Just before I start, this blog has an RSS feed. This means that if you click the little rss icon that’s somewhere on the page (probably the address bar at the top) you can bookmark my blog and see if theres new posts, instead of having to visit the site to check. Not that I don’t want you to visit my site!

Visitors

I was having a look actually at the visitors to this site. Mostly from the UK as I would expect but a few more international people, from the likes of Finland, Turkey, Germany (quite a few Germans actually), the US and Canada. By all means, leave a comment and say hello!

Good News

Last week was a great week as expected. My hard work finally paid off as our group won the design competition for the Two Minds project so we have a meeting later this week with the project manager. I’m nearly sick of looking at the site, but most of the hard work is done, so all that’s left is to fill in some content. Between the three of us it should only take a few hours.

Last Week’s Gigs

As I said before, last week I went to see both Third Day and The Answer. I enjoyed the Third Day gig quite a lot, good old Brian Houston supporting. A bit disappointed that Third Day didn’t change their set too much from last time, I’m getting a bit tired of the same stuff over and over again. I was listening to some of their B-sides the other day and got rather frustrated that some of their songs are brilliant and soulful but it’s the more generic hits they produce that seem to get the most attention. Good show all in all though, and Connor passed on a copy of Make it Whole to drummer David Carr. Nice.

The Answer on the other hand were flawless. I invited my friend Stuart and his German housemate Martin along. Support came in the form of Winnebago Deal, a sort of thrashy two-piece that really didn’t hold my attention for anything more than the first drum intro. Then on came the Answer…

This band continues to amaze me. I think this was possibly my 5th time seeing them and my socks were unquestionably rocked off! This is a band that loves what they do and it’s always special to see them in Belfast. They’ve been around Europe and Japan the last few months but they saved their energy for the Belfast show. The place was packed, hundreds of us there were! The guitar work continues to put me to shame, I haven’t seen such wizardry since Gary Moore several years ago!

Totally different style to Third Day, but nonetheless a far superior show.

Leaving Party

So I finally got my DS-2019 form through the post which means that my application for an American Visa is complete. All I have to do now is pass the US Embassy’s ridiculous interview. From what I’ve been told a typical interview lasts 3 minutes and consists of:

“Are you planning a terror attack on America?”….
“Are you intending to illegally stay in America when your Visa expires?”

US Consolate Interview

All I have to remember is to answer ‘no’ to both these questions. Oh, and fill out their pointless 15-page pre-interview form. It’s a total hassle to get to the place, and expensive too.

The wonderful Ritchie family had me over at their house last night for a small leaving party. The rest of the band were there, and for a change I brought the parents along. The food was great, and the craic was mighty. And to top it all, they bought me a 30Gb iPod
as a going-away pressie. Man, I’m really gonna miss this place…