DIARY: Birthday and Year End

It's been very quite on the private front, as some may have noticed I mostly post on my mountain runner blog these days (that's were the interesting part of my life seems to happen!).

Departures
A few "interesting" things have happened lately, though, most of all the departure of my best friend Per, and his girlfriend, to Madrid. They left after we celebrated a few "leaving do's" in the beginning of June and are planning on staying there for 2-3 years. Its a big loss personally, as we've had great times together, but I'm sure we all need a bit of fresh experiences, and there'll be load of tales to tell when they return to Dublin.

I'll miss the many good football evenings and weekend coffee sessions, though, Per! Good luck my friend!

Year End

Things are quite busy at work since it's Year End. It does not affect us trainers as much as everyone else, but we had a few things to sort out and quite a few projects to finish, so I think I speak for everyone when I say: Roll on July!

Getting older
Yep, Friday it happened, yours truly turned 28 (well past my peak in many ways I guess, but thankfully not the "endurance runner peak"!). I've never been a great upholder of the birthday tradition. In fact, I managed to forget my own birthday two years ago when I first came here.

This year I knew it was coming, though, but I didn't want any celebrations as I have some really busy (running wise) weekends coming up (real adventures if you ask me), so I thought the best possible present was a quiet weekend.

As readers of my other blog will know I took a long mountain trip the next day as a little "extra present", but have also bought at ton of running gear for myself the last few weeks, as well as some good books, notably "God is Not Great", a fantastic book, highlighting the deficiencies of religion in a very reasoned manner (and less provocatively and reductionist than Dawkin's, otherwise excellent, "The God Delusion").

I got nice cards from the family, and a great present, Bruce Springsteen's "Live in Dublin" featuring most of the best songs from his Seeger Sessions Band. As a great lover of these old songs and of "musicians who love to play" in general, this is an album you can't miss. Particularly moving are "Further On Up the Road", "If I should Fall Behind" and "Highway Patrolman". Good on you Brucie for bringing some well-deserved attention to Folk Music and being relevant at the same time. Plastic artists out there: Take note!