Didn’t realise that I pass Het Rembranthuis each morning, lol what a blind mofo I am.
Found some other good shortcuts that are useful, I like that (after 6 months) I understand where most things are in relation to others… bout time really.

A mate of mine had a very bad experience with taxi’s this weekend, while moving some bags via taxi (something she told the dispatch office about upon ordering it) the taxi driver that arrived was not a happy bunny. She packed the taxi, being careful not to damage the taxi, and on the way he was rude and abusive. She panicked and just wanted out so kept quiet until the end where on her rush to get the stuff out she said to him that she just wanted to “put as much distance between them” this seemed to be the wrong thing to say (amazingly). He than began kicking the boxes and hurling abuse, the last piece of which was, I hope you die tonight. Charming!!!

I’m a softie, two things each year guaranteed to bring a tear to my eye are the Leaving Cert and its results day (its such a rite of passage) and the First Day of School. Listening to RTE Radio 1 the other day I heard a recording of Gaybo reading a poem by John D Sheridan about a child’s first day at school. Have a listen if you know of a little one that headed off, or pass it to your mammy, you know she’ll like it.

Loving the neighbourhood of Straat & Dijk – Haarlemerstraat and Haarlemerdijk, its where a mate of mine is moving and its really cool. Actually as its a 3 min bike ride from me its just as much my neighbourhood. Another thing I love about Amsterdam Centrum, its just so cool everywhere. I mean so is Dublin but things just seem more accessible here. Perhaps its just that after so many years in one city do you stop looking around, get stuck in a rut?

Still liking the cycling, its helping that I can listen to the radio (RTE/2FM) in one ear on the way.
Been trying to pick up the courage to come home through the old town, its lovely, I did the route once with Christine but its scary and there are more people wandering out in front of you and more risk of coming off the bike. Still eventually I will get the courage up

On the topic of accidents, went to see Catherine on Friday, she had to have the amputation.
She was in “good” form, but she’s such a private person that it would be hard to know really how she’s doing. I think she’s pretty amazing.

Ok I have more than this drivel to put out on the interweb, but I wanted to make a post and my brain is fried, I’ll try some photo posts this week too.

TTFN!

Wednesday at 2pm Poo went home to Ireland, think he’s glad to be going home. I think he liked the time to relax in Amsterdam, I’m not sure it was what he expected but I hope he was happy.
I really liked him being around, I know I’ll miss him but I have lots of visitors over the next few weeks and the trip to New York to look forward to so its all ok.

Got a HUGE mosquito bite on my neck tuesday night…… I look deformed, no really I do.
Actually the one on my arm is more worrying… looks like a second elbow and there’s a nasty red line running from it to almost my armpit…. I’m not a doctor but it doesn’t look great

Went home last weekend, didn’t think Poo was leaving so quickly after or I’d have stayed but I had it booked ages ago and I hadn’t been home for 7 weeks so it was due! Saw all the work mums had done in the house, stuff she’s wanted to do for ages and I’m glad for her that she’s getting her house a little more the way she wants it, she deserves it.

I’ve been waking up every morning wrecked, it began when I moved here first and abated slightly after 3 months to return with a vengeance in the past month. I have to say I chickened out of cycling to work for the last three days on the basis that I wasn’t awake enough to competently make it to work in one piece. Really I was just too lazy and preferred the idea of veging on the tram/train/metro/stroll listening to morning Ireland/rick o shea/2xm streaming on my mobile (yes i found a way around the olympic ban – more on that in a bit) I could be forgiven for one morning as it was excessively wet, however Thursday and friday have been lovely so I am just a useless lazy sod to be honest!

The restrictions on RTE broadcasts for the Olympics bug me, even if working in the industry I understand them. RTE paid money for the rights to broadcast exclusive coverage of the Olympics and as such have to keep that coverage within their territories. This allows the IOC to sell similar rights packages to other territories on an exclusive and therefor more expensive basis. But really, could RTE not just delay transmission by 15 seconds and edit out/ block any news bulletins or coverage of Olympics? Anyway …. as I must circumvent every rule relating to my aquisition of entertainment I spent an hour trying to find another way to satiate my aural needs of morning ireland/ rick o shea / decent music. I happened across a site called moodio (m.moodio.com) and within mins was streaming my daily fix through the wonder that is my mobile!! I hope the usage is within the limits of my 9.99 “endless” data package, but I am restricting myself to just those two shows and then switching to the internet to listen to 2xm which is unaffected by the blanket ban.

I spent a couple of hours watching the Olympic Opening ceremony last Friday, wow it was amazing. Sorry I had more to say on this …. but it took the last train out of my head!

Lots of visitors this weather, which is good, and bad. Mostly good…. all the visitors that have stayed in my house so far have been pretty excellent. Beginning to wonder about certain requests for lodging tho. Ever wonder when to draw the line under a friendship, when its run its course and now its just a vestige of something that was….. I do!

Been doing some great night time blog searching these days, and found some treasures… hope they dont mind me listing them here; most are in my sidebar anyway….
Travelvice – the blog of a guy who has been traveling the world since Dec 2005, first solo, then with his girlfriend and since Jan of this year, with their son!
Conortje - the blog of an Irish guy in Netherlands for ten years, I love his writing, very witty and intelligent.
Textsecrets /Post Secret – two sites really but similar idea, people write anonymous confessions to absolve, incite, inspire, entertain the public….

Ok enough from me…. suspiciously photo free post!