Day 38 - Monday, February 7th, 2011

With soaring joy attacking my heart and their associated veins and arteries, I embarked from the Lighthouse to commence another week of work. The day came, went, and was replaced by another double-dose of cinematic pleasure at Cineworld. First on the agenda was Hereafter (4.5 out of 10) - a story about a brilliant psychic (Matt Damon) who wants to stop being brilliantly psychic as it is cramping his lovelife. The film was watchable, but some of the direction (by Clint Eastwood, surprisingly) was embarrassingly bad and the film features one of the world's worst ever child-actors seen on screen, who seemed to be reading his lines throughout.  The film did feature a very impressive tsunami scene though, and Matt Damon's performance was excellent too. And loads of the film was en francais which provided an excellent refresher opportunity.

A mouth-watering 49 cent Aldi egg mayonnaise sandwich later, it was time to view The Fighter (8 out of 10) , which pleasingly proved to be the film of the year thusfar. The raving about Christian Bale's performance is entirely justified, especially when you see a clip at the end of the actual guy that he plays - he impersonates him to an absolute tee. The acting from Mark Wahlberg, Amy Adams and Melissa Leo is all fantastic too, and the story is hugely watchable from start to end, with no glances at the watch required.

Homeward bound now, and it strikes me that my 8th and final Citydeal voucher for Bombay Pantry is due to expire this Thursday - potential catastrophe! What better way to avert crisis than to phone in a mammoth order and pick it up three minutes after their scheduled closing time, having walked briskly along the picturesque Summerhill palisades to get there? Simples! The culinary booty is whisked home, allowed to cool, and placed in the fridge for consumption tomorrow.


If you haven't seen it yet, go, GO NOW!


Tallest take-away in Dublin


Contentment : 11 / 25
Excitement :    1.5 / 10
Memorability : 2 / 15

Overall Score : 29% (21st out of 38)

Day 37 - Sunday, February 6th, 2011

Another wonderfully restful day - no matter, as a busy week is ahead, together with a trio of weekends away to Blarney, Derby and Barnsley (stay tuned for all the glamourous detail, peoples!), all in a row. My sporting investments today were not as fortunate as yesterday's but came oh so close, with both my 6/1 stabs (on Celtic to score 3 goals or more, and on 5 goals or more in the Celtic-Rangers match) coming up painfully near-but-short. (Rangers 2 Celtic 2 was the final score.) The match was an exciting watch though, which is more than can be said for the Chelsea-Liverpool encounter which officially became a snooze-fest when I snoozed from the 17th until the 86th minute - true story!

I arose from my slumber to concoct a culinary treat, in the shape of a tomato-pepper-and-cheese frittata, with shoestring fries and baked beans - sublime! Empowered by the afternoon snooze, I was able to watch the SuperBowl live to its conclusion for the first time ever. For the record, the Green Bay Packers beat the Pittsburgh Steelers in a lively encounter, Christina Aguilera murdered the Star Spangled Banner (oh-woh-oh-woh-oh-oh-oh-woh-oh sayyyyyyyy.......................can you-ooo-ooo-ooo seeeeeeeee................ etc.) and the Black Eyed Peas put on an awesome half-time show with the help of Slash and Tron-style illuminated dancers.

                                        You say frittayta, I say frittata........

Contentment :  9.5 / 25
Excitement :     0.5 / 10
Memorability : 1 / 15

Overall Score : 22% (32nd out of 37)

Day 36 - Saturday, February 5th, 2011

After the excesses of the night before, today screamed "Couch Day!", and thus it was, when I did eventually rise following a 7am retirement. The undoubted highlight of the vast quantities of sporting action viewed was Wolves' 2-1 defeat of ManUre, all the more juicy and sweet as I had backed Wolves at 6/1 to score 2 goals or more. The Pizza Hut consignment that was delivered was once again vile but no doubt I'll forget all about it in a few weeks and order the same again. And find it to be vile once again.

 
Nice one, Kevin Doyle!

Contentment :   10 / 25
Excitement :      1 / 10
Memorability :   0.5 / 15

Overall Score : 23% (31st out of 36)

Day 35 - Friday, February 4th, 2011

Unusually for a Friday, work was a busy affair, and lunch was celebrated with the adding of boling water to a pot of Koka Noodles, after emptying two sachets into the pot - one of curry powder, the other of 3 dehydrated peas and a shrivelled carrot flake. The results were surprisingly tasty, albeit with diminished expectations.

Fortified by at least 4 of my 5-A-Day, the afternoon transpired speedily and I grabbed a Dublin Citybike back to the Lighthouse in order to change. Possibly not a great decision, for whilst the gale-force winds were at my back on the outbound journey, they were in my face with added rain-lashings for the struggle back into town. The body was re-energised however with two tasty courses (chicken skewers and beef teriyaki) washed down with a glass of rouge house-plonk at Sushi King, a steal at €13.50 thanks to CityDeal.

Onwards to the public house formerly known as Judge Roy Beans - the Porter House Central, where boisterous farewells tinged with unspeakable sadness were being bade to Louise McNerney, who is departing Northern Trust to sign for Capita. Spirits were high, especially those in the shot glasses that were presented to Lou during the night, each one bearing a more potent brew than the last. My libation to her was Sambuca, which went down well but did seem to attempt almost-instant re-emergence. The Porter House brews its own ales, and my choice for the evening was Chiller, not dissimilar to Budweiser in taste and hue. In a damning sign of the recession that has devastated all our lives, the pub was absolutely wedged with people, causing some lengthy delays at the bar, as people seemed to be desperate to offload what little money they have remaining.

All too soon it was time to move onwards to Tripod to see awesome DJ legend John Digweed in action. As conditions were hazardous and Enda had a gimpy knee, the 800-yard journey was made via rickshaw, up Grafton Street, past St. Stephen's Green and up to the top of Harcourt Street - a bargain at €3 per person. After the first of many trips to the bar for the energizing goodness of vodka and lucozade, we took up our dancing positions at the front row of the balcony, and Diggers' 4-hour set did not disappoint.

Sanity would dictate that at 4am it was time to go home, so we headed to Colossus Casino for some early morning gamblage, and three hours later I emerged no richer or poorer, having been down, then up, then even. Mighty craic though!

Contentment : 155 / 25
Excitement :    4.5 / 10
Memorability : 5.5 / 15

Overall Score : 50% (4th out of 35)

Day 34 - Thursday, February 3rd, 2011

Work today was most enjoyable, with a number of meetings that provided adequate brain-stimulus and broke up the day magnificently. And before it could be known, 'twas time for the 71st Thursday Night Darts Club - huzzah! Proceedings started a little morosely, in truth, as this week we were sharing the back of Doolan's pub with a funeral "party", unbeknowst to us beforehand. However, spirits amongst the mourners seemed reasonably high, and before long, the need to keep any dignified silence was made apparent as being unnecessary. Children in pubs get, by nature, interminably bored, so the gathering appeared pleased that we were there to provide their early primary school quartet with mild entertainment. It was evident that the lil' mites wanted to get loose on the oche and throw a few themselves, but the idea was not nurtured, so its egg remained coldly unhatched.

Back to the sporting action now, and a very splendid nine athletes made it to the starting blocks. For the first time in many months, the line-up was devoid of females, as stalwart competitor Lara della Volpe had sent her medical apologies in advance. For the first two hours, the competition was extraordinarily tight, with 5 athletes all within 2 points of each other, but in the final half of the evening, two sporting heroes broke away from the peloton and in the end Jimmy "Screech" Leach (aka The Dark Destroyer) notched up his 8th title with another narrow-but-deserved 4 point victory over John "The Equaliser" Delaney.

                 The Top 4 TNDC 71 Athletes in radiant post-match pose

                  My attempts to finish a game on Double 5 prove hilariously fruitless

                         My chagrin at such fruitlessness is poignantly captured

   Yes, it's everyone's favourite National Convention Centre - but look at the water-height!


Contentment : 12 / 25
Excitement :    2.5 / 10
Memorability : 3 / 15

Score :  35% (15th out of 34)

Day 33 - Wednesday, February 2nd, 2011

Let me level with you - today was monumentally dull. Not unpleasant, mind, it's just that nothing out of the ordinary occurred. Work was a normal work day, and a brief contemplation of yet another foray to the cinema was suppressed in favour of a walk home, and a lazy evening. The Bombay Pantry feast, acquired last night, was unceremoniously devoured, with the exception of a half-plate of chicken karahi, which will do nicely after the walk home from Thursday Night Darts Club tomorrow.


Tumbleweed Day!


Contentment :  9.5 / 25
Excitement :     0.5 / 10
Memorability : 0 / 10

Overall Score : 20% (33rd out of 33)

Day 32 - Tuesday, February 1st 2011

Another day of work came and went, only briefly interrupted by a desktop Marks & Spencer's Seafood Paella lunch. Afterwards, a beeline was made to Cineworld for another double-bill. First off was Barney's Version (1.5 out of 10) - a shockingly-bad load of hammy poorly-directed awfully scripted nonsense, which was all the more disappointing as it had been the subject of rave reviews on top film review website rottentomatoes.com.

Conversely, I had low expectations for Blue Valentine (7 out of 10) but it proved to be excellent - a brilliantly acted affair that is as far away as possible from your traditional slushy Hollywood love-story flick.

On the way home, time to pop into Bombay Pantry to expunge another €18 CityDeal voucher, purchased for €8. For a voucher and an additional 60 cents, the culinary haul includes 2 Subz Bhaija (vegetable dumplings), a Batata Vada (potato and Nut pastie), ultra-hot Chicken Karahi, Aloo Gobi (spuds 'n cauli) and rice. Mindful of the late hour of the night and of the additional 2.5 pounds of flab acquired in the month of January, the haul heads straight to the fridge for future consumption, and the evening concludes with a tuna, tomato and cheese sandwich instead.

 
Blue Valentine


Contentment : 9 / 25
Excitement :   1 / 10
Memorability : 0.75 / 15

Overall Score : 21.5% (31st out of 32)