Another BA deal

Come visit! Please! Hurry, time is running out!

http://www.britishairways.com/travel/offerus058/public/en_us

Well, not really running out...but I like BA most of all the airlines I've flown so if you can get a good deal then it's worth it for sure.

Cheers!
Dan

Skiing in Ischgl continued...

Hi there,

So finally going to finish my Ischgl stories. Since I'm flying back to NY on Thursday, I've been very busy trying to get all my work settled and everything else ready.

Anyway, this was an absolutely fantastic trip for me. It was put together by my Texan friends and about 15 of us flew into Munich and then drove about 2 1/2 hours into Austria. We went over some scary mountain roads as main road had washed away from recent flooding. But finally arrived at Ischgl (pronounced Ish-Gl). Our hotel (Piz-Buin) turned out to be wonderful. After a hard day of skiing, the pool, hot tub, sauna, and steam rooms were quite a treat. But the real attraction was the hotel bar.



As I said in my last post, this former Austrian ski champ guy started this bar and now from 5 to 9 every day he leads crazy German sing-alongs. When I first walked in I was pretty shocked. I'd never seen anything quite like this. People of all ages yelling at the top of their lungs in a language I definitely do not understand. But after a few beers (ok...lots of beer), I started to get the hang of it. The people there had unlimited energy and there was always a smile on their face. What could be wrong with that? And since there was so much repetition in the songs, me and my friends were singing along and waving our beers with the rest of them by the end of the night! One guy even got offered someone's wife for a dance! Unbelievable!



Oh, and we were on the slopes a bit too. It's pretty amazing to get on a gondola in the morning, ride up for half an hour to the top of the mountain, and not make it back down till the end of the day. For some reason, it never occurred to me that most of the slopes, lifts, and restaurants would be above the tree line. It just looked so barren compared to Vermont. But I loved being able to ski into Switzerland for lunch!



There was one lift on the back of the mountain where the wind was whipping through a small valley and up the mountain. You really felt far away from civilization sitting on the apparently slow moving lift. Usually there are trees around so you don't really notice where you are. But here, you look out and you only see scary mountains and the occasional skier off in the distance! A good reason to make sure you are always skiing with a buddy.



Anyway, I skied pretty well and was able to ski down just about everything I could before. A lot of the more difficult runs were closed because the snow was thin as it was so early in the season, but it was still a great time. Look at me go!



And here's a bunch of other pictures taken during the weekend. Normally I'd cut it down more, but I like them all!

http://daninischgl.shutterfly.com/

I'm back to NY/CT tomorrow, so gimme a ring if you are around. :-)

Cheers!
Dan

Skiing in Ischgl

Wow.

This trip was full of firsts for me:

1. Skiing above the tree line

2. Skiing since my knee surgery (all went well...hurray!)

3. Staying at a posh European ski town in a hotel with a real sauna

4. Partaking in a real German sing-along (note the red shirted guy with the mic - he was on the Austrian ski team and now has a hotel bar named after him)

I'm very tired now after such a crazy weekend, so I'll write more soon and post the rest of my pics too.

Cheers!
Dan

London Slang -- "full stop" and "blow off"

[In an attempt to make up for past missed London Slang posts, I give you two sorta related ones. Basically they are related because they are both vulgar. Enjoy!]

full stop
n. s.

The dot at the end of this sentence.

Editor's Note: The term used in America is "period". Obviously that has another meaning, so I'm not sure how we ended up using it, but the Brits definitely don't. I heard a funny story recently from an American friend of mine who was trying to tell someone that they were missing a period. She was quite embarrassed when they started laughing and finally explained to her that what they were really missing was a full stop. It's quite odd for me to hear someone use "full stop" as the term for "that's all," when we would use "period." For example, "This is the best blog in the whole world. Full stop."

blow off
v.

This does NOT mean to rudely ignore someone -- like it does in the US. It means something a bit more literal. So I definitely have to be careful with this phrase.

Longer Pub Hours!!! New Airline Search Site!!!

Longer pub hours go into effect tonight!!! Hurrah! I'll be out after work having a sneaky pint (as they say here) to celebrate.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4461888.stm

Also, Tristan sent me a new (or new to me) web site that searches lots of airlines. Haven't looked at it much, but seems pretty good from what I can tell. Add it to your list!

https://www.air-gorilla.com

Cheers!
Dan

Bizzaro Skiing

This weekend I had the pleasure of heading down to Esher (pronounced E-sher) and paying £10 to go "dry skiing." This unbelievably bizarre experience lead to many bruises, but was actually pretty entertaining. A good thing to do to get back into the game or to get started for cheap though.



Basically, dry skiing involves a small hill, a huge pipe-cleaner like mesh, a bunch of dumb Brits, and one dumb American. I was originally told we were going to the indoor slope with real snow, but that costs a lot more and I lost the vote. So there we were, going down on real skis and trying to turn on this crazy mesh thing. I fell a lot! So my knee did ok, but now my hip hurts. Quite an experience.

Here's a zoom in of what the floor looked like:



It was pretty hard! Reminds me of skiing on ice back home. :-)

Here's my flatmat Natalie on her first run. She was pretty good at the snowplow by the end of the day.



Here's the rest of the pics:
http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=8AZMnLlm1atGRZ&notag=1

Anyway, we had a good time and I feel better about my trip to Austria next week. I imagine I'll get some better pictures there.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! I've been trying not to think about the fact that it is actually tomorrow because I'm having a few friends over on Saturday and trying to cook. Everyone will be bringing wine, so even if the food is bad we will have something nice to wash it down. And Tristan will be here! Nice to have a fellow expat to share missing Thanksgiving with.

Ok, I hope all you Americans eat a lot and have a great time this week. Fall asleep in front of a football game for me.

Cheers,
Dan

Candy Confusion

This week my lovely Mother mailed me a care package and, amongst other things, it contained some of the leftover Halloween candy. Being the generous guy that I am, I decided to bring a lot of it in to share with my colleagues. They, of course, appreciated it greatly. However, an unexpected piece of British trivia came out of all this.

It turns out that in the UK there are a lot of the same chocolate bar names that we know, but what the bar actually contains is all switched around. We had a nice time picking through each type and figuring out what's what. Here's the list we've determined so far:

American --> British
Three Musketeers --> Milky Way
Milky Way --> Mars Bar
Mars Bar --> Topic
M&Ms --> Treets (now also M&Ms though)
Snickers --> Snickers (they aren't all different!)

There are also a few more generic terms which I thought were interesting:

candy --> sweets
chocolate chips --> chocolate drops
cotton candy --> candy floss

There are a load of other foods called different and amusing names that perhaps I'll go through some other time.

Cheers!
Dan

Reverse Culture Shock?

As you know, I was home a few weeks ago. The truth is my biggest concern was reverse culture shock (seems it should have been the flight home). Anyway, you may be thinking, "you idiot....that only happens when you go to Africa and live with no indoor plumbing." But the "culture training" I took when I first moved here told me that it can be serious stuff. They had me all worried that when I returned tight roll jeans would be back in fashion and everyone would laugh at me because I still wore mine normally.

Fortunately (obviously), it wasn't that bad. I did find that I had a hard time figuring out the right balance of talking normal (gossip) and about talking about my experiences in London and throughout Europe. For example, I quickly found that explaining my struggle to figure out what is REALLY in American cheese caused a my friend's eyes to glaze over as if I was talking about computer science. This was at one point very important to me because I had to figure out what kind of cheese to buy instead of American. But clearly it isn't important to anyone else.

And that's the point. Most of my days are spent in a city very similar to NYC doing a job extremely similar to my old job, but the small differences had nearly consumed my life. I was just starting to get over my obsession with these differences when I flew back to the States and noticed these things all over again.

People were walking on the right instead of the left. There were 25 cent coins. It sounded stupid if I said "cheers" when someone held the door for me. I had to tip bartenders again, but couldn't remember if I'm supposed to tip a private bus driver (I didn't).

Clearly none of these things are as bad as when my friend Rob came back from Afghanistan and marveled at the efficiency of trains and the informed conversations people were having about politics.

However, on the other side was the fact that I could hang out with people who actually knew me and that I was truly comfortable with. One of my other worries was that I would be back with my real friends and family and not want to leave again. This also turned out to not be as bad as I feared, though there are definitely days when I wish I could just call up a few of my friends and meet up somewhere to chat about old times.

I will be seeing everyone soon though. Tristan is coming to London for Thanksgiving weekend to enjoy my delicious cooking. I'll be back home in Dec for 3 weeks over Christmas/New Years. Tom is coming skiing with me and friends in France in late January. And I think my brothers are visiting in Feb! Phew!

Anyway, just something I've been thinking about since my trip. I'm still nervous that when I move back to the US I'll have all kinds of culture shock issues, but nothing that a few glasses of wine won't sort out.

Cheers,
Dan

Guy Fawkes Night

Hi there,

This weekend I went with some friends to a huge fireworks display at Clapham Common near my neighborhood for some crazy thing called Guy Fawkes Night. I forgot my camera (again!), so was looking around online for some pics that might make this more interesting and I came across something very disturbing. Some Aussie dude (Darren) is living my life. Only it was 1 year ago. He writes this blog called "In the UK" and went to Clapham Common last year for the same night and totally wrote a summary about it! Freaky! And he even has good pictures! I think my title is better than his though.

Anyway, in the spirit of blog-niceness (and laziness), I decided to simply pass you on to Darren to explain my weekend. Please read it because he hits all the points I was going to write and has a few good links there too. Arg!

http://darrenking.com/uk/archives/000240.html

Cheers!
Dan

1 Day

Yes indeed. This time tomorrow I'll be sitting on a plane about to take off from Heathrow. Hurrah! It's going to be a great trip. I'll be meeting up with friends, going to a Cornell alumni event, attending what is certainly going to be a FABULOUS wedding, and, of course, seeing my family. I have to say I'm really excited for the wedding and am sure I'll have a story or two to share.

Last post I mentioned I was in Cork and that I kissed the Blarney Stone. Here's proof:


If you look at the zoomed in pic below, you can see that you have to lie down, lean over about 50 feet up in this castle, and kiss the last stone at the bottom of this wall. A bit bizarre, but pretty fun actually. They have these two polls you are supposed to hold but I, of course, was only holding one and got so excited about kissin the stone that the guy was yelling at me to hold the other. You can see him trying to push my arm towards the other poll. Hehe


Susie and I had heard stories about the locals going up there at night and pissing on the stone, but I thought it would still be ok for two reasons:

1. It was raining and it rains a LOT in Ireland (more than London, haha), so hopefully that washed everything away
2. The stone is at the top of a CASTLE. And they are built to make it sorta hard to get into. I've been a rock climber for a while, but even I would have trouble getting up there in the middle of the night after a few pints of Guinness.

Anyway, the other excitement for the weekend was that I got to see my first proper Irish Rugby match! We went down to the local Cork rugby pitch and crammed in with a load of Irish blokes screaming at the ref for 90 minutes. In the end, Munster (the province that contains Cork) beat Leinster (Dublin) 33-9. Take that!


Cheers,
Dan

1 Week

Dear Faithful Reader,

Hi. How are you? Thanks for checking my blog today. I apologize for not updating it lately. There are a few reasons:

1. Things have been sorta slow for me lately.
2. I decided my idea of introducing you to the lady who cuts my hair is really stupid.
3. I've been learning less London slang (I'm sure you know by know what a lorry is).
4. I'll be home in 1 week.

The last one is obviously the important one (or I wouldn't have used it for the title). I've had a funny reaction to finally coming home. You may think "oh it's only been 5 months," but a lot has happened in those 5 months. When I moved here I had no place to live and my only "friends" were the two coworkers who interviewed me 4 months before. Since then I've been in 12 countries, seen 10 people from home, had countless pints of beer, and still only have two friends.
Plus now that it's almost here, I'm feeling like posting is a bit pointless because I'm going to see a lot of the people who will be reading this. Clearly I don't think this is entirely true, but I need to save some stories for when I'm actually there! Otherwise, I'll just be repeating everything. I do love posting things here and will definitely continue it as long as I think someone is reading.

All of this doesn't mean I've just been sitting around watching reruns of Fawlty Towers. No no no...instead I've been watching reruns of The Office. I bought the box set and couldn't put it down. Well, I guess I had to put it in the DVD player...so I could put it down...but I couldn't stop watching it. Till it ended, of course. Anyway, what an amazing show. The Brits use the term "cringey" to describe it, which I think is excellently self-explanatory. I hope everyone gets the chance to check out the original version because the characters are ones you can pick out in your life and you love to hate. Oh the joy.

I went to Cork again too. It rained, of course, but I had a really nice time and did some cool stuff. I'll post a bit more on that later on. You may even be lucky enough to see a picture of me kissing the Blarney Stone. You are supposed to be granted the 'Gift of the Gab', but based on this post I think I must have kissed the wrong stone.

Thanks for hanging in there. No more posts about people who look like me, I promise.

Cheers,
Dan

SideStep to London

Yo party people! My bruffas and I were chatting about their planned trip to London in February, and we remembered this site:

http://www.sidestep.com

It's like Orbitz but gooder. So check it out, plan a trip, and come visit EVERYBODY!

Cheers,
Dan

London lately....Or....Maybe I look like him

Remember the Rocky & Bullwinkle TV show? They used to have two titles for every show. It would be like, "Rocky takes a nose dive......oooooooooorrrrrrrrr......Potato is the new black." And the second one would never make sense. I always swore that I would write it down and try to figure out through the show if it did make sense (maybe potato WAS the new black somehow), but then I'd get excited for the show and forget all about the titles. So I think sometimes I'll throw in two titles just for fun. But they will usually make sense.

ANYWAY, as you've probably guessed, things have slowed down a bit for me. After the recent spree of travel, I've been able to catch up with some friends here and generally get back to enjoying life in London. It's fun though because now I've actually got things to do rather than being the perma-tourist that I was for the first 2 months. So for the next few posts I'll try to tell you about things that have been happening here and help you to get to know life in London. So, for example, I'll take you on a tour of Balham (my neighbourhood), introduce you to the lady who cuts my hair, tell you a bit about my offices (more than one?), and anything else that strikes my fancy.

This weekend I had the joy of heading into Hyde Park (where I saw Live 8) to play American football with the Texans. Cool! I was a bit rusty in the beginning, but was able to make a few good catches, an interception, and a touchdown. Take that Texans! Unfortunately, my knee isn't quite back to 100%, so I'll have to really get back to working on that so I'm ready for skiing. Did I tell you I'm going to Ischgl, Austria, on Dec 1?

Well, did you remember the 2nd title of this blog post? This is the part where I finally tell you the reason for that (I'm sure you were on the edge of your seat). Liz and Melissa think I look more like Doug (on the right) from the Doug TV show:



What do you think?



Cheers!
Dan

Separated At Birth?

A couple of my coworkers recently commented to me that I am the spitting image of Prince Harry. Harry, the who son of Prince William (The Prince of Wales), celebrated his 21st birthday this week and has been in the news a lot. Congrats Harry! You are a lucky guy -- to look like me that is. I've heard this before actually, but can't seem to think of where. I think it may have been a NY cabbie or something. Anyway, you judge for yourself:

Glasgow and Edinburgh

Howdy! Sorry (again) for no posts of any substance for a while here. Things are really nuts at work these days because I am releasing a big part of the project I've been working on and a guy is leaving so I'm ALSO getting all his work. Sweet. But I'm sure you'll all be thrilled to hear we haven't found any problems yet. So that's the fascinating work news.

Anyway, this weekend I hoped on a cheapo EasyJet flight up to sunny Scotland to hang out with Susie. Both Glasgow and Edinburg are cities I've really wanted to see for a while: JPMorgan has a big technology center in Glasgow, and Edinburgh is just really cool. Plus Edinburgh has a great big festival that I'm definitely gonna go to next year.

The impressions I had built up from what I'd heard and read were pretty much on the money. Glasgow was a sorta industrial city with a few bright spots. But the day trip we took to Edinburg was really the highlight.

It's really a delight to ride the train from Glasgow to Edinburgh through the rolling hills covered in fog and sheep and end up in the heart of the capital of Scotland. As you enter the city you are in a tight valley and you look up to see the castle looming over you. It was raining (of course), but we didn't mind that much. We found a few cosy little cafes and a fantastic bar where we spent most of the night knocking elbows with the local chaps. Funny thing is with the heavy accent, I felt like I could understand way more people in Prague than I did in Edinburgh.

In the afternoon, we took a guided tour of the castle from a VERY entertaining Scottish guy who really filled the whole thing with a great sense of pride and humor. Did you know that the hole in the front of the toilet seat was invented by a Scot? They also invented a bunch of other important stuff that I can't remember. Here's a pic of the fountain on Princes Street with the castle in the background (pulled off the castle web site because I forgot my camera that day):


So that was Saturday. On Sunday we were back in Glasgow and went to an Irish bar to catch the All-Ireland finals of Gaelic Hurling. Just what you were expecting I'd do in Scotland, right? Hurling is actually a really neat sport played only in Ireland (I think) that's a lot like lacrosse actually. The stick they use is all wood, though, with no pouch. So they kinda throw the ball to themselves WHILE RUNNING and hit it like a baseball. Cool! But it goes really far and they can score by either getting it into the goal (3 points) or through the uprights (1 point). These guys are tough as hell though and really whack each other. Many don't even wear helmets. So the game moves really fast and doesn't take long to pick up what's going on. After a tight match with the Galway fans in the bar screaming a lot....Cork won! We were pretty excited and cheered with a whole bar filled with Irish people. Well, except the Galway fans who weren't happy. Too bad for them! Here's an article on the match and a pic I took of the fans storming the field:
http://www.westernpeople.com/news/story.asp?j=27083



Glasgow was actually a pretty nice city in some parts. Here's a story to give you an idea of why it still has a bad reputation: We were staying in a nice Hilton hotel, but when you walk out of the hotel, you would either have to basically walk along a 4 lane highway, or down a dark street for about 100 yards. And since we couldn't understand the locals at all, you'd never know if someone was coming to mug you or ask for the time.

But there were nice parts too. Here's a pic of Buchanan Street, a lovely pedestrian street near George Square and Merchant City in the center of Glasgow:


So it's been a busy month and a half -- Slovenia, Croatia, Czech Republic, Austria, Scotland. Phew. Not sure what's next, but I know it'll be fun!

Cheers,
Dan

PS. Here's another pic of Liz's dog. Great!

National Geographic

Ok, so this blog isn't gonna turn into "Dan's Favourite News of the Day", but you will have to admit that this is amazing:

http://www3.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0410/feature5/

Nice work Mr. Presidente.

I'm off to Glasgow and Edinburgh this weekend for a little tour of Scotland with Susie. Should be fun. Hopefully I'll have some cool pics for you next week!

Have a good weekend.

Dan

Army Blimps!

So this is sort of a strange post, but I saw an article in the paper today about the U.S. Army issuing a design contract to Lockheed Martin and Aeros Aeronautical for a blimp/airship hybrid:



And I wanted to let everyone know that I TOTALLY had this idea in high school. You people laughed at my small obsession with blimps, but who's laughing now! Hahaha. Well...my idea was for a blimp shipping company, but that's easily extended into the Army. Blimps are back baby!

http://www.gizmag.co.uk/go/4538/

Prague and Vienna!

What up party people! Sorry for the looooong delay in posting. Went on a little holiday (again?) last week to Prague and Vienna. Hurrah!

So last Saturday, Susie and I flew into Prague and had arranged to have the rental car guy meet me with the "STORMS" sign in hand. Unfortunately, he wasn't there. And NO ONE at the airport had heard of the sketchy rental car company Vecar from my Lonely Planet guide book. Went over to another rental car joint and actually got a better deal. Strange. Starting to lose faith in the Lonely Planet. Don't worry....the story gets more exciting than this. Have a look at some pics while I continue:
http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=8AZMnLlm1atGP0

So we hopped into our little Skoda Fabia, went the wrong way at the start, but eventually got through the 5 hour drive down to Vienna. I think I saw a Czech movie star in the gas station because the attendant asked for her autograph. But they were speaking Czech, so she could have in the royal family for all I know. Our hotel was on a really nice pedestrian street right in the middle of the city. Great to walk on, but driving on it (like I tried to) doesn't work out as well. Ooops...gave the tourists at the outdoor cafe quite a scare. Other than that, Vienna is a lovely, romantic city. As long as it isn't raining. Then it's sorta grey. But we drank a lot of coffee, had a LOT of cake, and some beer too. Took in the symphony at the royal palace and climbed to the top of the impressive St. Stephen's Cathedral. Here's a pic of me in a really nice cafe, whispering a secret to the statue sitting by the door:



If you are curious, the secret I'm whispering is that he should leave Vienna....and go to Prague. Which is exactly what we did. And though Vienna was nice, Prague really overshadowed it and may hold the prestigious rank of Dan's favourite European destination. What an honor.

Oh, also stopped one the way up by a cool little Czech town near the Austrian border called Cesky Krumlov. A beautiful castle with a tower designed by Hans Christian Andersen dominated the view, but the small streets and beautiful river looping around the old town really made it a fantastic place to spend the day. Here's a pic looking down from the castle:



So that night we drove up to Prague. We decided to take it easy the next day after a busy start to the trip, and sat by the Vltava river and had a really nice, long lunch with a few Czech beers. Did you know that Busweiser actually came from the Czech beer Budvar?

The next day, we headed up to the wonderful castle, toured the massive St. Vitas church and saw the grave of good St. Wenceslas (of the song). The church is HUGE and really beautiful with another great view from the top. Lots of stairs though.

The Brits are kinda down on Prague these days because they say 10 years ago you could get beers for 50 cents and there weren't really crowds. But now there are lots of tourists and beers are up to $2. Oh the horror. I didn't find the crowds to be all that bad for such a fantastic city. And the food, sights, and beer were well worth the trip. At one point we were outside of the touristy area and got an ice cream for 25 cents. Wow.

So on our last night, we thought we'd stop into a club by the Charles Bridge. Another reason the Brits slag off on Prague is that there are tons of British stag dos (bachelor parties) and hen parties (bachelorette parties). Kinda like the European Vegas with a funny accent. For example:



Then we went up to another club nearby and out of the corner of my eye I saw a tall American guy coming my way. Turns out it was Howie from my fraternity! He was there with Cliff, another friend of ours, who a few of you might recognize as the guy who Liz and Melissa started calling Izzo at one of my parties. hehehe :-)



Also at that club, I was at the bar getting beers and a guy turned to me and asked where I was from. I told him and he said, "America! I am from Croatia!" as if there was some correlation. And then he turned and told his friend where I was from, who immediately said, "I love America!!!" I gave them a cheers and walked away. Better than talking to the French though.

On the last day, we had a few hours to kill before the flight and were able to really get away from the tourists by heading down to a nice park with another huge church looming on a cliff over the river. The park was very well kept and the sun was shining bright. A great way to end the trip.

Happy Labor Dabor everybody everybody!

~Dan

London Slang -- "piss"

piss
v. or n., s. or pl.

1. Urine. eeewww.

2. Drunk: "I was soooo pissed last night."

3. Teasing someone or joking around: "Are you taking the piss?"

Editor's Note: This one took a little getting used to for a wholesome Connecticut boy like me. I kept doing double-takes when people would ask if I was taking the piss. "Um, no. You'd know if I was." Trouble is that my American sarcasm is confusing to the Brits because they are used to British people coming out with that stuff, but not so much the Americans. So I was constantly being asked about the activity of my intestinal tract.

Editor's Note (2): In Ireland, it's not "taking the piss" but instead "pulling the piss." How quaint. Don't hold it against them!

Texans in London?

Ah yes, never would have thought that I'd fall in with a bunch of Republican Texans in London. But this weekend I went to Regent's Park (see British Softball) and met up with a bunch of American Expats for a few games of softball and lots of beer. Just like old times. Thankfully, everyone knew how to play, so there was no more of this crazy British confusion. Here's pictures of me at bat and scoring (I guess whoever what taking photos liked me):





And no, I'm not skipping. Just running and they got me at a weird point in my stride. Actually, every point in my stride is weird. Anyway, I had a great day at the plate actually. First pitch...bang! Home run baby. Take that Texans! Second at bat...bang! Single up the middle. Ok, well not so much bang there, but a solid hit. Third a bat, last inning, we are up by a few runs, bases loaded....bang! Cracked one into the outfield. If they weren't playing me WAY out there, it would have been a grand slam. So, of course, my team won the tournamant.

Ok, enough of that. Was pretty neato actually because the people there were really nice and it was cool to be out there playing softball for real. AND I'm chatting with these guys (one of them is in the 2nd pic with his hands up in the foreground) and it turns out that they went to Princeton with my brother Mike. Crazy. They laughed because Mike beat them in some big beirut tournament and then I get here and beat them in softball. Don't mess with the Storms boys! So this group gets together fairly frequently and plays football (the real kind) almost every Saturday and also does stuff like Halloween parties and ski trips. Nice to have some Americans to kick around with when I want to. Here's everyone...play Where's Dan?



Check out their web site for more:

http://www.fornogoodreason.com/

Also, I have to show you this picture of Liz's new dog Chanel (like the perfume...apparently that was her name when she got her). I want one!



Cheers,
Dan

London Slang -- "muppet"

muppet
n. s.

1. Someone who is dumb to the extent that it is annoying.

Editor's Note: A good example of a muppet is this guy who was trying to sell me a membership to the gym near my flat recently. He promised Natalie that I would get 2 months free and only have to sign up for a 6 month contract. He also gave her a bunch of free passes for me to try out the gym. So after trying out the gym, it was pretty clear I was going to join. When I called him he said he never had that conversation and would never promise something like that. So I set up and appointment to see him and he didn't show up. Then he called me back and apologized for missing the appointment saying that he didn't have my number. Huh? Finally I had to go see him on a Sunday morning or else the "offer" would expire. He did end up giving me a deal, but not as good as the "great news" he had been telling me about. What a muppet.

Slovenia & Croatia trip

Friday just after lunch....feeling tired....

Oh, hi! Anyway, here's a bit about my trip to Slovenia and Croatia with Emily Marron. We really had a blast and are still friends after (she didn't kill me). A few very odd things happened on the trip which I try to list below. First, here's some pics:
http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=8AZMnLlm1atGPH&notag=1

We flew into Ljubljana, which is the capital of Slovenia. It's a really neat city with a castle smack in the middle and a few canals which add a lot of charm. Slovenia's economy is doing quite well and they have joined the EU, so life is good there since the fall of communism. Not what everyone thinks of when they are thinking of a holiday, but I get the feeling it will be soon. After a loooong night of fun in the bars and clubs there, we ended up renting a car and driving down to the Istria peninsula right near the Slovenian/Italian/Croatian border -- didn't know there was one until this trip! Here's a pic to help explain it a bit better. If you look at Trieste, Italy, you can see the Istria peninsula directly below it:



On the way, we stopped at a gas station and I started chatting with the Slovenian attendant there. He asked where we were from (in excellent English) and when I said New York he responded, "Holy f*ck!" Not quite what I was expecting, but he seemed pleased to meet me but surprised we were there. He then asked if I had a Slovenian girlfriend. Ah, no. He also got a big kick out of my response when he asked if our rental car - a VW Golf - was expensive, "Less than in New York."

Anyway, since Istria has been owned by Italy and Croatia at different points in history, Italian is the main language and culture in many of the towns. How cool! We went down to the town of Pula that has a huge Roman amphitheater and back up to the beautiful little town of Rovinj. Remind me a lot of Venice with the houses built right up to the water. There's more pics in the link above. We watched arguably the most amazing sunset from the foot of the church you see below:



We also headed over to what was supposed to be an incredible "national park" on the island of Brijuni. The former Yugoslavian dictator Tito (they called him the president) had a big house there and built a "safari." I keep putting these things in quotes because it was really just a big brown island with a a few deer, zebras, and two elephants. Not sure what this whole safari thing was about, but an bizarre experience for sure. Plus, a museum dedicated to Tito was there with a bunch of bizarre animal displays. No explanation or clue as to how they fit in, but interesting to see I suppose. Not sure what these monkeys are doing there....



After all that, we headed back up to Slovenia to the perfect mountain town of Lake Bled. It's in the foothills of the Julian Alps and had Slovenia's oldest castle and it's only island. Huh. But the highlight of that town was our accommodation. We had trouble finding somewhere because we didn't get the chance to book anything. So since all the inns told us there was no room, we headed out to see if any of the Sobe places could help us out. These are private individuals who rent out a room or a small apartment in their house for visitors. We stumble across a woman who has an apartment which turns out to be fantastic and really cheap. But when we tell her we are from New York, she get so excited she nearly has a heart attack. Apparently, her nephew lives in NY and is a computer engineer. Well...I'm a computer engineer. That one statement made us instant celebrities. She was more excited about us that if Tito himself had come back from the dead and asked for a room. And to make our stay as comfortable as possible, we were even shown the secret cabinet containing the instant coffee. Wow. I think Emily wanted to take her home. Here's the house. Too bad we didn't get a picture of her. :-(



Then, after all that it was time to fly home. But we made one last stop at a really small town near the airport which had "the most idyllic Slovenian town square" and a really nice castle. I'll post the name of the town when I think of it (or when Emily reminds me). The castle had a fantastic museum with a great mixture of old timey stuff and WWII stuff. It was amazingly well done for a town which I'm sure doesn't get too many visitors. Bravo Slovenia!

Connecticut Accent?

Back from Slovenia and Croatia! Had a great time and am pretty tired at work today. I'll post stories and pics soon. Really cool places, though. I even heard from a few locals, "I love America!" Hurrah!

Anyway, Emily and I were chatting a bit about the Connecticut accent. We thought it was simply less pronunciation of the "t" in words like "right" -> "righ". While here, I've had a hard time coming up with a British accent that I can use for fun (usually after a few pints of London Pride beer). The only thing I've thought of is pronouncing those t's -> Bri-TISH. Anyway, here's an article on the Connecticut accent:

http://www.speechdr.com/SundayTimesSept2004.pdf

I'm curious to hear what ya'll think about this one. Especially from YOU Jess "Speech Specialist Extraordinaire" McCallum.

London Slang - different ways to say thanks

A slightly different style London Slang this week. I'm going to list out the various ways to say thank you and when they seem to be appropriate. I was a bit surprised by this, and maybe you will be too. I'll go in order from most formal to least formal:

1. Thank you -> I seem to be the only person who uses this phrase.
2. Thanks -> Obviously the most common way to say thank you (duh).
3. Cheers -> Almost as common as thanks. Used when someone holds the door for you, when you get chips (fries) from the chippy (fish and chips shop), and definitely when the bartender serves you a beer (even though he doesn't get a tip, apparently a hearty cheers! is enough).
4. Ta -> Very informal. Used in such situations as when someone casually mentions you have half of a spear of asparagus between your teeth, or when passing the salt.

Cheers!
Dan

PS. Next post will be post-Croatia. Hurrah!

R.E.M. and Reynold's Park pics

Hi there,

Finally able to post and fix up the pictures from R.E.M. and Reynold's Park from last weekend. So here they are. Really had a nice time and have to say that these big concerts seem to be more fun and laid back than in NY. Here's the whole set, with one special one of Michael Stipe doing his dance:
http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=8AZMnLlm1atGMa&notag=1



In new news, my friend Emily Marron is coming to visit next weekend and we are hopping down to Slovenia and Croatia! Yeah! Right now the plan is to fly into the Slovenian capital of Ljubljana and then take the train down to Pula, Croatia. The really famously beautiful places in Croatia are in the south (Split and Dubrovnik), but it's too far for us to do in a long weekend. Pula is supposed to be great anyway, it has an original Roman amphitheater sorta like the Colosseum in Rome. If anyone has been there, I'd love to hear suggestions.

Cheers!
Dan

Airline Pitch (Leg Room) Guide

Just bought tickets to fly back to NY for my friend Jess' wedding. I'll be around NY/CT from Oct. 19-26. You can email me if you want to book time - but I'll be at the wedding over the weekend.

Anyway, this is for you tall ones....

http://www.airlinequality.com/Product/seats_americas.htm

Cheers,
Dan

London Slang (it's back baby)

pants
n. s. or pl.

1. Underwear.

2. Something really bad. "This food is absolute pants."

3. Something you get rid of or is out of style. "Say pants to poverty."

Editor's Note: Perhaps we should say pants to the word pants?

Bombers Identified

Seems they were young, British-born men of Pakistani origin. Amazing. They were really sloppy too because investigators found all sorts of ID around the bomb sites. Or perhaps that was on purpose. But makes you realize we aren't just dealing with extremists shipped in from Afghanistan and Pakistan, they are members of society and willing to die. Seems a bit too Israel/Palestine for my liking. But I'm guessing the parents of the typical suicide bomber don't usually file a missing person's report......

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=355617&in_page_id=1770

Quite a week

Hi all,

Sorry for the lack of posts lately other than about the bombing. Obviously that was a big deal, but things are starting to get back to normal now. Been taking the tube this week and so far all seems pretty much fine.

I've had quite a time in the past week or so. Went like this:

Live 8 (Sat, July 2)
http://share.shutterfly.com/osi.jsp?i=EeAMmTlyzatWjF5A
This was such a cool event! I was in the free part in the south of Hyde Park, so we weren't by the stage, but there were 10,000 people there and it really felt like you were part of the concert. I got there at 1pm and left at around midnight. Makes for a long day, but the music was so great and we really had a blast. I really feel this event helped raise awareness about what we should be doing for Africa.

Anyway, here's my American friend Stephen ruining a really nice picture

Independence Day (Mon, July 4...duh)
http://share.shutterfly.com/osi.jsp?i=EeAMmTlyzatWjFxg

Went to an American place called Bodean's BBQ for Fourth of July. I think there was only one other American there actually....the owner of the bar. He bought us a round. People there didn't even seem to know what day it was! Well, I suppose it's understandable.

Here's me and my roommate Natalie at the bar

Bombing (Thurs, July 7)

Pretty much said everything there is to say about this. But clearly it was a scary and difficult time. I took this picture that morning before I really knew what was going on. But it's got a bus like the one that had the bomb on it and Big Ben in the background. Makes you think about how much worse it could have been. So this weekend pretty much just chilled out and stayed away from the city. My Irish friend Susie came to visit and the weather turned nice on Sunday so we headed to the park and had a really nice time. Hoping to make it there again soon and jump into a frisbee game, we'll see!

Bright Eyes and The Faint concert, last night (Mon, July 11)
http://share.shutterfly.com/osi.jsp?i=EeAMmTlyzatWjFoA

The Faint is a sort of 80s rock, dance, punk band. Really cool. Bright Eyes is Conor Oberst and whatever group of people he's decided to play with this week. Conor is amazing. And the venue was incredible. Don't have places like that in the states for sure. Here's me and my friend Tim at the concert.

Thanks again for all the prayers and kind words. They have really helped during this difficult time.

12 hours later

Well it's been a long day. After my last post, I've been home all day and basically spend the day watching the TV, texting my family, and trying to respond to the many, many people who have inquired about my safety. Thanks everyone for the well wishes and prayers. Definitely makes me feel loved and safe today to have so many people caring for me - even if it is from 3 or 4 thousand miles away.

So it seems there were four bombs in London today and they are saying that 50 people have been killed. A few points from my perspective:

• All of my friends and coworkers seem to be fine. Closest I've got to a personal story is my roommate's friend's cousin was stuck in the tube for about an hour, but got out fine.
• A bit strange that my DSL modem was finally delivered to my flat today. Obviously I really wanted it today, because with it I can email everyone and also work from home tomorrow. Good sometimes to work for a big company - remote access is nearly mandatory.
• One of the bombs was between Aldgate East and Liverpool Street and near the Moorgate tube station. That is the station where I get out when I work at JP Morgan's London Wall office. I go there about once a week because the traders are there. No one in that office was injured, but I'm glad I wasn't working there today. Here's a map of the two offices I work in (pink) and where I was on the train and on foot today (blue). My apartment in Balham is about 6 miles South of my offices:

• The Northern tube line seemed to have a problem before the attacks because my friend got to the tube and said there were delays but a train came. Not shocking because there are often problems on the tubes. He made it 1 stop up to Clapham South and they stopped the line and told everyone to get out saying there was a power failure. He then walked back down to Balham and waited to get the overland train that I took. I called him after getting into the city and told him the whole tube line wasn't running, but bus and overland train lines were still running then. He decided to just forget coming into work and work from home.
• I have tickets for this Saturday to see R.E.M. at Hyde Park where Live 8 was. I was really hoping that they would delay it with all that's going on, and they agreed with me. Pushed off till next weekend. Good work Michael Stipe. Should be interesting to see how people act at that big show here only a week after the bombings.
• News reports are MUCH less dramatic here than in the states. There are no massive headlines announcing Terror In The Streets or anything like that, except on Fox News, of course.
• Rudy Giuliani is in London today, not sure why, but I saw him on the BBC and thought it was interesting.

So, I have to say I got quite emotional after being home for about an hour and texting with my family for a while and then Tony Blair came on TV. He seemed visibly upset and it was very moving to see. You could tell he was shocked to be trying so hard to help a whole continent of desperate people that aren't his people, and then his people are attacked in the middle of these talks. It's almost as if the terrorists are saying that the world shouldn't help each other. And perhaps they are. But, fortunately, I know the good people who are working on building health and positive attitudes in the world will continue their work.

Thank you everyone again for your messages and just for caring so much. I am feeling OK now, just quite tired from such an emotional day. Glad I don't have to head into the city tomorrow, but will still be working as I think everyone should try to.

Hope this finds you, your friends, and your family all well and safe.

Love,
Dan

London today

A few explosions in London today. I'm fine. Scared still though. Left for work this morning at about 8:45am and the tube was closed. This happens sometimes, so didn't think anything of it and caught the train (also goes from Balham) into Victoria Station. Tried to get the District line tube from there but found out that all tubes were closed in London due to a "massive power failure". Hmmm. So started walking towards work and realized that I had a radio on my mp3 player (thanks Rob). After listening for 5 minutes I hear about exploding buses and tubes and people going nuts and decided that central London wasn't the place I wanted to be today. So headed back to Victoria and grabbed another train to Balham and now I'm in an Internet cafe and it's 11:15am. Feels a bit better to be 30 minutes away. So far everyone that I know that I've spoken to is fine. I'll let you know.

Strange thing is that through all the troubles that have occurred between NY and London, this is the first one I'm actually here for. 9/11 I was at Cornell. The NY blackout I was in Rio. The recent UK consulate bombing in NY I was on a plane to London from NY. I have to say I'm surprised at how long it took me to realize how serious this is. Where I was there was no panic and no smoke or anything. In fact, I walked by Big Ben and Westminster and there were still Japanese tourists taking pictures like on any other day.

I hope all your friends and family are well and I wish London the best of luck getting through this. Quite a contrast from yesterdays celebrations of getting the Olympics.

Happy Independence Day!

Just a quick note to wish everyone a happy 4th of July. I'm hoping you all get very drunk on cheap American beer and eat lots of burgers. Tonight I'll be heading to an American bar in Clapham called Bodean's to eat lots of bbq. But today is without question the day that I am missing being back in the States the most. So many great memories from the McCallum's and at Kull's beach house.

Anyway, had a fantastic time at Live 8. What an amazing event. I'll post stories and pics this week when I have a few more minutes.

ok bye!
dAn

What the Blog?

So I've been thinking about this blog a bit. I originally started it as an easy way to not have to tell the same stories over and over. It's worked quite well at that. And so far the people that I've spoken to seem to appreciate being able to keep tabs on me. I've also learned the value of the shout-out.

*hi Mom*

At first I intended for it to be only for close friends and family, and I hear word has spread a bit. Did you see my spot on ABC News last week? Just kidding. I would like to keep the audience sort of minimal so that I can be fairly free about what I write. You know what I mean? So far I've been happy with the people who I've heard are reading this, but if George Bush starts using it as a way to "understand" Europeans.....then I'll be a little upset. I know that this is on the internet and all so that makes it public, but you get the idea.

Anyway, more important than what I want, is what you want! So I'm hoping to get a little feedback on how this is going so far. Building web sites is sorta my job (not this site), and I've found recently that a little feedback can go a long way. Not sure why it's taken me so long to learn that.

Soooo should I.....

• post less (or more) frequently?
• ramble on less? or more? I doubt it's more
• be posting more (or less) pictures?
• put pictures in the blog, or do you mind going to Shutterfly every time?
• provide more interesting tidbits about London? Culture? History? Food? Places to visit in Europe?
• keep the weekly London Slang?
• add more weekly things? any suggestions?
• have a less boring life?
• not be asking for feedback like this?

If you don't mind your comments being public, feel free to click on the Comments link below and add a comment. You will have to sign up if you don't have an account yet, but fear not, this site is run by Google and I haven't received any spam from them yet. Otherwise just email me.

I also think it would be fun if people wanted to comment on some of my posts (i.e. give advice / related stories / just say something interesting).

Ok, I won't post these admin styley things much because they are lame. But I am really interested in what people think. And since I haven't been so great about getting in touch with all my friends (sorry!), I'm hoping this makes up for it a bit.

Thanks and cheers!
dAn

P.S. I'm going to Live 8 this weekend! Look for me on TV....well, I'll be in the main part of Hyde Park and not in the stage part, but we'll be able to watch it on the big screens. Should be fun. And look for Liz in Philly!

Tristan's Visit

So this weekend my world-traveler friend Tristan made a stop in London. I believe her trip went DC -> LA -> New Zealand -> Australia -> Singapore (for 1/2 hr) -> London (for 1/2 hr) -> Geneva (where she'll be moving in Sep to work for UNICEF) -> London (Fri-Sun) -> DC. I've never actually been around the world, but it sounds very tiring. It was so terrific to see her and spend a whole weekend with such a good friend. I can't wait till she gets to Europe full time! It's funny how even spending a short time with someone from your "past life" can brighten things up (it's raining here again).

So we figured that since Wimbledon was still on, we'd head over there and see how long the line was on Saturday morning. It was very, very long. So we hoped on the tube and headed into the city. Had a nice picnic near St. Paul's (you can drink anywhere here - we went with a nice Riesling) and decided to hit up the free Museum of London. It's quite large and has a lot of interesting exhibits talking about the vast history of the places that are only blocks away.

What an amazing city. I am, however, starting to understand the Brits interest in things surrounding death. Between the Plague, the Great Fire, both World Wars, and the Troubles with Northern Ireland, overcoming death seems to be a big part of life here. That, of course, is significantly less true NOW than it was in the past (don't worry Mom). I was interested to learn that there are no rubbish bins in the city center because the Northern Irish used to put bombs in them. Hmmm.

Here's a few pics:

http://share.shutterfly.com/osi.jsp?i=EeAMmTlyzatWjFbA

Hope all is well,
dAn

London Slang

chav
n. s. or pl.

A derogatory term for people who have really bad taste and generally dress in a gaudy, embarrassing way. Easy ways to spot chav: fake Burberry, any kind of bling on a white person, exposed midriff that causes the viewer to cringe.

http://www.worldwidewords.org/topicalwords/tw-cha2.htm

Editor's Note: This is definitely one of my favorite British slang terms. I encountered a very large number of chav when we were supposed to go on the boat trip on the Thames and there were all these teenage girls having birthday parties and generally being annoying. My friend joked that if the boat sank the only trace would be a large number of fake Burberry caps floating to the surface.

Editor's Note (2): Just remembered that before I got here I didn't know how to pronounce Thames. So some of you might not either. It's "tems". Not sure what happens to the h. Cheers!

British Softball

So last night a big group of people I work with (mostly business, not tech) headed over to Regent's Park to play softball. An interesting concept as I live in ENGLAND, but I thought it could be fun anyway. It was...but mostly because there was a lot of beer.

Regent's Park is excellent, by the way. Lots of people sitting around having picnics and generally enjoying themselves. And it's only a short tube ride from my office. I'll definitely be going there more (as long as it doesn't rain too much).

Anyway, playing softball with the pohm is an interesting experience. Obviously the rules go waaaay out the window. Most people hadn't played before, and I got fun questions like "which player wears the glove?" To which I generously replied, "I do." Clearly I was the only one who brought a glove. And a ball. And a bat (old, small wooden bat from when we were kids - remember that one Mike?). I'm starting to figure out why I was hired.

So one tip on playing softball with coworkers which I think works world-wide: Make sure you are on the boss's team. Especially when no one knows the rules. Because Maura basically played the old kids game "I win." Maura gets 15 swings. Maura's team gets 8 outs. My team gets 2 outs. Maura's foul balls are always fair (even when they roll off into the rugby pitch). You get the idea. Hence the beer for the rest of us.

Anyway, it was good fun and I'm glad I was invited to play. And though everyone either swung the bat either like a cricket bat (from the hip) or a golf club, a few of them could hit pretty well. So if we get the fielding down (ie. throw the ball to first base not to the tree), we might be looking to take on the New Yorkers.

Here's a few kinda bad pictures. I still have to figure out the best way to get my camera to work well in low light. Or maybe I wasn't holding it very steady....

http://share.shutterfly.com/osi.jsp?i=EeAMmTlyzatWjFCg

London Slang

pohm
abbr.

People Of Her Majesty.

Editor's Note: This was first said to me by a Kiwi (person from New Zealand for those who don't know that either) who was in charge of helping me move. Nice guy, but loved to make fun of the Brits. So he says something like, "Yeah, the pohm love their curry." Sounds like it could be a farm animal or something.

Editor's Note (2): I also heard last night that the British people would say pohm and it would mean "Prisoners Of Her Majesty." As in Australia. Hmmm. Two very contradictory meanings. Please add comments if you know more about this one......

U2 2

Ah, so U2 was quite fun (of course). A very entertaining band who has a good collection of songs. I did have my hopes WAY up, so I think they had a hard time living up to that, but Bono came up to me after the show and told me that it wasn't his best night because he was thinking about the kids in Africa so much that he forgot how to be a rock star. I guess it's hard to juggle the two sides of the coin.

Um, sorry about that. I do applaud all the good work Bono has done for Africa and really do hope that he makes poverty history.

So the opening bands were Idlewild (who I didn't know but were pretty good in an REM sorta way) and Ash (who I know and like a lot and was happy about). Twickenham is a massive rugby stadium and was really a great place to see a big band. We were in the standing area around the stage so you could see really well. Not sure I'd want the ones way high up though.

Ok, tip for any apartment living people: Don't lock yourself out of your flat when your roommate, landlord (her sister), and owner (her dad) are all on a plane to Italy. Makes for a tough (and expensive) Saturday waiting for the locksmith to show up.

Cheers!
dAn

U2

Sooooo, going to see U2 this Sunday. Rad! A nice American boy (Stephen) that works near me has kindly offered me a ticket. Apparently they sold more last week after they figured out the exact size of the stage. Good for me! It's outside at a huge place called Twickenham Stadium (pronounced Twickem or something apparently). Check it out at:

http://www.rfu.com/microsites/twickenham/index.cfm

London Slang

double glazing
n. s.

Storm windows.

Editor's note: I didn't realize, but apparently this is a big selling point for London apartments. I just kept wondering why every apartment I was looking at was sugar coated.

Off to Cork

So yer man (me) went to Cork this weekend. Perhaps shouldn't have gone because I was feeling quite sick Thursday and Friday, but I had bought the tickets and really didn't want to bail. Luckily I started feeling better on Saturday and by Monday was doing quite well. I went to see my friend Susie who lives there now. Some of you may have met her when she was in New York visiting while living in Boston about a year ago.

http://share.shutterfly.com/osi.jsp?i=EeAMmTlyzatWjEsA&notag=1

Anyway, had a really nice time. On Friday night I met Susie at the reception for her friend's wedding at a great hotel called the Maryborough House Hotel (http://www.maryborough.com). Lucky for me it was a black tie event, so I got to look good in my tux for a few hours. Had a nice time and met a lot of her fun Irish friends, but had to take off early-ish due to illness. Darn.

Saturday we went to a barbeque at the groom's house and I got to see a bit of "behind the scenes" Irish life. It was such fun to sit with all these people who went to high school together and hear them tell stories from growing up. Sounded a lot like Connecticut!

Sunday Susie and I headed over down to the southern shore of Ireland to a small town called Kinsale. It was really nice and I took a load of pictures. Had lunch at a great pub called Bulmans and then sat outside with what felt like the whole town and had a few beers by the water. A few boats came in and people would have a pint while the kids played in the water. Seemed like a pretty good way to spend a Sunday.

So went back to London on Monday morning and spent the rest of the day lounging in the sun in my hammock. A pretty good way to spend a Monday....

Cheers!
dAn

Longer Pub Hours!

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/B/BRITAIN_PUB_HOURS?SITE=1010WINS&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

(thanks Chris ;)

London Slang

hundreds and thousands
n. pl.

Sprinkles that go on ice cream.

Editors note: I know this one is a bit cheeky, but I've been assigned to organize a "Friday afternoon" food activity for my floor of about 75 people (it rotates between groups). I'm going with ice cream (of course) and I asked if people wanted sprinkles and got a lot of blank stares. Then one guy said, "oh, you mean hundreds and thousands." Blimey!

Low-cost Eruopean airline search

Here's some more good links for searching low-budget European airlines that Tom has discovered. I think most of these are for travel within Europe, not from the US to London. I'll see if I can find some good ones for that too. If anyone has some, please email me or post them in the comments for this post. Thanks!

http://www.whichbudget.com

http://www.lowcostairlines.org

http://www.cheapflights.co.uk

http://www.openjet.com

http://www.skyscanner.net

London Slang (hopefully weekly)

minger
n. s. ming·er

Something unattractive, dirty, or gross. Often a person. In this case, me.

Other uses: "This flat is minging." "That French man really mings."

Stockholm! Vin Diesel! Tom from home!

Wow. Had a crazy weekend in Stockholm. What a beautiful city. The combination of a prosperous society with brilliantly intricate architecture was wonderful.

So I met Heather on Friday and we went right out to meet her friend Denise and a couple that she knows that lives in Stockholm. Always nice to have a guide. He took us to a great outdoor bar and the weather was wonderful. Everyone looked so glamorous. I've never been to Hollywood, but this is totally how I imagine it. Lots of big sunglasses and blond hair.

We ended up in a beautiful restaurant/bar/club called Hotellet. You can see pics of the bar at:

http://www.restaurangguiden.se/sth/ostermal/hotellet/main.htm

Ended up eating very late, so we were basically chomping on our chicken while a club was in full force around us. Fun, but a bit strange. Lots of wine of course. The scenery was quite impressive also. Heather's friends from her business school class in Copenhagen were great fun and we all got along well. Plus it was really great to see someone from home - especially someone as cool as Heather.

So for the rest of the weekend we walked around (a LOT) and saw the whole city. Stopped in the modern art museum (free!) and the palace. Had beer and great Swedesh meatballs...just called meatballs in Stockholm, of course.

Here's a few pics. I'll have more soon when Heather and her friends post theirs.

http://share.shutterfly.com/osi.jsp?i=EeAMmTlyzatWjEOA

On the flight back, Vin Diesel was sitting in first class 8 rows in front of me! Though it was a bugdet airline, so I heard him say "This is first class?" Ha.

Then in Heathrow airport, I'm about to get to the tube and two backpacking lads come up to me and say "Are you Dan?" I told them I was tired and didn't want to sign any autographs, but if they hurry, they might catch Vin Diesel getting a cab. Just kidding. It was Tom and Karl from home! They went to my high school and are just starting their post-college "eurotrip." Lucky guys. So we went out last night to a few bars in Clapham with my flatmate Natalie and her friend Sophie. Lots of fun. They apparently got very lost in the city center, so were pretty late. I guess London is a tricky city. It was really cool to hang out with them and I'm going to meet them again tonight, so I'll try to get a few pictures for our Moms. =)

Oh, and here's some pics of my flat and office I took last week:

http://share.shutterfly.com/osi.jsp?i=EeAMmTlyzatWjEXg

Cheers!
dAn

Travel Tip from Tom

It is wise not to book a flight more than 8 weeks in advance because before 8 weeks there is no incentive from the airlines or travel agencies to rush to fill up the plane. The majority of great deals come between 6 and 8 weeks prior to departure. On the flip side, you should never book a flight less than 7 days in advance because then you get killed with fees.

Britain losing it's sense of humor?

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20050524/lf_afp/afplifestylebritain_050524214117

BA deal - today only!

So for those folks looking to visit me (should be everyone), I just saw this British Airways deal that seems pretty reasonable for trips this Fall.

http://london.ba.com/index.asp

Make sure you read the find print at the bottom (copied below). But I found a flight in November that came to a total of about $450. Taxes really get you on these. Just noticed it needs to be booked by today though! Anyway, gives you an idea of what to look for. If you book too late prices really go up a lot.

* One-way based on round-trip, 7-day advance purchase, non-refundable, select economy class midweek (Mon.-Wed.) fares for travel Sep. 1-Oct. 26, 2005 and Dec. 16-Dec. 23, 2005 from New York JFK and Newark to London on British Airways only. Higher fares apply for other travel dates and from other departure gateways. Weekend travel (Thu.-Sun.) has $30 surcharge each way. Fares subject to gov't. approval & do not include gov't. fees/taxes of approximately $110 and a $2.50 September 11th Security Fee. Min. stay Sat. night required. Max stay 11 months.New bookings only, made May 17-26, 2005, subject to availability.

Busy and Stockholm!

Sorry for the delay (already) in posting this week. All the sudden I got really busy. Mostly in a good way though.

I'm going to Sweden this weekend! Heather is heading up to Stockholm from Copenhagen and I'm going to meet her and some of her friends there. Bought the ticket at the sort of last minute, so didn't really get any of these great inter-Europe flights, but it's still not too bad. Really excited to get started on my travels around Europe. I sorta feel that it's half the reason I'm here.

Work is going well. Been moving forward on the project that has been assigned to me. My boss has this great management style where he basically says that everyone owns some part of the system and gets help from the other people if he needs it, but in the end the owner is responsible. This allows you to really run with something, but I guess it also means that if someone leaves the team we are in a situation where that part isn't really known to anyone else. Anyway, it's good for me now. Plus, they are starting to build risk management capabilities into the system (Cristal), and they are sorta surprised to find out that since I've been doing that for a while I know a little bit. So I'm moving towards working on that too -- which is much more interesting than my current project.

As for social life, been doing some of that too. Mostly hanging out with people from work. They are lots of fun and we do a fair amount of heading to the pub for a few beers after work. I was supposed to go on a boat trip on the Thames this weekend with one guy from work and a whole load of his friends, but the boat never showed. So we decided to go to a bar instead (of course). It was a really fun place called Mash and since there were so many of us it was like I actually had a few friends. =)

Ok, back to work. Going to be around late a lot it seems, so if you send me an email with a good time to call between 9am-3pm NY time I should be able to.

Cheers!
dAn

Photos

Here's some photos from New York before I left and also some in London. You can see the small hotel room I stayed in, my new flat, and some touristy stuff I've done.

http://share.shutterfly.com/osi.jsp?i=EeAMmTlyzatWjEGg

- Dan