A Check up on The 2012 List

To try and get myself back into the blogging swing I thought I'd start with a little self reflection on the year so far and how my hopes for the year are going. The non-italics are the list from January's 'The 2012 List' post and the text in italics the update on how it's gone so far.

Generally:

Stay alive (so far so good)
- Still in existence and as confused as usual!

Read 1 whole actual, real, in paper, page turning, proper book (seriously that number isn't a typo, I read a grand total of 0 books in 2011)
- Ashamedly the current tally of books read is still 0. In my defence I totally forgot about it, I do read often but just not holding a book.

Try to find/get/make a job I would enjoy doing (a long shot but it won't happen unless I try).
- If I'm being honest this one took a back burner and fizzled out so I need to re-ignite it.

Try again at learning to separate the stress of work from home (if possible).
- Doing better! Still room for improvement but much less stressed this year compared to last.

Follow 1 Olympic 2012 sport über religiously. Has to be a sport that I honestly don't care about right now. For no reason whatsoever really except for a bit of fun. If anyone would like to join me feel free to volunteer and suggest the sport.
- Post to follow soon outlining my plans for this one!
Don't allow Clothes Mountain (the pile of washing in our bedroom) to rear its voluminous crumpled head again. This has been a success but Norngirl and moving house have been the main help to this - we now have space to do some housework.

Not get my hopes up with Euro 2012.
- Succeeded with style, I was optimistic that we'd do better than expected but knew we'd be long shots to even go close. I had England reaching the Semi Finals in the prediction game and they were a penalty shoot-out away from that guestimate.

Make at least a small positive difference to something worthwhile.
- The worthwhile part I should really have qualified a little better, but yeah, I think I have in some shape or form.

Risk it for a chocolate biscuit and do a few more things on the spur of the moment and procrastinate less
- Hard to say really, we've done a lot of random things this year but most have been us reacting to situations rather than the other way around. Still, moving into a house the day after seeing it for the first time and meeting people you know from the internet from another country probably count right? Maybe still room for improvement on both, especially the procrastination.


Finances allowing:

Visit 5 cities/major towns that I have never been to before.
- 3/5 so far (Washington DC, Boston & Eniskillen)

Visit 1 new country.
- Sadly, situations outside our control and finances aren't likely to let this happen.

Visit my family at least twice.
- This is planned to happen but will be weather dependant (0/2 so far this year though).

Attend 3 or more comedy gigs
- 1/3 so far, Sarah Millican was very funny, but no more comedy show tickets yet booked.

Attend at least 10 ice hockey matches.
- 7/10: 3 NHL games (BOS at WSH, WSH at NYR, NYR at BOS) and 4 EIHL games (BGvsNP, BGvsSS x 2, BGvsDS)

Watch 20 films I've never seen before
- 22/20 and probably more to add - So far: Fools Rush In, Role Models, New in Town, The Graduate, Casablanca, Premonition, Mystic River, The Muppets, Alien Autopsy, The Inbetweeners, Super 8, Glee, The Skin I Live In, The Big Lebowski, Men In Black 3, To Kill a Mockingbird, Le Orme, Some Like it Hot, Goodfellas, All the President's Men, She's Too Young, Titanic (1953) all seen for the first time.

Don't leave the entirety of Christmas shopping until December.
- Haven't started yet, maybe it's time! Too soon?

Possibly move house.
- Done.


Internet-world-wise:

Spend even less time playing games on the net.
- I've picked up the bad habit of playing Bejewelled Blitz but it's a game that is much easier to pull yourself away from, though it is highly addictive - damn it!

Do a spring clean of my Google Reader.
- Yup, did that and I do read everything on there now, maybe went a bit far though and could do to find some nice blogs to add.

Spend more time commenting on the blogs I enjoy reading.
- Like my own blog, I've been neglecting others, I do read all the blogs I follow still but like posting to my own, I've become even worse with my time. Must try harder!

Spend less time pointlessly commenting on political blogs where everyone has their minds made up anyway no matter what you say.
- The good news with the general lack of posting to any blog including my own is that I've not replied to one political blog since - every cloud! :)

Find at least 3 new blogs to follow properly - like I would those on my blog list to the bottom left of this page (if you're reading this and have any good suggestions please do add them in the comments).
- Still a to do but it's tricky to find quality blogs as the ones at the top of listings are just often those best at SEO, often the best blogs are the ones you don't look for but rather the ones you stumble on whilst looking for something else.

Be more sociable (if it's not going to make my brain hurt)
- I didn't try too hard but even just not being reluctant to be sociable seemed to help - we even made some new friends - must try to keep that up.

Take even more photos.
- Sadly this has gone the other way, whilst I took more than ever on our vacation, during a regular week I've been taking less.

Disclaimer section of the 2012 list:

Try to do all this whilst not injuring Norngirl mentally or physically (she can be judge and jury at the end of the year).
- Other than being perplexed at my reluctance to read books, apparently it's a case of so far so good according to Norngirl.

RIP Kelly the Cat

It's with much regret that I have to inform you all of the passing of one of the worlds most awesome animals. A week before we were due to visit my dad back in my native land of Yorkshire, Kelly the cat had gone missing and sadly when found, it wasn't good news.

It was just weeks before we were due to visit sunny Yorkshire that he was still gathering mice for the new Kittens my dad had taken in, but he had also been getting a bit bigger and a bit slower - as all cats seem to do when they get a bit older - so it wasn't totally a shock when he did go missing. We went searching for him when we were over, checking up at the house he'd spent a week at before when he was being fed by two families simultaneously - the sneaky beast - but sadly we couldn't find him. We put up posters in local shops but kind of expected the worst, so it wasn't a big shock when his remains eventually showed up under a dividing bush between two houses across the road. The neighbour found his remains by the power of smell as you can imagine. Apparently the spot was next to one of his sun bathing areas and so by all accounts he likely curled up in a ball and never woke up, nothing seemed untoward at least, so it seems like natural causes. The best way out we can all hope for really, so that was a comfort.

That's the morbid bit over, so why was Kelly the Cat so awesome?

Well, first of all, he started life under the guise of a girl. We don't go rummaging around down there on our animals and we'd been told he was a she. I guess it's a tricky thing to know when the said feline has long fur. It wasn't long before a vet found the mistake, it's hard to be spay a cat that has no ovaries. Oops.

Thankfully, the name Kelly (as Kelly of the Stereophonics will attest) can be used for either gender without much bother so it was kept as initially intended - named after Leeds United legend and Republic of Ireland international footballer - Gary Kelly.

As far as cats go he wasn't one with a huge attention span, he was quite the live wire. We got him during my first year at high school and many a time I would be walking home from school and he'd meet me at the top of the road and walk all the way along side me back to the house, getting as far off the ground as he could whilst doing so by tight rope walking on walls, fences and gates, eager for some food and attention.

He tortured a fair few smaller creatures in his time, especially mice, but he also took on bigger competition. At least one time that we know of (which was witnessed) he had a face off for territory in the back garden with a fox twice his size. and won. Thankfully both animals survived the encounter though Kelly the Cat did come out of it with a cut or two. Similar cuts appeared once or twice over the years so he probably had other run ins with local wildlife too but we'll never really know.

Unlike the local wildlife though, his known run ins with humans was the exact opposite, well except my cousins leg but to be fair Kelly was given good reason to retaliate after being nudged out of the way so often with a foot. At home he always seemed strangely responsive to emotion, if you were feeling down he'd be over to sit on your lap and offer a purr. Strangely when my dad was going around the neighbours and the local area, the people he spoke to all knew who Kelly was, enjoyed him visiting their gardens and knew where his favourite spots were for prowling and lazing around.

Normally you find some people who despise cats in their garden but it seems either my dad lives near to people who are all just uber polite or who really liked having 'The Old Man' around since he seemed to use his own back yard as his main toilet spot, as it should be really.

And as he had been fertilising the garden for years, so it is he'll be fertilising the garden for even more because his burial was by the cherry tree in the garden.

An awesome cat and my best bud for many a year. I'll remember Kels as a crazy but kind nutter butter of a domestic tiger, he really was one of the family.

We're just hoping since they got to spend some time together that a little of Kelly rubbed off on the latest additions to my dads house, Nelix and Kes:

Nelix

Kes

Like their Star Trek namesakes, Nelix found himself branching out when he got stuck in the tree on one of his first adventures out and Kes has already tried flying the nest.

Kes even managed to leave the house one night and the only way out was a very partially opened 2nd story window. Thankfully both survived and will hopefully grow up to become awesome cats like Kelly.

A game of Time and Typing

Blogging has gotten away from me lately. Lots going on at work and lots happening at home too...

Sadly not all of it productive. I got addicted to Age of Empires again... oops. I bought Age of Empires 3 Gold and the extra add on too when they were like a tenner in a sale about a year or two ago, they hadn't even been opened but a free weekend cropped up and well, time literally became history. Another game that had been neglected - sat unopened - since my birthday was Monopoly for the Wii. We've certainly made up for that though and become somewhat addicted to it too... thankfully those games tend to be quicker than the real life version... our longest games being around two hours and the quickest a mere 47 minutes.

In other news the Crues played Fulham in Europa League Qualifying last Thursday which was brilliant. I still hope to write a big post on all that and the new stands etc at some point so I'll not go too far into it but in the revamped Seaview Stadium, Fulham put out a strong first team featuring 8 players who started in the Europa Cup Final in 2010. Crusaders lost 1-3 in the end but not before giving their fully pro and highly paid counterparts a good scare. We're really looking forward to our trip to London to see the away leg at Craven Cottage on Thursday night. We have our one for pride already so nothing will dampen our spirits, even the chance of rain :)

I finally got my hair cut (hurrah!) and totally unrelated we also had Gentlemen prefer Blondes night one weekend where we took both the food and the TV outside.

That was followed by Star Trek night the next weekend which concluded the first ever El Presidente's film festival.

I have half posts already written about those (not my hair cut mind though it was noteworthy in the speed of it, totally how it should be!) so hopefully when I can drag myself away from football and collecting resources and taking over maps I hope to get back to keeping up recording events as they pass. The problem again (as always) being the more that happens the more behind I get with the list.

Along those lines, well, mainly due to my old phone being a brick (albeit an amazingly indestructible brick!) from the last millennium - I dipped my feet into the murky waters of a contract phone and got an almost up to date handset. So I now have the ability to use apps, browse the web on the go and write a text message with a qwerty key pad. I never did learn how to use predictive text and now I never will - One small step for mankind, one giant techno-leap straight over a decade of unfortunate wrong wording for Simon.
Victory is mine!

So yeah, I'm going to have to use that blogger app at some point and give this a go on the move now I have no excuse. I'm not too sure how easy it'll be to add photos and they'll be mobile phone quality but I might give it a try and see how much of my data allowance it eats up if I can't find some free WiFi kicking about.

So that's my quick update, apologies for being an absent blogger so far this month, as far as social media goes I've probably written more words on Twitter than I have on my blog which is slightly worrying given my usual length of posts but enough about what I have or haven't done for now. Sleepy time, night all! Catch you soon.

The Cold of Winter

Hi lovely readery peoples, how has your January gone so far? Sadly for me, mine hasn't really got started due to the dreaded cold, flu and general all round sickness which has made bed seem like the best location in the world and soup more appealing than sex with chocolate on top, well, only when the cold relief capsules and sinus spray haven't kicked in.

Over Christmas I came down with something that was more of a bad cold than a flu, I tried to kill it off with whiskey and cold relief medication and this either contributed to it's downfall or the virus realised it had a problem and checked in to AA then took up religion. So, as it turned out, I was just feeling better the week after New Years. I got a good week of a fully functioning face without leaks and I even joined another gym with Norngirl. We're not total newbies to the gym but we'd only ever joined our local council one before and now we're attending a cheaper but much shinier one in town. We've made it 3 times so far and there are some fun looking machines to bend you every which way but the the treadmill is still my favourite and this one is very cool... literally, they all have in built fans with 3 settings. It's like running through the streets especially since they have several in the windows looking over the square.

Then from no where came along the reformed virus, born again from the afterlife and looking to convert my cells. *blaaaaaaarrgurghhhhhh*. The day after our 3rd trip, I got the start of a sore throat, that turned into a head cold. By Thursday it had me falling asleep at my mother-in-laws house after work and I dropped into my bed at home soon after 8pm. If I'm in bed without wife or laptop before 11pm at night there is usually something amiss. A long night of fever and sweats followed.

As an undiagnosed idiot (at least not legally) who doesn't wish to be penalised by his workplace for having the audacity to be off sick when I am actually sick, you know, just in case I'm actually sick again later in the year with something I can't physically walk with - I went to work anyway (everyone else does). I felt oddly alert that first day but I think that was more to do with the caffeine in the cold relief capsules, the plentiful supply of snack sized Haribo and throat lozenges that I was using as an aid to create a hole in my neck to get some air in my lungs. Ta Santa! Friday was a harder slog and I was far off the mental and physical pace but each night I had chance to recuperate and I got the work done I had to do.

By the weekend I could narrow it down, it seems I had caught myself some seasonal flu, aka man flu, that scourge of the male psyche, maybe a viral pathogen dreamt up by a pharmaceutical entrepreneur who had gone through a bad break up with a man and wanted revenge and to also make millions of dollars in the process by selling relief that involved making men visit chemists.
I wonder if there will be a mad scientist one day who will come onto a show like Dragons Den and ask for all their money under the condition that otherwise that they will release 'Women's flu' into the populous. No doubt the money lenders will all be sceptical and ask for a demonstration then all we'll see is Deborah stating that she must keep working as she falls asleep drooling phlegmy saliva onto her pile of cash.

So yeah, so far it's not been a brilliant start to the year. Norngirl is under the weather too health-wise. So we're hoping we get well soon and can kick start 2011 again.
On the positive side. With half a month of 2011 gone, one of the vaguely held bucket list of to-dos is ticked off with getting back to a gym, it's stereotypical timing but I won't let that deter us try to look after our health since I'll be happy to not have a face full of snot at some point. One thing that has been surprising, but in retrospect understandable, is the amount of times I've burnt my tongue with hot liquids. Being slightly doped up with the cold relief - a little out of it with the symptoms of the flu and the amount of hot drinks and soups consumed - it all stands to reason. But it's still a stupid thing to do to yourself, a life lesson to be learnt there somewhere.

Other positive news is that we're getting stuck into some DVD box-sets, namely all of the Benidorm seasons which we finished on Sunday and now can't wait for the next season (RIP Mel of course). Next stop is digging our teeth into season 1 of Enterprise, 4 episodes in at the moment.
We know its the least popular of all the Star Treks but I haven't seen all of them and Norngirl is willing to give them a try, so we're going all out.

In other news, Dean the fish is still alive and swimming, the football season is going better than expected and we ran out of gas again... though Dean doesn't mind, he quite likes the cold. Hopefully my sinuses will let me stay out of the house for longer periods soon and I might have more than just the rest of the highlights from NYC to blog about :)

Feel free to post your stories or links to yours pages in the comments section about how your year has gone so far, hopefully you've had more luck than us so far!

The 2011 list

So here we are, 2011! The start of a new calendar year - that chosen marker tied to the beginning of another orbit of the Earth around the Sun. A time that seems to offer a chance to reflect, to take stock and to plan ahead. After a nice Christmas away in Yorkshire with my family and after being very appreciative of some down time, I'm going to make a list. Lists are my favourite way to keep organised, even with an outlook calendar I can't beat a simple list. So as well as everything I'll take forward from 2010 here are the new additions to my list of New Years resolution type/ to-do type things for 2011:

General :
- Live a little more whilst we're still young and relatively free n'easy:
      > If affordable, try to make it on at least 2 foreign holidays and take in new places.
      > De-stress a little more often and don't let work stress carry home when at all possible.
      > Book more wee things we like to do like comedy gigs, cinema trips, Belfast Giants games and the likes.
- Remember to back up my hard drive more often.
- Invest in some new shoes.
- Sign up to a gym that is open during hours that are good for me to make use of it.
- Look into the possibilities of moving house (again).
- Use what I have before buying more and stop hoarding junk ( + sort through my mass of t-shirts and get rid of a few to make room for some trousers).
- Keep an eye out for a Career change to something I'd enjoy more that is more suited to my studies.

Blog related :
- Take more photos (I really enjoy photography).
- Spend less time on things like blog promotion and put that time to writing posts.
- Spend more time commenting on the blogs I really enjoy reading.
- Clear out Troll blogs I've been hooked on from my reader (Note to self: I'm human - not a fish - don't get hooked into wasting time debating with ill-intentioned people who don't deserve the attention - especially in relation to those with religious or political ideals I find questionable who like to stir controversy - Northern Irish politicians being the exception since they have a real life influence over our lives)
- Make a new title banner.
- Finally write a post about our wedding and honeymoon.

Hopefully an exciting 2011 ahead for us all and I for one can't wait to live it.

As tempting as it is to curl up in a ball and do an impersonation of our family cat, we don't get that many cosmic twirls around the sun so it certainly makes sense to make the best of those we do get. Time for me to get started on that list.

A visit to Happy Hour at the Brooklyn Brewery

Venturing away from Manhattan and a little off the tourist trail, we ventured into Brooklyn in the hopes of a good evening with lots of beer. This was my experience of Happy Hour at the Brooklyn Brewery.

We got off the subway and climbed the stairs up to the street. It was only early evening but it had been dark since we were at the top of the Empire State Building. When we had made it to street level, we stepped into the softly lit streets of Brooklyn.

The streets in the area we had arrived in reminded me more of home than the jungle of Manhattan. The first thing was that the buildings weren't quite so tall and more importantly the streets were quieter with a slower pace, most notably; less traffic and less people. Once we'd taken a moment to adjust our eyes, we realised we didn't actually know where exactly we were going. Norngirl had printed lots of maps but we hadn't called back to the hotel so we didn't have the one we needed with us. Oops. Not to worry though, Norngirl kinda of knew what we were looking for and with a bit of landmark spotting we picked the direction as being about right and set off to find Camelot; our own very silly place - or at least somewhere we certainly hoped could be after some beer.

We hadn't located the Brewery at the time but we were hungry. We called into a convenience store and bought some snacks that we wouldn't really find at home, a Bean Burrito in my case. Why I bought something containing Kidney beans, when I don't really like them, baffles me, but whatever sauce there was in that thing made it really quite tasty!

We lined our stomachs lined as we walked and before long we turned a street or two and found ourselves in sight of the Brewery. We couldn't tell from the end of the street but the queue outside it kinda gave it away.

We got in line. The accents around us seemed to be more local than those we'd been listening to the rest of the day which had been quite a mix of dialects from around the world. The people in line were also chatting about work, life, sports etc. This wasn't the tourist crowd we'd been around all day. I had the feeling like I was back at Uni, it wasn't a clubbing crowd either, it was the sort of crowd who enjoy a nice drink and chat with their friends - aka - my sort of place!

After a short wait, the doors opened and the line filtered into the building through a check of IDs at the door to make sure we were all 21 or over. Thankfully we still were and made our way inside.

Inside there were some big vats and in front of them some bags of Malt and other beer making ingredients. We were a little confused for a second as there was a queue for a bar but also a queue for a small booth which had a display case of Brooklyn Brewery branded merchandise. The signs soon enlightened us that you buy tokens at the booth then go to the bar with them to get the beers in. We got our tokens and headed to the bar. There was a nice wee selection of Beers and Lagers on tap, from the standard low % Pilsener to a general Larger, to Brown Ale to some nommy high percentage beers... and I mean high percentage, 9.6% and 10.2% alcohol if my memory serves me correctly. The two strong Beers were called the Blast and the Detonation and cost 2 tokens each compared the regular beers at 1 token. Tokens at the time we were $4 but if you got 5 you got a 6th free, so $20 for 6 tokens or $3.33 (Approx £2.10) per drink or $6.66 (Approx £4.20 at the time) for the high percentage ones. I think it was the cheapest we found beer out of anywhere we went in our week in New York.

I started off with a Lager to get warmed up and Norngirl jumped into the deep end with a Blast.
I really like my Ales and Beers so I'm not sure why I began with a Lager and and not with a Brown Ale. Sadly we didn't get a Brown Ale at all that night, it's popular and the barrels had ran dry by the time we had got through the rest of the beers. This was happy hour but happy hour is the event rather than one specific hour of time; by the sounds it's most Fridays of the year from 6-11pm. Thankfully we did try the Brown Ale in a bar later in the week and it was very nice. That night though we gave the rest of them a try and my favourite was certainly the Blast. As Norngirl said in her blog post about this day, she preferred the Detonation Ale. Granted these probably aren't names that breweries have top of their marketing lists in Northern Ireland.

In the world of beers, Theakston's Old Peculiar is my favourite followed by Guinness and I wouldn't say no to a Speckled Hen or a Wells' Banana Bread either. I think that 'the Blast' would come in there after an Old Peculiar on tap in Yorkshire and a Guinness on tap from the Guinness Storehouse in Dublin - so a well positioned 3rd in my overall list. It had a nice rounded flavour to it that wasn't at all over powering for a beer with such a high percentage. I've had a couple of other beers in the past that were of a percentage as high as these and they didn't taste right at all. One of those was a German beer in one of the beer tents of the Christmas market at Belfast City Hall which had 'Santa' in the name somewhere but these in the Brooklyn Brewery were everything that beer wasn't as far as flavour and enjoyment go. The Detonation was nice too, it had a similar but stronger flavour but I just preferred what I felt was the subtler edge with the Blast.

The beer wasn't the only thing our happy few hours in the Brooklyn Brewery had going for it. Many people were sitting at tables and chairs laid out in main part of what was essentially one big room but we had taken up residency on some of the bags of Malt in the thin part of the room by the token booth and doorway, sat with the vats behind us. It was a very chilled atmosphere and although lively, everyone seemed to be able to hear one another talking. In all honesty I can't remember if there was any background music playing or not, I'm going with not but I could be wrong as Norngirl thinks there was, she is usually right. The only negative I can remember from our visit was that later into the evening, the toilets had gone down hill a little in the cleanliness stakes. Apart from that though it was all excellent and we had a nice time chatting away to one another only to be distracted by a few random things:

One random thing - (to me at least) was the arrival of several huge pizza boxes and many other take away packages. As Norngirl explained to me at the time and as I came to find out, unlike in stingy UK and Irish establishments, New York is very open when it comes to ordering take out to a place like this or to your hotel room, I was ever so slightly envious and intrigued by this.

Brooklyn Brewery Cat photo by Norngirl

The other random thing - was a cute cat which seems to be very much at home in the Brewery. I would think probably a helpful aid in making sure no pesky mice sneak in off the street to nom all the ingredients. The kitty seemed very used to the noise and all the attention. Other than mingling around the feet of people drinking their beer, it was jumping up on to the bags and onto the desk/counter of the tokens booth, positioning itself into prime stroking locations. I love cats and was eager to pet this one, as was everyone else - staff included. The kitty wasn't going to let anyone go home disappointed though saying that it did try to nom a bit of take away from one of the door men but the dude wanted the food more so it didn't get a stroke from him, more of a shooing away.

Enjoying our beer, the evening got away from us and at around 10.15 we decided we best head on back across the river to find ourselves a proper evening meal closer to our hotel, so sadly and with a heavy heart we had to leave the Brewery and its merriment behind.

Happily tipsy, we wandered back to Bedford Street Subway station and caught a subway back to Manhattan. We got off a few stops short of the hotel where Norngirl knew of a few restaurants she had heard good things about with her pre-trip research. We ended up in an Italian restaurant where we ate some very nice pasta which we washed down with some water and a carafe of wine (that's 1ltr of wine, or pretty much 2/3rds of a normal bottle each). It probably wasn't the brightest idea given our evenings alcohol consumption up to that point but nevertheless we drank most of it. It was a very-very-merry stroll back to the hotel. We hadn't gone past the point of no return like you'd see some people doing on the streets of Belfast on a Saturday night as we know our limits even if we do push the boundaries now and again. That night we were just to that very happy tipsy place where life is good and where it's hard to not find things funny but still in a place where we can be polite, work out the correct tip, walk in relatively straight lines and find our way around places we've never been before. We're happy drunks rather than depressives or angry ones you'll be glad to hear. We made it back before we knew it and jumped into bed.

My comeuppance to mixing the grain and the grape and having a brilliant night out was a pretty heavy hangover when I awoke the next morning. I ended up trying to remedy this with a lettuce leaf, a dollop of Chicken Mayo sandwich filling (ordered in a hungover daze) and a walk in Central Park but before I get onto that, I'd just like to pass on some fine advice from an American great and true hero. Some advice that may help you decide if you want to follow in our footsteps with a similar night out in the Empire State.

"To alcohol! The cause of... and solution to... all of life's problems " – Homer Simpson

So to summarise, the Happy Hour at Brooklyn Brewery was great and highly recommended. Having a carafe of wine in the same night is not such a good idea for keeping your liver in good condition or for feeling fresh and awake and trying to order a normal breakfast the next morning. Drink wisely my awesome, non-judgemental, kind-hearted blog readers, always drink responsibly.

The Big 100, Blog Life ain't so Bad!

Welcome to a bit of landmark for my blog, the 100th post! It has been 1 year, 8 months and 6 days since this all began so I'm going to take this post as time to reflect and recap on blogging and life in that time.

In that very first post I wrote about the occasion years earlier when I was leaning against the side of the plane and looking out of the window at the scenery below. Last Sunday on our way home from our weekend in Blackpool I finally had the after image from the before and after 'spot the difference' scenes. On that first flight I was heading to Northern Ireland for the first time and I was sat alone pondering life and love. This time, with Blackpool and the Fylde coast disappearing into the darkness below, the scene was different. My wife at my side and my sister-in-law and friends nearby laughing and joking, the risk I took that first flight was the biggest leap into the unknown of my life and for certain the one I would never change.

So although I blog and end up complaining about a lot about things in the local and wider world, in my own deeply personal and largely non-blogged world, the ride of life is firmly on the tracks, zooming along with the fervour of time.

That ride has been quite eventful in the period I've been blogging and blogging itself has now become a part of my ride which is slightly odd but odd in a good way. I hadn't anticipated that writing my blog would take up so much of my time. Due to its almost therapeutic release, for me it is a nice problem to have to balance but nevertheless I have found that blogging is a bit of a paradox. Blogging to me is all about recording and portraying experience but the more you do, the more experiences you have to blog about and the less time you have to blog so the less you get to blog and in turn to blog it all would impact on time used to type. With the quieter times, you get more time to blog about what has happened but the fewer experiences you have to blog about.

I have one regret with blogging so far and that is not having the time to give as much as I'd hoped. I have posts written but not typed about my wedding and honeymoon and several fun events slipped under the radar. One day in the not-so-distant future I still hope to catch up with at least the major things.

So that has become my main dilemma with blogging. The reasons I started to blog are the same as they were from that original post however throwing yourself into the mix brings a dedication of time I wasn't anticipating, but you know what, I think it's worth it.

In that 1 year, 8 months and 6 days, which translates to roughly 88 weeks, an awful lot has happened and due to blogging it, I have a half decent record of it. Not only that but through reading other blogs and researching my own point of view, I have learned a lot and reassessed a lot from creating my content.

The extra plus I have found (other than slowly learning to spell and structure a sentence!) is that there are some really great and genuine bloggers that I mightn't have come into contact with if it wasn't writing my own blog. I've been able to see life close to home and far away from a perspective different to my own but in ways I can relate to. A lot of bloggers go for page clicks and ads but some, such as these few examples (in no particular order) are a some of my favourite blogs and where I believe blogging is really at its best:

Stickleback

East Belfast Diary

San Fran ♥ Belfast

Mere Frivolity

Into Geek

London Town and Me

We Heart New York

Sadly, as well as the great personal and interest bloggers, in what can be a weird and wonderful blogosphere there are an awful lot of shallow and materialistic bloggers who will do anything for a page view, usually those who don't create all of their own content or don't reference their source which a little pet peeve of mine I'm afraid to say.  The culture I've come across in the world of blogging is slightly different to other online communities I've had the privilege to being a part of. It's maybe because everyone operates from a different page rather than all coming together on one but there seems a larger emphasis on being seen and getting your voice heard, especially when it comes to people who want to be authors or to sell their product. Finding people genuinely interested in what you are saying is a rare thing as there largely is no other connection and I find that kind of sad. Sad because although a blog can be even more personal and expressive than a lot of other online environments, the one-to-many nature of it seems to leave a gap of sincerity.

On the plus side though, blogging gives you freedoms of speech unparalleled and the ability to reach audiences to whom you wouldn't ordinarily even have contemplated passing on your views. I guess that can be a bad thing as well as a good thing. One instance I had of reaching someone I didn't expect came when my blog post about Toy Story 3D and the cinema in question out-ranked that organisation's Google search result at the time. I received a comment from the General Manager offering me tickets to another show and perhaps to blog about it. I turned down the offer as I am a not-for-profit sort of guy and so is my blog. What did surprise me though was the fact that my ramblings led to someone with the ability to influence our future experiences to go so far as to act on them in their own way gives an indication that blogging has the ability to give an individual a voice otherwise muted in the big giant ball of spam out there. Hrmm, if only the folks at Stormont would take so much notice and offer a second election (or more) until we get someone with common sense in a seat of power!

Other than that, another surprising but fun moment was receiving a few mentions on the Belfast Telegraph site thanks to Blogger and Columnist Geoff McGimpsey whose blog is Boballs (but slightly mothballed at the moment) and whose column is largely dedicated to the local bloggers here in Northern Ireland.

It's great that there are some people like Geoff and the Belfast Telegraph out there who are putting a lot into promoting the blogosphere and also great that this area of the world, with all it's issues and problems, has an active online presence led in voice largely through much more dedicated bloggers and blog sites such as Alan in Belfast and the tangled web of politics debated at Sluggerotoole.

So on this, my 100th post, I'd just like to say that blogging, like taking that first flight to N.I many years ago, has been very much a good thing for me up to this point at least. Blogging has intertwined itself as a part of my life, it's encouraged me to involve myself more in what's going on around me, to engage further my interest in photography and to savour the special moments in life that little bit more as typing it out again really does almost mean reliving it. It has very much been worth it so my advice would be: if you don't blog or have never blogged, why not give it a try?

Exploring the Cavehill and Cavehill Country Park - Part 1

My feet kept sliding backwards, it was clear I had taken the wrong path in my trek to the summit of the Cavehill in the Cavehill Country Park. It dawned on me that this was probably why the sign said the equivalent of 'take the sheep's path at your own risk'. It really hadn't looked this steep from the bottom. Oops.

I caught my footing and clambered back to much  sturdier ground that was scattered with plenty of fixed-in-place rocks. I negotiated my way over them, on all fours at times. It was like being a kid on a climbing frame again.

Conscious of eroding the hill quicker than nature and other people were already doing, I did my best to not cause the scree I was walking on to relocate further down the slope. I dodged the rabbit droppings that were peppering the ground and after a quick stop to rabbit spot, I was all but a short climb of some steps from McArt's Fort.

Before we head up those stairs though, here is where it all started...
The Monday before last was the Monday following the weekend of joy that crescendoed with Leeds United being promoted from League One to the Championship. So whilst feeling on top of the world, I had planned to use one of my days off to head a little higher in the physical sense of the term. So when the weather forecast had given the indication that Monday was the best day of the week to be heading outdoors, I made a vague plan. The idea was to make my way to ASDA on the Shore Road, to buy some supplies and then set off walking towards the Cavehill Country Park and, via Belfast Castle, make my way to the top of the Cavehill where I would reward myself with my lunch.

I know Divis at 478m is the highest elevation of Belfast's Hills but at 370m the Cavehill won out, mainly because it was closer and I couldn't fathom how to make it to the top of the Divis hills with just public transport and my own two feet (at least in any reasonable length of time) - though having found the link there I think that this trip might be do-able in the future!

Kitted out in the sort of gear you'd wear to play 5-a-side football but with a coat over the top, I beeped my items through the self-service checkouts and started my walk.

From ASDA this was my eventual route:

Path depicted using Google Earth

The first part was a breeze. It began well as I hadn't even passed too far by the old gateway to the Fortwilliam area before I had spotted some wildlife. It was a grey squirrel foraging around but it was already on the move before I had the sense to try and take out my camera. I was soon at the Antrim Road and walking up Innisfayle Park and into the grounds of the park.

The incline started to pick up as I approached Belfast Castle itself. Belfast Castle is a castle only in the palace type definition of the word as it is a sort of Victorian stately home, but is never the less an impressive structure with quite a view.

Having found myself here plenty of times before, I didn't go snooping around and just passed through the gates to head onto the forest path. The path leads up to an odd feature of the Cavehill, a depression surrounded by tiny-hillock like mounds and boulders, an area known locally as the 'Devils Punchbowl'. The path is lined with trees and from a gentle start gets quite steep about 3/4 of the way up to the Punchbowl. Being unfit and wanting to make it to the top as soon as possible (I was very hungry by this point) I took a quick rest and took on some fluids to keep me going.

I set off again and soon made it to the Devils Punchbowl. Once there I had a look at the quickest route to the top. I was in two minds as to whether to stick with my original plan of making the steepish clamber or take the easy but longer hike. Sat on the edge of a hillock looking up at the hill I made my mind up. Or was there a little devil on my shoulder telling me to do it? Whatever the real reason, I decided I was going to head up the steep route.

With slightly heavy legs I began the walking-clamber. At first it is a slight hill heading south beneath the cliffs, then with the large basaltic outcrop looming, the path became earth and rocky scree. With the path uneven and very loose in places I was in two minds between looking up incase of falling rocks and looking down to ensure I wasn't going to be heading backwards.

Inbetween the glances up and down I caught sight of something moving. Two rabbits bounded in opposite directions and out of site. Like Alice spotting a glimps of the white rabbit, I had to follow, although unlike Alice, I had a camera with a decent zoom so didn't have to get too close. Having spotted a rabbit moving I had the camera on and aimed. But where had it gone? I never saw it leave. I took a photo and had a look. Still nothing, but...ah wait, there it was! It was camouflaged against its habitat, presumably to make it harder for the birds of prey that stalk the hills to make the wee thing their next meal.

Back on the move, I found myself facing a literal uphill struggle. I could perhaps make better progress on a solid base of rocks. With that plan though came the problem of it being steeper. I ended up having to use my hands as well as my feet. It was feeling like the wrong choice, but in so many other ways it was the right choice. I was feeling free and having fun, even if I was having to avoid putting my hands in rabbit droppings.

I persisted and only got myself in a twist the once which required sitting down and spinning around. Having got out of that pickle I was soon on a short walk on flatter ground between two outcrops feeling quite proud of myself. I was near the top but couldn't yet see anything infront of me but rock, grass and path. The informal path reached a proper one and a cattle gate too. I was almost at the top, a climb of the steps away from the view from McArt's Fort.

As I made my way up the steps, the anticipated panorama was hesitant in appearing and a continued view of grass meeting the sky met my eyes. Then there it was, Belfast and the surrounding area, in the distance I could see the North Down coast and further afield. The Mourne Mountains were poking in and out of the clouds and the city was bustling by below me.

Sadly there was quite a bit of cloud so the view from the top of the Cavehill wasn't quite as far reaching as it could have been, but it was quite a sight never the less and here are some of the sights I captured on camera from (and in one case hanging over) the edge of Napoleon's Nose:

   

Once I'd absorbed the view, I sat myself down and unzipped my backpack. I took out the goodies I had bought and dug in.

Settled down for a short stay, as you do. I set up a windmill and with the wind up there it spun like it had never spun before (yes I am a big kid, did I not mention that already?). Also except from birds, planes or the wind blowing it off the cliff, I was protected on all sides from food thieves and could really enjoy the hour or so I loitered watching the world go by.

Reluctantly, I had to make a move and head down the hill. I packed up my things, making sure not to leave any trace of my presence. The question in my head was then, which way?

After hopefully joining me in a short hypnotic interval with the Hypnowheel of Belfast, please do visit the next page - Part 2 of Exploring the Cavehill and Cavehill Country Park to find out what I came across next.

You haven't been to Belfast in 2010 until you've...

10. Taken a long detour to get to a shop because of construction works, a journey that likely resulted in a bounce across a makeshift wooden bridge which you perhaps slightly enjoyed even though you know you should be annoyed by the inconvenience.

9. Witnessed a near death 'You've been Framed' moment on or around one of the sculptures in the middle of town - like the Spirit of Belfast - and wished you'd caught it on camera!

8. Had the joy of listening to old men 'gurn' and complain at a local sports event, seemingly oblivious to the fact they aren't at home in front of the TV or watching the multimillionaires.

7. Considered how the view will look from the top of the Obel and if you could get a paper plane from the top of it to land on the Odyssey?

6. Made it to the top of the zoo on the cave hill and said "Bout Ye" to the cute Sunbears. They tend to pop their heads up to the glass to get a better look at you and maybe say "oh hai".

5. Stood wobbling at the top of Victoria Square on the viewing platform whilst peering at the passers by below and plotting the logistics of an abseil down to sneak up behind them.

4. Got bored trying to find something cheap to do so head into a bar or cafe only to find it would have been cheaper to have done the thing you were thinking about doing in the first place.

3. Felt bad for almost falling over a busker or big issue seller in the street - though in your mind questioned the choice of location they have occupied - usually at the at the other side of a blind corner!

2. Become frustrated by the tour bus people offering you a leaflet when you've already turned down their colleagues or competitors all the way down the street - especially when you're not a tourist, dagnabit!

1. Walked around the Ulster Museum and come out wondering how next time you can get away with making things in the 'interactive areas' without been frowned upon. Likely to coincide with thoughts of how you could go about borrowing a child for an afternoon or making one just for this purpose, followed by the thought of 'don't be silly, grow up', followed by the thought 'then again...'.

Plenty to come... please hang in there!

Sorry for the lack of posts this November. As November's go, this one has been, and will be, an extra special month. In 12 days I'll be getting hitched. The weekend just past was my stag do weekend. The evenings are taken up planning and sorting, the days working and getting things done and the spare moments hopefully dedicated to writing a speech that is still only a small bunch of notes long... eek!

Though for once I have a list of events, meaningful thoughts and feelings to blog about, the time isn't yet there to put them into the form of a blog post. To that end I am making a real and actually-written-down-in-a-hard-backed-notepad type list and I am determined to make my way through writing about them as soon as I find time - this is more than likely after the wedding. Possibly in the sun whilst Norn Girl reads chick-lit books about divorces ;)

So from appearing in the audience of BBC TV/Radio shows and a Leeds game, to Stag do's and meeting old friends, from ponderings about keyboards and time travel to hopefully (what will probably be many an entry of) the biggest event... the wedding and honeymoon.

Unfortunately life doesn't seem to have a pause button. So what has been and what is to come will have to just hold on a little while longer. Please don't venture far... I'll try to make small updates in the mean time but I'll be back soon, with more to blog than ever!

Climate change, a very local story.

Northern Ireland has many of its own unique problems to solve but there is one problem that Northern Ireland, Ireland and Great Britain have in common and a problem that they all contribute to on the global scale - influencing climate change. How do I know this... because I live in Northern Ireland and I believe that I too contribute to the problem. I know, not a great admission to make, especially when you take into account I spent 3 very worthwhile years of my life studying the environmental sciences. So why am I telling you this?

I’m telling you this because I don’t mean to detrimentally exploit our environment, but I know my actions are likely to be contributing to the problem. I’m telling you this because, although I’m by no means an expert, I studied the literature from what I hope was a balanced perspective, I’ve read the arguments for and against and have made my own mind up from the scientific data and theory I’ve had to sift through to write my essays. I was even going to write another essay for this occasion of Blog Action Day. However to cut a long story short, my opinion is that we are precariously playing with natural systems that are resilient but that are part of such a complex balance that we’re foolish to think we aren’t at least having a significant impact. An impact that could leave a much harsher world for our offspring to live in by worsening pre-existing problems that it seems mankind can’t even resolve during the best of times... the likes of poverty and war.

It wasn’t that long ago I was at university, and climate change was a leading topic but as we found when searching the media, it hardly made the news that often and it wasn’t such a large part of a political parties manifesto. Thankfully that has in recent times begun to improve, even if it has led to a slight transference of scepticism because of its increasing use as a political tool to win votes. Eventually though, those with the ability to approach the problem, i.e. government and the industrial and business world, those who are reliant upon the systems people have developed up to this point, have at least on the surface begun to show signs of acknowledgement. Sadly though, change is slow in human behaviour. A change that has not been helped by those who have a vested interest to oppose such change, especially when the change might affect their profits or control. But like the political scene in Northern Ireland it’s likely to be a generation or two before a general consensus overwhelms the petty arguments and those in a position to do so get their acts together. Let me put it this way, Northern Ireland has its fair share of sceptics on climate change problems but I’m not one of them, sadly regarding the hope for change, our last Environment minister here in Northern Ireland was.

My more immediate and local problem though, is that in my current situation I find more often than not that I am not in a ready position, like billions around the world, to do what I would need to in order to restrict my own impact.

For instance... I choose not to drive but I still have to use a bus that is stuck in traffic pumping out its fumes because Northern Ireland is seemingly obsessed or dependent on the petrol motor car and there are only limited mass transit facilities in Belfast. I try to buy locally sourced produce, for instance if I buy bottled water for my desk at work I buy the one that was bottled and sourced closest, but I still end up buying it because it’s convenient when really I could go out of my way to carry a 2ltr bottle of water to work each day. I use a lot of electrical devices and lights and I turn them off when not in use, we’ve also replaced most of our bulbs with energy saving light bulbs but the electricity here is still predominantly provided from non renewable power stations and it’s either their way or the highway. We don’t use hardly any heating and wrap up in blankets but when we use hot water it’s powered by a gas boiler, we live in a rented home and neither our landlord nor we are eager to fund an expensive conversion to renewable energy sources. We like to travel and experience new places and culture but to do so we have to get on a plane or a boat, there is no realistic alternative. We recycle but just about everything we buy comes in packaging and bags. These are just a few scenarios whereby whether I or not I like it, I end up playing a small part in reinforcing mankinds effect on climate change through many of my choices.

Sure, some choices are not exactly choices, others are indirect consequences and some are my choices and those I do hope to change the outcome of in future.

The point though, is that even with a conscience acknowledgement of the problem, it’s not so easy, at least in my experience, to make changes that can help rather than hinder on your own. Northern Ireland isn’t the best place to try and live carbon neutral or in a sustainable manner right now, but I’ll keep trying even if I’m frowned upon by others in their 4x4’s. I intend to make a more concerted effort and hopefully I won’t be alone. Though just another view, much like the rest of this post, Northern Ireland is in a great position to repolarise the effect in place at present - there is hope yet and we can all make a difference if we try a bit harder. Given also the support shown today with Blog Action Day 09 we won't be alone. I’ll hopefully blog further on this topic in future, preferably with some facts and interpretation rather than just opinion.

Wedding planning, "Yellow Alert!"

With less than a month and a half until the wedding, yellow alert has been called. The rise in stress has stepped up a notch, especially last week. The joys of planning, arranging and holding a wedding with many of the more traditional elements, would seem to hold the potential to provide a taste of married life, before it’s even upon us.

The 'yellow alert' we've called, is seemingly due to a culmination of a few factors. The first admittedly, is that of me as of the end of last week not getting involved enough - my bad.

The other more substantial issues causing us headaches in our wedding organisation are as follows:

- Lots and lots of little things that snuck under the radar which all raise their little heads from the ground like attention seeking zombie leprechauns. Just little to-do's all asking for attention and needing a resolution.

- Work and other commitments eating time. It’s hard to relax when your wedding is on the horizon. Sadly and probably short sighted of us; the main victim of this, apart from our sanity, has been our gym time. This fell by the wayside some time ago.

- Other people. Please don't get me wrong, we really want everyone who's invited to show up to our big day (especially given all the planning involved with the day itself) but our original plan didn't include the complex web of wedding planning that we're still working on today. We didn't plan to be antisocial, but our initial ‘Plan A’ was to travel somewhere else, ideally Scandinavia. To head there with just our immediate families and in a beautiful setting, to have an intimate ceremony. The up side would have been that along with our families, we would have had a trip to remember. We wanted to then just hold a wee gathering back home for everyone else to not be left without a party.

Sadly, because of the cost of the travel, those plans didn't fit into our budget, even when cutting corners and after saving for the best part of 2 years. Now we're dedicated to Plan B. Plan B happened to provide us with some great venues here in N.I - a castle and a hotel no less. The problem with being here is that so many other people will also be there because its close, and as we've come to find, now more than ever, even some people you know well can be very unpredictable. It seems almost surreal the unnecessary problems we've had thrown our way.

It's not that we don't like helping, if anything we've a habit of never being able to say no when asked to help. However, if its not people wanting us to resolve their travel arrangements its being asked to confirm details that they have already been given the means to the information for and just not looking. As well as that its people asking for plus ones. It wouldn't be so bad if it was just asking - in fact we've not turned anyone down and now have people coming to the reception who we will be meeting for the first time. Come to mention it, we must ask for full names for the seating plan. The annoyance has come in the way we've been confronted with the requests. Whether intended or not, the enquiries we've had, have basically insinuate that they won't be coming unless they can bring a plus 1.
This would be understandable if it wasn't for the fact that the people know a lot of other people who will be there anyway. After all, we planned and planned and planned the guest list, it might not be perfect but everyone will be near someone that we know they know and actually like - or at least we hope they still do, eeek.

We've tried our best to cover every base and the majority of people have been great and many RSVP's have come back with Yes I will attend proudly ticked so it’s not as bad as I might have made the situation out to be. Its just a little disheartening when your best efforts are thrown back at you by people who you would have thought would appreciate those best efforts, even if they obviously fell short of their expectations.

Ah well, I'm sure there will be plenty more ups and downs yet as the time draws closer.

A big list in a calendar format was a creation on Sunday. A countdown, as well as a reminder of all we still need to do. A list I'm already behind with, oops.

Despite the stresses and what seem to me to be overly complicated arrangements. I still can’t wait to be married to the girl I fell for 7 years ago. I might be dreading the speech and we're both unnerved about the fact that so many eyes will be staring at us all day, but I'm defiantly looking forward to saying "I do". I just can't fathom why its so damn hard to set the scene to do so, and to throw a party afterwards. We were never going to be able to afford a wedding planner to take the stress away, so there was always going to be some organising to do. Its just maybe proving to be more complicated than it might have been.

I just hope that we can ride out the storm long enough to prevent us swimming away and eloping. All being well it won't come to that but I'll keep an eye out on national express coach prices to Gretna Green just in case.

Thinking out loud and some words from Einstein.

I stayed up late last night, well past my bedtime. Ideas I've toyed with in my mind for a long time were at the forefront of my concentration and I finally felt I could maybe piece together a coherent post about it. Slightly encouraged by the quite creative movie that we saw on Monday; District 9, I got to work. My thoughts and opinions flowing onto the screen in my own very convoluted manner. I soon hit 2566 words. That’s where I ended. My eyes were struggling to keep open. The morning was almost upon me so I had to place my thoughts and opinions on hold and head to bed.

All the spare minutes at work today I spent thinking about it. Passing thoughts around in my mind - scenarios regarding how society, the structures and groups of people in the world and their ideas interact. The drives of humanity, psychological and physical needs, necessity, emotion, but also the darker drives of the society we live in, greed and exploitation. I pondered how ideas could make or break humanity... after love and happiness, is there something in life that is worth focusing on more than anything else? If making more money really is worth the dedication required, or if there is something much more meaningful, something helpful to humanity we could aim to do with life. How it might be possible to limit the detrimental ability of those with entrepreneurial, political or ideological ruthlessness and greed in obtaining and retaining wealth and power that brings about scenarios that are not pareto efficient, and further to that how to ensure that those who need it most are helped before those who have more than they need.

My thoughts were also geared towards how the influence of organised religion on the world can be reduced to find a situation where personal belief does not impact on other people or society in a way that indoctrinates, causes discrimination and division. Thinking about if it would be possible for human society to find a constructive bond that could unite people and set us on our way. Somwhere on track to find leaders of the future capable of Star Trek like ideals, where monetary competition might no longer be needed, where competition is about the will to further and better ourselves and explore. And where we might be able to dedicate more than we can now to help each other and to try to answer questions of our existence. Not forgetting having a few laughs and a bit of fun along the way.

Although I spent a fair bit of time typing it, I’m glad I held off posting it now. Mainly because I know I still have a lot more to learn, an education that might take a life time to refine my thoughts... and even then I still might not have an answer to the questions I was even asking myself let alone the arguments others would pick in my arguments. Thankfully I have found someone who held a similar world view to that of my own. Someone who wrote something that I’d like to share because there are unlikely to be many wiser words written and like all of his work, whether you agree with him or not, its great food for thought ...

Here is an excerpt from “Out Of My Later Years” by Albert Einstein, 1950:

(and here is a longer extract that I have found on the web which includes the lead up to this part... best though would be to lay hands on a copy of the book :) )

“Every individual should have the opportunity to develop the gifts which may be latent in him. Alone in that way can the individual obtain the satisfaction to which he is justly entitled; and alone in that way can the community achieve its richest flowering. For everything that is really great and inspiring is created by the individual who can labour in freedom. Restriction is justified only in so far as it may be needed for the security of existence.

There is one other thing which follows from that conception-that we must not only tolerate differences between individuals and between groups, but we should indeed welcome them and look upon them as an enriching of our existence. That is the essence of all true tolerance; without .tolerance in this widest sense there can be no question of true morality.

Morality in the sense here briefly indicated is not a fixed and stark system. It is rather a standpoint from which all questions which arise in life could and should be judged. It is a task never finished, something always present to guide our judgment and to inspire our conduct. Can you imagine that any man truly filled with this ideal could be content:-

Were he to receive from his fellow men a much greater return in goods and services than most other men ever receive?
Were his country, because it feels itself for the time being militarily secure, to stand aloof from the aspiration to create a supra-national system of security and justice?
Could he look on passively, or perhaps even with indifference, when elsewhere in the world innocent people are being brutally persecuted, deprived of their rights or even massacred?

To ask these questions is to answer them.”