There’s something intrinsically depressing about British trains, I think. From the second you step on them you’re predestined for a gladiatorial territory dispute for a seat (frustration level adjusted based on whether you’ve paid for one in advance or not), and if/once your temporary empire is established, there’s always the lurking question as to whether you’re ever going to get to where you want to. Admittedly the answer is customarily “yes” – the variety comes in the number and pedigree of excuses you hear along the way.
Presumably this makes German …

Having just arrived back from my holiday, it seems only fair that I now write about my previous holiday.  After all, without this sort of carry on how am I ever to make it appear as if I do nothing other than ambling about the place having fun, eh?
Just before Christmas, thanks to K’s brilliant idea I had a chance to tick something off my non-tangible but sporadically visualised “always wanted to” list – namely, an unstructured backpacking tour around Europe.  Granted, we didn’t go particularly far, and we departed …

That’s hot.

Still on the search for palatable chocolate milk (raised as I was on the highly excellent Farmers’ Union Classic Chocolate, nothing on this side of the world has proven a viable substitute). In the Swedish supermarket I spotted this moderately amusingly named variety, and decided it was Sweden’s turn in the Humpyvision Milk Contest.
Quite nice actually. Certainly not as powdery as some of the ones in Europe, and unlike all the UK ones I’ve tried so far this actually tastes like milk is one of its ingredients.

Here we are, set up at our excellet apartment in Åre. So far we’ve done a fair portion of remarking about how cold it is (-16 C), had an excellent dinner (Thai chicken curry – thanks johan & yoyo), and marveled at the diagrammatic accuracy on Swedish milk cartons. Snowboarding tomorrow! Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeee!

Now, why would anyone in their right mind go to Scandinavia for a “lads’ weekend”?  When any occasion is prefixed with “lads’”, it is transformed into a vision of a scabby darkened room where a bunch of boisterous blokes pissed on whatever third-rate warm swill that happens to be for sale in that darkened room leer at a series of women who gyrate implausibly and disinterestedly disrobe on an elevated surface, and try to relieve the blokes of as much of the local currency as they can in exchange for …

It’s a shame that “British Rail Companies” isn’t an anagram of “Architects of misery”, as that would be poetic and justified.

On our recent trip to Las Vegas I was lucky enough to insinuate myself onto a guided tour of a fascinating and overlooked piece of Sin City’s heritage, the Neon Boneyard.  It was an extremely near-miss, owing to my propensity to not really know what day or time it was, but luckily just that week they’d moved from doing 1 tour a day to 2, and was able to overcome the fact that I’d incorrectly written down the time I was actually booked in for.  I first read about the …

This could be interesting. Am en route to Dublin for work today – I love an early flight. The first part of the plan came off ok: the waking up at 6:30 bit. Getting to Victoria station was straightforward. Getting the quarter-hourly Gatwick Express? Am not sure whether it’s Sod’s Law, or comeuppance for my failure to check the website to ensure that the quarter-hourly service which you pay a premium for is in fact running every 15 minutes.
It’s all ok though – they’ve apologised for the late running.
This ought …

Aside from waxing enthusiastic about the size of our hotel room, I don’t suppose I said much about our trip to Vegas, did I?
Funny old place, Las Vegas – used to be a nice grassy place due to its nearby underground water sources, and quite a well-positioned cattle ranch as a result of it. Without resorting to Wikipedia I couldn’t tell you what changed, but over time it got more popular, then some weisenheimer decided to legalise gambling, and presto – tons of casinos were dropped on the spot …