In this one I head to the Frozen North

Hello my lovely aardvarks,

Her snifter is more powerful than the force

It has been a while, has it not? Well, turns out my travel season began a bit late this year. In fact, I went to lake Placid just two weeks ago. However, other than this furry little beast very little was different. So I might delve into that in some later posts.

Yes, I said later. I also said I might. And as you all know, I am a lovely handsome blogger who keeps my word... sometimes.

But, my lovely Baobabs, why this missive? Well it turns out, I am on a road trip. This road trip, I will be covering close to 2000 kms over three days along with my lovely girlfriend and the fuzzy one pictured on the right.

Things I discover, I am sure are of value not only to you, but also to the generations that have not yet come to pass. I have put them in a list as I have to dumb it down for that one reader of mine. You know who you are. Yes... you.... stop looking around.

• There is no permafrost north of Toronto. I know, I know. It's hard to believe that 1 hour outside of Toronto is not covered with a layer of snow, older than... me, I suppose. 
• A pack of wolves did not randomly attack me when I stopped to take a "comfort break". I have been watching a lot of cycling, and when they pee, they call it a comfort break. I am on occasion known to ride a bike, and dress in tight spandex. Sometimes, I do the two activities together. Therefore, I see no reason to not adopt this vernacular. But back to the topic, no wolf attacks. This made me particularly happy, as I was advised that since bears eat wolves, I would not be attacked by bears either. Of course, the more I thought about the sillier it sounded. I mean if there were no wolves, the bears would be super hungry and might consider eating handsome, bald bloggers.  
• My dog is awesome. Enough said about that. This might not help the later generations as much. Unless you can clone my dog, in which case, can you clone me as well? I would like to play with my dog again. Thanks. 
• The quality of coffee is directly proportional to how far I am away from the centre of the city. 
• Spiders. Why are there spiders? 
• Rain is apocalyptic up north. I mean just look at this.  

I think that is all I have for you little munchkins for this evening. But stay tuned as I head over to meet my girlfriend's parents for the first time. This travel blog should take an interesting turn then. 

yours in warm custard, 

@damookman.

In this one I become a vegetarian

Let's talk about bovines. So what do we know about them? Yes, you in the front seat.
John Diefenbaker: They are large.
Correct. What else? Yes, you with the pony tails.
Lenny Kravitz: They give milk. Oh, and they have horns.

Ok, clearly I am working with insanely astute crowd. Why can you guys not be like my blog readers? They are smart, polite and ever so good looking. Anyways, bovines are large four legged creatures. Renowned for their abilities to congregate in large "herds", they are good sources of milk, meat and jackets/shoes. What people neglected to inform me prior to Ireland was that Cows do not voluntarily go to an abattoir and the meat is not surgically removed from them allowing them to continue a frolic-filled existence. Damn you people, why did you not support my delusions?

The first problem arose when I crossed the borders into the emerald isles. I discovered that the emeraldyness stopped when faced with the local cuisine. The food became predominantly meat oriented. This in itself never poses a great challenge for one so awesome as I, however, Enniskillen, where we stayed on a road called Killyvilly killed my desire for meat, forever.

Let me talk a bit about Enniskillen. Nestled in the heart of county Fermanagh, lies this depressing little burg. I have travelled to a fair number of places in this world. I adored the chaos of Delhi, I loved the "primal" nature of Algonquin Park, the gorgeousness of the Adirondacks, the swell of humanity in London. All those places had their downsides be it pooping in the dark imagining a bear around each shadow to mosquitoes (looking at you here, St. Lucia), from getting stranded due to trains being late, to a city grinding to a complete halt due to snow. But each and every occassion I have loved these places. In general, I have loved every place I have been to. I have memories stemming from each one, that are pleasurable and despite certain hardships, just bloody fantanstic.

Really? Is this the best Acronym you could come up with. 

Enniskillen, has no saving grace. None. I am sorry. No wait, the people were nice. I do like the people there. But take away the niceness of the people, you are left with nothing. The town has a feel of decay hanging over it, and is not helped by signs like this.

So we find ourselves, MT and I that is, in county Fermanagh, hungry as hell at around 6 in the evening. Venturing out in the wild of Enniskillen we find ourselves confronted with closed stores. Subway- closed, food stores- closed, ASDA - closed, the only places open, were a fish and chip store, a seedy pizza store, and a massive chinese buffet. It is here, that something snapped inside my head. I could not eat meat anymore. Every jiggling piece of flesh that was served in front of me, made me want to gag.

So here I sit, in a cafe in downtown Toronto, I can still say, I am now cured of meatatarianism with momentary relapses. It has been a long three weeks. Stupid, Killyvilly. I liked my beef burgers.

In this one I liveblog Northern Ireland

Oh hello,

I didn't see you there. As you lovely sinners all know, the Republic of Ireland is near and close to my heart. This is in part due to the fact that I am in it, but also due to the fact that Northern Ireland turned out to be a massive let down. Please join me as I and my faithful sidekick MT  as we tour around Northern Ireland. In italics are the accurate descriptions of the locations provided to us by the trusty guide "The AA best drives of Ireland" and our experiences which were recorded by my photographic memory. In this case the use of the word guide is about as reliable as my memory. That should not bode well for anyone. 

In this one I crack the code of ancient Irish

Sometimes, I shock myself. As the smarter of you lot might have figured out, I am in Ireland. The Emerald Isles are truly a gorgeous place. The vistas are truly awe-inspiring and, hell, the cliffs of Moher are alone worth a post. I am not going to write the post, because, well, I am lazy but I stand by my initial assessment that the place is phenomenal.

But since I can bitch about anything, I had a few questions to the ancient Irish. Why? Why did you put stone walls EVERYWHERE? I do not mean here and there. I mean everywhere. I mean look at Inishmaan on the Aran Islands. (Photo courtesy of Chris Hill at Pixdaus)

You see those lines, they are all walls. The entire island is full of them. Why? I was perplexed my little toucans. And then I put my 984 years worth of brain cells to work. With the processing power far exceeding the earliest computers, my brain told me "Mate, why do jersey cows look like that?" I promptly discarded it's answer as useless and turned my keen eye towards the country side. More walls, but hidden here and there were ruined keeps and castles. Abandoned towers and look out points (all made with more rocks) festooned the landscape. And then it hit me.

The ancient Irish, were great builders. Certainly the predecessors to Ikea, given their skill at assembling said buildings with rock and nothing but a rock (save a pickaxe which can be likened to an ancient allen key) they built these buildings and walls everywhere. The problem was that no one told them about the good spots to put said walls and buildings. I like to think of the ancient Irish as a band of enthusiastic nomadic DIYers going from village to village constructing castles and keeps. To thank people for food, or to warn other tribes of nomadic DIYers from entering villages or even specific houses they built these walls. These facts seem to fit my observation. Consequently, any further research in to this subject is pointless and not required.

As I said, sometimes I shock myself.... WITH BRILLIANCE.

Stay tuned as I live-blog MT and my experiences with sight seeing in Ireland.

In this one I steal ideas to start my own members exclusive club

My little Orcs and Goblins,

It is a well known fact that I am classy and stylish in every sense of the word. Why, once, I went undercover to study the homelessness situation in the Nomads of the Saharan deserts and even there, I was voted as the best dressed person. Granted, I was the only person who was dressed in a full tuxedo, but that is beside the point.

In this one I liveblog a cricket match from Lords

Starring in this live blog is Mr. KB and your lovely brown blogger. Come join us as we take you on an adventure through the mecca of cricket, Lords Cricket Ground.

These events are largely based upon factual events. (Sort of)

In this one I rock it in W8

Hello my lovely peasants,

As I type this, I am sitting in a lovely living room on top of a mansion block (also known as a penthouse, dah-ling) in the prestigious Kensington neighborhood of London. As my impoverished fans know that I am a down-to earth-person, who has his feet rooted to reality, so really this kind of top upmarket neighborhood does not really swell my head too much.

Now where is that goddamn butler with my badger infused macchiato that can only be served in a gold plated skull. Ugh, serfs.

So my little plebs, you might ask, how was your day, you handsome yet humble blogger? Well, children, day one in London was spent going to Brunch and then watching cricket. Brunch is an interesting experience in the motherland. In Toronto, where a certain handsome bald blogger lives, Brunch is a yuppie, fun experience to catch up with friends. However, Brunch in London is more of an upmarket dining experience. I had something called Prawn Omelette, with coriander, green chillies and Sambal sauce. Yea, kind of makes my badger infused macchiato sound normal now, huh?

KB just pointed out that my Badger infused macchiato joke is not funny. I took this to mean that the Butler could not prepare it, and consequently told him that he was fired. Bloody peasants.

Tomorrow, we actually go to Lords and hope to have cucumber sandwiches served to us on silver plated gold platters.

Toodles,

@damookman