current location. Still my familiarity with this feeling brings me no comfort right now.

Suggestions welcome...