Dodo Flu

The swine flu pandemic is certainly something that is on people's minds these days. There has been a lot of hysteria in certain parts of the word and I find it hard to tell if it's completely justified or not. Obviously, people are dying from this virus which is a terribly unfortunate thing, but I'm not sure if it is as serious as is claimed. Certainly, conflicting opinions on the matter from "experts" don't help. Some say it's a new super-strain for which vaccines will become futile while cynics liken it to the SARS and bird flu outbreaks which just seemed to eventually go away.

In all the talk about prevention of swine flu, the issue of personal hygiene has reared its head. Many places I've gone (at least within Dublin and London) have signs informing people how to blow their noses and sneeze properly i.e. use a tissue and dispose of it immediately afterwards. Common knowledge? Maybe not.

The latest aid to facilitate personal hygiene throughout my university, and probably other places, are dispensers of hand cleaning gel. I've seen them in my school, the accommodation building and the gym amongst other places. This is all well and good, but my concern - and I'm almost certain this will happen - is that once these dispensers run out they will not be replaced/refilled. I think it's a case of short-sightedness whereby authorities think they must be seen to be doing something so they've installed these dispensers, not thinking that they'll empty quite quickly and will have to be indefinitely replaced. Unless the goal is to get people into the habit of regularly cleaning their hands and that eventually, even without the dispensers, they'll do it automatically, I believe this will just be another knee jerk reaction.

Similarly to the time I found an iodine tablet in my drawer at home that was issued in the post 9/11 frenzy and fear of a terrorist attack on Selafield, I envisage a situation in a few years where people are walking around and they see these brackets everywhere on the walls - possibly still holding the empty gel dispensers - and a conversation ensues:

"What's this thing there for?"
"Oh, remember back in 2009 when everyone got in a big kerfuffle about that swine flu thing and they installed these everywhere so people would wash their hands?"
"Oh yeah, what ever happened to swine flu anyways?".
"Went the way of the dodo seemingly."
"I hear he died of swine flu."

I hope I'm right :-)

Ticketmecca

I was ordering tickets for a gig on Ticketma$ter this morning. As usual, I was presented with a captcha (wikipedia entry if you don't know) as a security measure before I could proceed. I couldn't decipher the first one, so I clicked to get another and was presented with the words "Islamic aircraft". I thought it was an interesting collocation anyways...

Sepp Blabber

FIFA president Sepp Blatter is not happy at the the influx of foreign footballing talent to England and at the amount of money being spent on these transfers by English football clubs.

The two most expensive transfers in England since the end of the season (as of writing) were €21 million to transfer a player between two English clubs and €13 million to transfer an English player between two English clubs.

Real Madrid (which is in Spain, of course) just spent approximately €165 million on two players, one of whom was bought, incidentally, from an English club.

Fool.

Sprechen Sie Deutsch?

I don't really speak German. I have a few words here and there. When I've been in German speaking countries I've successfully employed pleasantries and asked the odd question (although I've not always understood the response). This is beyond the point, however. I...I've forgotten where I was going with this blog post.


*UPDATE 14/08/09*
As yes, I remember now! It was going to be something to do with how phrase books are pretty useless because obviously when you ask a question in the native tongue, the response is generally in the same. And you haven't the foggiest what is being said! Phrase books try to counteract this by providing a list of 'possible replies' but that's really useless, particularly if your asking something specific like a train time, platform number or something like that. The best thing to do is learn how do say "Do you speak English?" in their language or get them to write something specific down. Pointing helps too. To this effect, I find this book particularly helpful: http://www.amazon.com/Point-Travellers-Language-Dieter-Graf/dp/3980313026

A return to form

Yogi Bear covers MIA

All I wanna do is *boom* *boom* *boom* *boom* and a *click* *ching* and eat your honey.

Good things come...

As much I would like to be like Bill Bryson, what with the travelling and writing about it and that actually being a profession, I have no such luck. So the writing has to be done in my spare time which is paltry these days.

Having recently been to Hawai'i I had fully intended on comprehensively documenting by experience, especially considering that, despite it being the 22nd, it was the first nation I'd visited outside of Europe. I still have quite a few observations to make and have noted the jist of what I care to divulge elsewhere, but it's just going to have to wait. Hopefully not too long. I may break it down into more manageable chunks and release it slowly but surely, like a good...

Stay tuned.

Football is a matter of life and death

I'm slightly disturbed at football's ability to affect my mood for significant periods of time. I'm a Liverpool supporter, and on days when Liverpool play and win I tend to have a nice day -- like waking up on the right (read correct) side of the bed. But when Liverpool lose it's quite the inverse -- I'm pretty moody and irritable. This can be brought to extremes, for example, depending on the magnitude of the match. When Liverpool lost in the Champion's League final in 2007, I sobbed uncontrollably in a bar in Valencia and had to be consoled by a number of people, included concerned strangers (I swear I wasn't drunk :-|). That being said, I wouldn't change it for anything. I love it enough that I'm willing to take the rough with the smooth.

Being a Liverpool supporter, I loath Manchester United. So much so that when they lose I feel nearly as good as when Liverpool win. I bring Schadenfreude to a whole new level. And then they win, it doesn't feel terrible but it's not nice. I guess it's probably analogous to losing €20.

So as you can imagine, when Liverpool play Manchester United, the shit well and truly hits the fan. This biennial occasion came around once again last Saturday. Liverpool hadn't beaten them in over 2.5 years, so a win was long overdue. The result you ask? 60 hours later and you still can't wipe the smile off my face :D

"Some people believe football is a matter of life and death, I am very disappointed with that attitude. I can assure you it is much, much more important than that." -- Bill Shankley