Every Day is Election Day

Hello, nice people of the intraweb…

Firstly, I’m really better, and starting to feel human again. Finally. I was, in a word, riddled. Exhaustion really kicked in and my immune system packed its bags, leaving me with a pounding head, vertigo-type dizziness, a septic throat, a Dylan Moran ‘dippy tummy’ and an ear infection of head pounding frustration. As of yesterday I can taste food again and my throat no long feels as if it’s wallpapered with sandpaper… and a glorious thing happened yesterday: I sneezed and the ear popped, so Amen, brother, I can hear again! I must say, it’s been a while since I’ve been so disorientated with sickness, my whole body just stopped working, and my mind started raving, I swear the dreams were just mad. Mental. I blame The Law.

Secondly, thank you all very much. Gav and I have really thrilled with the number of visitors to everydayiselectionday, which have been steadily increasing for the past few weeks, even before Gav’s insanely amazing Wordpress post (On that, ain’t he something? He’s so good, thanks for all the nice comments, he’s buzzing from them). We’re hitting about 120 a day, and it’s fuelling a drive to keep it up and maintain the good response we’ve been getting. I won’t lie, this was Gav’s brainchild (along with most other great/life changing things that come the Gavra/Ciava way) but I’m surprised at how much I’ve taken to it; I used to feel like an inappropriate visitor to other blogs I would (and continue to!) follow, but now I think I’ve earned my look in, and they can have a look back at me.

In the real world (not that the blogosphere isn’t real - y’all are real, right?) my all-time pet hate has to be people who take everything and give nothing in return, so I guess this is just me legitimising my presence as I skulk away on other people’s blogs, wondering in admiration how they can be so brave, so insanely hilarious and just downright honest and share all that with me, so eloquently and creatively. I don’t know many of the people whose blogs I read, but there is a lot of common ground out there and oh-so-many lessons to learn. I struggle to share as many of my thoughts and musings with you all to the extent to which I would like, and for that I apologise. I’ve never really written a truly ‘personal’ post before… it’s a oddity, really, especially since I am very open about my feelings/emotions with folk generally, whose who know me will know that (bloody hell - this is a couple’s blog, doesn’t get more open than that!).

I don’t know what exactly I’m afraid of; I’m a tough nut most of the time, pretty footloose and fancy-free, and have stood up to seriously difficult situations and come out strong and earnest to overcome/succeed – but for some reason, seeing those situations, just writing them down makes for a very difficult task. I’m also really conscious of the fact that on the greater scheme of things my ‘issues’ or ‘problems’ are whimsical and insignificant to the many serious and sobering real problems some people face. Such ‘issues’ are nothing new at any rate, nothing thought provoking, something you haven’t all been through. And I know a problem shared is a blog post, I mean, a problem halved… but I just can’t bring myself to type them… however, I’m hoping to change all that one post at a time.

That’s the bloody politician in me, I’m afraid to admit my shortcomings. Don’t get me wrong, I’m so grateful to have had the year that I did last year, but I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t cagey about people and their attitudes about me and my life after the Students’ Union sabbatical experience. You spend your whole year justifying your position, seeking validation and approval and hoping beyond hope that you won’t be ‘caught out’. You try so hard to be everything to everyone, to the point where you are so exhausted, you forget who you are yourself. You’re damned if you do and you’re damned if you don’t. And it was only at the end I realised that I didn’t want to play ball the same way my colleagues did, and if I could do some things differently now I would, but them’s the blows I guess. I ramble.

Anyways, the last thing you want to do is admit your failings, because if you note them, then sure as hell someone else will, and then it’s a REAL failing. So you brush it under the red carpet and you move on. You have this odd ‘confidence’ that is as shallow as your motivations, and a drive as ferocious as the fear that eats you up. I tried to articulate such feelings to the University Observer before I left, in an interview that I’d do so differently now, given activities and ‘liaisons’ of my colleagues I’ve learnt about that went on behind my back all year (most of it involving scamming money off students and the University, and sick and twisted jokes about some students who came for help. Disgusting.) I also came across some ridiculous ‘commentary’ between people who I clashed with on an issue last year, that was personal and vindictive (regarding my private and family life) that I would probably name and shame, nay ruin, for their own indiscretions and inactivity (I ruffled a few feathers with a motion of No Confidence; sorry if I demand standards for the Union) but there you go. I wanted to be loyal, even when they weren’t.

So I guess I have reason to feel nervous about juxtaposing my idle blog links with my inner deep thoughts for people like that to access. But I’m going to try to learn to share more, just as you do with me. All I can do is put it down to experience and try to learn from my year, just as I learn from all of you, and the wonderful thoughts and ideas you share on your blogs. And try to accept I’m only human. Horrors.

Thirdly, I’ve no real newsies, except for the fact I’ve revised my exam schedule for October; I’ve decided I’m not doing EU this time around. This is following extensive discussions and soul searching and a recommendation from my lecturer that I appear to be suffering from some PTSD (Post Treaty Stress Disorder). The drawing board that is Val Corbett suggested Land Law could be a runner, and who am I to disagree with Val? Honestly though, I was going off on ones about Lisbon in tirades of Bibi Baskin proportions (did you ever see the like?) in my homework, so it’s probably for the best.

Anyways, I’m off to watch Obama’s speech from Berlin (I’m catching up!), which is a perfect excuse for me to post this:

C x

Officially diagnosed with exhaustion (FE1-itis) by Dr McNerdy, and I’ve been banished to the bed. As a result, there has been considerable resting and  I’m all disorientated when I sit up so typing is difficult. I hope I’ll be back soon, I need to mendsies. Thanks for the loves, I shan’t be long…

Meanwhile:

I took my love down to Violet Hill
There we sat in snow
All that time she was silent still

So if you love me
Won’t you let me know?

If you love me,
Won’t you let me know?

Long live the crusts…

We’re playing around with some new themes on the blog - this is a prototype, there might be a rotating image header after a bit, but do bear with us if this blog has more looks than Madonna’s back catalogue over the next few days. Anyway, as per usual Brennan has outdone herself on prolificy so I have to chip in with my token tuppence for a bit.

So, this is my first entry as a UCDSU alumnus - like Ciara, I left office at the stroke of midnight on Tuesday morning - and so far I can’t say I’ve been all too overcome with emotion about leaving the job. Somewhere around Spring a switch flipped in me where things at work seemed to tire me more than excite me and while I don’t regret taking the year out of my life for something that at times has stirred passion in me that few things have ever matched, I do feel a natural sense of conclusion in quietly slipping out and getting on with other things.

Having started the new job this week - with the Affordable Homes Partnership - and with Ciara still doing her job in Croker and her evening classes, we haven’t been seeing quite as much of each other as we’re used to, where instead of going to work together and going home together, we work in different places and don’t get every evening together either. When we have gotten time to ourselves this week we’ve taken to watching The Office (obviously) in bed. Having made it as far as the Christmas Specials (after four attempts!) I came across the first thirty-odd seconds of this bit:

I think it says pretty much all there is to say about life down there - you really are just thrown together with people with whom you have little but the same CAO preferences, and being able to spend it with a couple of people who just fit into your life anyway is quite a special thing and for that I’m very lucky and truly grateful.

So that’s that then. What’s next? Accidentally making the Six One news (clicky) yesterday for a couple of seconds with the new workplace being featured in a report by Gareth O’Connor and including a shot of me from a not-so-flattering angle. Well for some, eh? If anyone’s bored call AHP free on 1800 365 555 over the weekend - that’s me doing the voicemail.

Amusingly enough, the press release that went out from the photocall last week (recall?) carried myself and Steph’s home addresses for some reason, and my local radio station in Meath, LMFM, called work on Thursday asking if they could get a number “for that young man who got an affordable home, just to talk to him about his experiences of trying to find housing”. Now that was a call-back that was worth listening into. Imagine, my new employers denying my adoring public a chance to speak to me? I suppose it would probably never reach the same glorious peaks as my appearance with George Hook last August anyway on other matters accommodation. Which reminds me - I must throw up an mp3 of that.

Anyway, today’s drenched Saturday shall be spent importing my 70GB-odd of music from the external hard drive - and about ten hours’ worth of new podcasts - onto my re-formatted laptop (my God, the speed…), so expect more frequent posts today with me reminiscing about/guffawing about/taking the piss out of a decade’s worth of a music collection.

… but I didn’t so I can only promise myself I won’t deny myself next year.

Looking forward to what Unarocks has to say about the Jay-Z debacle; personally I thought it was banging, was glued to the TV all weekend. Mark Ronson’s set seemed decent too, but what do I know, because…
YES I went to Boyzone, YES I had fun, YES you can fuck off. I’m with McLynn on this one.

Mother and Orla came to visit and elder sister even stayed over on Saturday, bringing cold hard cash and M&S cookies. On the win list for sure.

Gave a voucher a battering on Benefit buying products such as this, this and that. God bless vouchers for ensuring you have nice skin on an oh-so-rainy day.

Have a woeful pain in my left arm, a sort of dull, throbbing pang of aghness, and the accountants are laughing at me, nerdy so-and-sos. Last time I said fuckers my Nan told me to say ‘so-and-sos’, so there you go Peggy. She’s probably online… she’s not a regular Nan, she’s a cool Nan. Very mean-girls-velour-tracksuit. I’m lying.

Study is crappy-pile-of-highlighed-and-starred-for-asthetics-load-of bull. So I’m dealing with it by kicking its ass.

Reading lots about the Women’s Liberation movement in the 70s, it all started with a book Reilly bought me called Monday’s at Gaj’s. Oh, the male oppressors.

Spain won. There was a Torres v. Ballack situation in Treesdale, but we couldn’t argue with the result.

I’m a bit meh at the minute, if you haven’t guessed. Darmo is coming up on Thursday, and I can tell you, I need her right now. We’re in similar situations, between projects, and both more than a little disillusioned with a plethora of stuff… but if there is one person I can rely on to supply the belly laughs, it’s my Darmo.

I lost my title at midnight. UCD seems far away. Me no likey. This may explain my aggression.

So this is the real world eh? Fucking accountants.

Want out.

What’s next?

PS - I’m liking my new phone and no I can’t do without it Declan!
PPS - Mulley on crisps and chocolate makes me want to undo my good curves work. Damn it. It’s so true. Hits the spot.

(Soccer themed, see. Deutschland über alles, ja.)

However, highlights included:

1. Getting high on Dulux as the office is being painted
2. Having a 15-minute debate about what biscuits are most win
3. The dog turd I’ve avoided on the canal bridge on the walk to work for the past fortnight is gone (avoidance win is mine)
4. Realising, before anyone else, that the painter was whistling Paula Abdul ‘Straight Up’ at 3.04pm
5. My mother saying at lunch, “You’re not as wrecked as I expected you to be, with work and study and your life being so tough at the minute”

Tomorrow is Friday, it means I can have two days off… TO STUDY! Yipee. Dontcha…

PS - Curves, or ’saggy camp’ as it’s known as in Tressdale, is going fandabby, not fatdabby.

PPS - Is it just me or are those Zurich ‘nickname’ ads ridiculously annoying?! Yes, I do mean you, Jason McAteer. Yes I am starting.

PPPS - Reilly, welcome back

PPPPS - Scally is housemate of the week, having supplied epic widescreen win of a Sanyo.

Brennan has just delivered the whole “You wouldn’t leave me alone at the side of the road, so why are you leaving me alone on the information superhighway?” so here I am, filling in the blanks in a quite absent online presence over the last while - well, except for my Twitter, but that’s just handy because a lot of my work has involved web inboxes and the like. So I’ve been online, but while working. If that makes sense.

That’s a rambling paragraph so allow me to start again!

Like the Brendawg I’m finished in UCD now, as although my time in the Students’ Union doesn’t end until next Monday, I’m currently on two weeks’ annual leave with time that I’d worked up taking so few breaks during the year. I’m starting with the Affordable Homes Partnership next Monday so I’ve spent last week and the last two days just hanging around at home, doing a few bits that needed time out of the office to finish.

The thing occupying the bulk of my time - and something I’m not sure if I’m at liberty to speak too much about still - is to do with an events guide-style website for UCD. Towards the end of our tenures in UCD, myself and Ciara went to meet some senior people in the UCD admin about a rejuvenated attempt to get an events website off the ground; something UCD themselves had tried to do previously (see www.ucdevents.com for a real-life reference of crapness) and failed quite a lot in doing. The project involves rejuvenation (if not complete replacement altogether) of the website so that it can handle an awful lot more events, as well as daily email alerts with the day’s activities and (hopefully) with the ability to send text reminders before events. It’s just in incubation right now and my role - if any - is yet to have been confirmed - but things are being discussed so I’m hopeful of a successful service coming of our efforts. I finally got my 3,000-word proposal on the matter finished and shipped off to the University authorities yesterday and feedback seems to be quite positive, so hopefully once things are a little more confirmed I might post the actual submission up here for public perusal.

It’s something that we’ve been trying a couple of times this year to get going - Ciara had promised the re-introduction of the What’s On Guide at the start of the year only for the University to take command of the idea and then scrap it - so it’s nice to think that stuff can still be achieved in the lamest part of ones time as a lame duck in office.

What else? Well, yesterday I was on MSN (having sent the proposal) when I got a message from Steph, incoming SU Postgraduate Officer and who’s working with me in AHP, having started a few weeks ago. She was asking if I was free today, because AHP were launching a new consumer website showcasing all of the affordable homes they had in stock, www.affordablehome.ie. They needed a few people to go to a photocall with the Minister for Housing, Michael Finneran, demonstrating the site, and possibly a “young couple” (read ‘unwilling interns’) to look like they were decorating a new pad bought under the scheme.

Well, there are no words really… pictures speak louder…

There’s a fair chance I might be on the Herald AM, Metro, Irish Independent and Evening Herald tomorrow, especially with all this talk of recession and the property crash.

So help me God, I think I might be crawling back under my cyber-rock for a while yet.

I know, I’ve been off the face of the earth for aaaaaaaages. Apologies. However I’m not as bad as Herr Reilly who is… wait, who is he again? If I know our site viewers, and I don’t want to, you lot are a smart bunch and have noted his absence from this opus… I’ve moved from being a co-blogertee to being on my Tobler in cyberspace. Reilly has been lost to the seductive duo of the Affordable Homes Partnership and the UCD communications department, both of whom he is trying to drag kicking and screaming into the 21st century technological age (I fell victim to him this way too, what can I say, he’s Firefoxy).

Frequent visitors to my Bebo / Bookface / Twitter / home are more than well acquainted with my ways of going all Bermuda triangle on your face due to study/work/family commitments. So get used to it, dear readers. I disappear, but I return wiser, fulfilled and laden with ridiculous photos and stories. I’m like the godmother who forgets about you till your communion/confirmation, when she arrives in with a Hallmark card stuffed with fifties.

Study is steady, but I’ve been a little tied up with crossover training with next year’s officers in the Union in the evenings. It’s been going well, all have got a good command of what to expect… the unexpected. I was less emotional leaving the office than I thought I would be, but I know I’ll be in and around the office next year and never too far away from next year’s lot. Luck would be a fine thing!

Started work in Croker this week too. It was ridiculously busy from the start, a honeymoon period I had not! Prince refunds took most of the week, but I’ve also started on that feasibility report I was yakking on about, so I will keep you updated!

Other olds (too outdated to be called news!) include the following: USI HQ (and Reilly’s website!) was officially opened during the week, and cheap wine and sambos were had by all. I got a new phone, Nokia E65 (the BlackBerry is just a reminder of being mugged. Twice). Neil Diamond came and went and the parentals enjoyed it a lot. See an interesting Flash Box on my Bebo!

Hmmm. I just got a text from a younger Brennan type telling me ‘OMG next Irish My Super Sweet 16 is being filmed tonight… in Kilkenny. LOL’ Expect a K4 Bebo-generation orgy of excess… on the same night as Dolly P reaches das Hurlingkapital. ‘Tis a classy place to be sure… loike, totally, Jolene.

I’ll be back anon with more funs.

PS - She has a heart! Lauren Conrad Darfur video:

PPS - Just realised I’m an excuse for a female blogger. I did NOT REVIEW SATC.

News! That’s me, and now Reilly, with respective McJobs secured to tie us over financially till academia takes over yet again. I’ll be in Croker for the Summer, spearheading a new Stadium initiative in the Premium section, and Herr Reilly will be putting his A&E brief from this year to good use, with an internship in the Affordable Homes Partnership. Both will be pretty challenging, but I guess if we can finish this year unscathed (-ish, my patience is a little frayed at this stage…) we’ll manage anything! It seems we’re the reason there are term limits, we’d stay here forever if we could. UCD days are now less common, we’re venturing out of our little cocoon slowly but surely, and my integration back into the real world outside of Belfield is going swimmingly.

Plans afoot include a cheese-tastic weekend of Westlife and Celine (don’t judge me, freebies would have you there too!), a quick jaunt home to KK for the Cat Laughs and finally, the Mini Marathon for me on Monday. My training has been intense; I get up, I walk from the fridge to the couch to get my own food, the remote is not being used, and it’s been almost 6 weeks since we were in E&C for chicken wings. I meant business when I signed up for this baby.

I have, however, joined Curves in Donnybrook, the noughties equivalent of aerobics, and survived a whole class of it this morning! I was a tad out of the social loop however, unlike the yummiest of the mummies present, I don’t own a weekend home in Wexford or have a little dorling doing the big LC. That said, I really enjoyed it, the atmosphere is very hairdressers (”Are ya goin’ anywhere nice on your holidays, love?”) meets Weight Watchers (”Jesus fuck-me Christ, that chocolate cake last night was, loike, a thousand points”), but it’s quick and simple and suits my life at the minute. I’ll keep you updated on my progress! Laugh as you might (you know who you are, certain male friends of mine) at the thoughts of me being in such a scene, but damn it, I want to be able to run up the stairs and not have a coronary!

As if that wasn’t enough Y chromosome action for me today, I’m also heading to see SATC later in Fundrum! Wickedly excited, I shall report back with a review, but not the plot, fear not!

PS - Beautiful little nugget of a news story here …spot on. JHR has been known to fill them in South Kerry himself! Great man for the first preferences!