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Category: Luke

English and their Weather

Published by Luke on August 13, 2009

If you plan on sharing a conversation with anyone in England, you better be prepared to discuss the weather. Without fail, it will be the second thing talked about regardless of the encounter you find yourself in. For example:

“You alright?” (Equivalent to ‘how are you doing’ often said without the ‘You’.)

“Ya, excellent|lovely|not bad.” (excellent is heavily used here and on par with ‘like’)

“So how ’bout that weather?|What crap weather.|Beautiful day we are having.|Absolutely pissing down.|…” (many more but all roughly the same)

The other person will usually take a long hard look into the sky, and then agree with the given conclusion.

Last night, apparently there was one of the most visible meteor showers of the year in the northern hemisphere. I was meandering down a very dark lane blasting my iPod to “The great gig in the sky” and gazing upwards into the lightly misting rain wishing the cloud cover would move. It got me thinking…

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Things I Remember From the Dorms

Published by Luke on August 7, 2009

Moving to University and staying in the dorms will be a requirement for my child(ren). Take a developing teenager and remove their parents and support lines and stick them in an over crowded arena full of other people in the same situation. At eighteen, the dorms had a strong influence on the development of my character that you may know today! I thought I would go through some of the memories that I remember from the dorms so you can have a little insight as to how I became who I am.

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The Palio in Siena Italy

Published by Luke on August 4, 2009

My usual method of planning a trip is to make absolutely no reservations and simply pick a few things that I must do while I am in the area that I am going to. For my European two month train journey with a rag tag bunch of friends, this list included; visit Rikard in Sweden, start in England, run with the bulls, try and goto the olympics in Greece, stay with friends in X, Y, and Z. This is always a loose list and liable to change. A last minute addition to this list came from a long lost friend from high school who randomly got a hold of me and suggested I visit her in Siena Italy and if possible, arrive on these specific dates to watch the Palio. I had no idea what the Palio was, but it was a welcome respite to stay with someone after being in hostels for ages so in a very warm August, we arrived in Siena.

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Osteonecrosis or Avascular Necrosis (AVN)

Published by Luke on July 16, 2009

From about age 6 I had always been playing football (soccer). It dominated my life for the next 15 years or so and I was quite happy to allow that. My time on the field started to wane when I began traveling the nation for my ex employer IBM. Six days a week on the road is not conducive to exercise or organized sports and as a result I gained quite a few kilos. I think I weighted over 90 kilos at one point. (multiply by 2.2 for your inferior “standard” weights system) I decided this was not acceptable and decided to join my friends in triathlons to get back into shape. It was at this time (two years ago now) that I found out that I had to give up football for the rest of my years as those trixsy doctors diagnosed me with osteonecrosis which translates to BONE DEATH!

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Dreams of Frustration and Combat

Published by Luke on July 13, 2009

Last night as I lay in my aunt’s house in Norway, I had two very memorable dreams. The first one I believe to be easy to decipher and the second one is not so easy but seems to be following a recurring theme I am having in many of my dreams. I will try to briefly describe the dream and then give my analysis which I have been avoiding in some of the last dream blogs.

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The go to Joke

Published by Luke on July 7, 2009

I love jokes but truth be told, I do not know all that many. I wish I knew seventy six jokes that I could rattle off at any given moment and all were equally hysterical and forced heads to turn within fifty yards and quarters to be thrown my way. But alas, this power I do not hold. However I do love story telling. With some wiley hand gestures, well timed connotation, and creative diction, you can hold a crowd riveted for ages. I try to make use of this as much as possible in my life, and as many people might be quick to point out, many times I do not really even have a point to what I am saying. I just keep talking to keep the listeners distracted while I am thinking ahead to figure a way out of the conversational conundrum I get myself into frequently. Well my favorite joke is a story which I will tell here. Depending on the situation, the language, the people, it can always be different but that is why I love it so much. A similar premis to the all too infamous Aristocrats joke as made famous by many a comedian. I call my joke “A walk on a beach…”

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The Perfect Day

Published by Luke on July 2, 2009

I used to read nonfiction books exclusively with the belief that they could teach me about the real world and I completely dismissed the idea of fiction being a legit means of self education. While Pat was visiting me in Argentina, I was whining to him about this literary situation I had found myself in so he left a few books for me, one of which I enjoyed immensely. Titled “Nine Short Stories” by J.D. Salinger, the same guy who wrote Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory among other things. I read it all in a day as I was perched precariously on a rock ledge over-looking a serene lake in the Argentinian Andes. It gave me a new appreciation for story-telling and I decided to try a story of my own. Here goes… The Perfect Day.

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