I was only three when we first met and yet I remember it. I recall unwrapping this huge birthday present with that pure, breath-taking excitement you only experience as a kid. I remember the amazement, the joy I felt when I realized what was in it: the biggest teddy bear I had ever seen.

It was love at first sight.

He looked just like a real brown bear, I guess that’s why I liked him straight away. He didn’t wear any clothing, nor that fake smile teddy bears often wear. He was just big, brown, soft and cuddly – exactly how I pictured a real brown bear ought to be. As a matter of fact, how I still picture brown bears to be.

We became inseparable. He was my best friend, in that special way Hobbes is Calvin’s best friend. We shared adventures, we shared laughs, we shared tears. We shared a big chunk of life.

And with Romeo, my innate passion for bears grew bigger. I don’t know why I have this thing about bears – I just have. I’ve always had. During elementary school, half the stories I was inventing for my compositions were about me befriending a bear and having some great adventures together in the forest. Few decades later, every time I stumble upon a documentary about bears I end up watching it.

I’ve always wanted to see a bear up close, in the wild. Winning this volunteering trip to help rescued bears in Romania would give me the perfect opportunity. Not only would I get the chance to learn more about bears, take some cool photographs and write about it all – I could actually do something concrete to help these bears while I do.

A child dream come true, with cherry on top.
Wait I tell Romeo about it.

Note:
This post is my entry to win a volunteering trip to work with rescued brown bears in Romania. Wish me luck! :)

Ok, I might have watched Harry Potter one too many times, but I can’t help it: baking really does connect me with my inner child. It’s fun and, plus, I get to stick my finger into the mixture.

Desserts are something I’d like to get better at, that is why I decided to celebrate week 10 of my Cook a New, Never-Made-Before Dish Per Week Project by making moelleux au chocolat.

They didn’t look quite as pretty as they do on magazines and cookbooks, but the smell was enticing and when my lips met the soft and thick dark chocolate molten heart… I forgot just about anything.

They’re not that complicated to make, so why not trying?
Here is the recipe, as published on Jamie Oliver’s Recipe Yearbook 2011/2012.

Moelleux au Chocolat

Prep time 15-20 mins, cook 10 mins. Serves 6.

Ingredients:

• 50g unsalted butter at room temperature, plus extra for greasing
• 350g dark (70% cocoa) chocolate, broken into pieces
• 150g sugar
• 4 large eggs
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• A pinch of salt
• 50g flour

Method:

1. Preheat the oven to 200° (gas 6). Put a baking sheet in the hoven to heat. Butter 6 ramekins (or 160ml dariole moulds) and line the bases with greaseproof paper.
2. Melt the chocolate over a bain marie, or bowl over simmering water, then take off the heat and let cool slightly.
3. Cream the butter and sugar together until pale and slightly fluffy. Beat in the eggs, one at a time. Add the vanilla and a pinch of salt. Stir in the flour until just combined, then gently mix in the melted chocolate. The mixture should thicken. Divide between moulds and bake on the preheated baking sheet for 10 minutes. Turn out and serve.

Enjoy (sensibly)!

Last Friday, though, I was feeling like something a little lighter (and I was still looking for a new dish to cook for my Cook a New, Never-Made-Before Dish Per Week Project), so I decided to give Vegeterian Carbonara a try. I had all the ingredients, it was easy to make and it tasted surprisingly good (considering the lack of bacon). Here is the recipe as I found it – once again – on Jamie Oliver’s Recipe Yearbook 2011/2012.

Courgette Carbonara

Prep time 10 mins, cook 15-20 mins. Serves 2.

Ingredients:

• 2 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
• 1 garlic clove, chopped
• 1 onion, finely diced
• A small bunch of thyme, leaves picked
• 4 baby courgettes, thinly sliced
• 2 eggs
• 200g linguine
• 80g grated vegeterian hard cheese

Method:

1. Heat the olive oil in a pan and sauté the onion, garlic and thyme for a few minutes until softened. Add the courgettes, season well and cook gently for a few more minutes until tender.
2. Meanwhile, cook the linguine in salted boiling water according to packet instructions. When al dente, drain, reserving some of the cooking water.
3. At the same time, beat the eggs with a handful of cheese and a little pepper. When ready, add the linguine to the courgettes, then pour in the egg mixture, plus a little of the reserved cooking water. Mix until the eggs are just cooked. Serve immediately, topped with the remaining cheese.

Since my idiosyncrasy to cheese, my version was of course – as you can see from the picture above – completely cheeseless. I also did put very little thyme, but even so the dish was very tasty. Classic carbonara still remains my favourite but I’ll definitely make this one again.

Please note – Whether classic or vegetarian, DO. NOT. PUT. CREAM. IN. CARBONARA. Ever.
Thank you.

Cleaning mussels – especially if you’ve got about 2 kilos of ‘em – is no fun, but the soup was so good that it made it all worth it. Here is how you make it.

Mussel Soup

Prep time 45 mins, cook 25 mins. Serves 4.

Ingredients:

• extra-vergin olive oil
• 1 large onion, sliced
• 2 tbsp chopped parsley
• 3 garlic cloves, chopped
• 100ml white wine, plus a splash extra
• 200g chopped tinned tomatoes
• 1kg mussels, debearded and scrubbed
• Juice of ½ lemon
• Croutons

Method:

1. Gently fry the onion and parsley in a pan for 5 minutes until soft. Add the garlic and cook until starting to colour. Add the wine and cook for 7 minutes until reduced by half. Add the tomatoes and 200ml water, season and cook for 10 minutes.
2. Meanwhile, place the debearded and scrubbed mussels and the extra splash of wine in a large pan over a medium-high heat. Cover with a lid and cook for 5 minutes, until they’re all open. Allow to cool, then take mussels out of their shells and stir into the soup.
3. Let it simmer for a few more minutes, add the lemon juice (I didn’t…) and serve with croutons.

Buon appetito!

Guacamole

Prep time 10/15 mins. Serves 4.

Ingredients:

• 1 ripe tomato
• 2 limes
• 2-3 small/medium (or 1-2 big) ripe avocados
• ¼-½ onion, finely chopped
• 1 pinch of ground cumin
• 1 pinch of sweet chilly powder
• ½-1 fresh green chilly pepper (jalapeño or serrano), deseeded and finely chopped
• 1 spoon of fresh coriander leaves, finely chopped
• tortilla chips to serve

Method:

1. Peel the tomato. To easily remove the skin, put it in boiling hot water for roughly 30 seconds, then refresh under running cold water. Cut the tomato in a half, remove its seeds and chop finely.
2. Squeeze the juice of the two limes into a bowl.
3. Cut the avocado in a half, remove the stone. Peel the avocado and dice its pulp. Transfer to the bowl with the lime juice, to avoid darkening. Repeat with the remaining avocados, then crush everything with a fork.
4. Add the other ingredients: tomato, onion, cumin, chilly peppers and fresh coriander. If served with tortilla chips, do not add salt. If used as a sauce, add salt to taste.
5. To serve as dip, transfer to a serving dish, garnish with finely chopped fresh coriander and serve with tortilla chips.

Buon appetito!

As my very first attempt at making guacamole I was very pleased with the result, I’ll definitely make it again. If you happen to know a different/better recipe, please let me know.

Mushroom & Saffron Risotto

Prep time 10 mins, cook 30 mins. Serves 4.

Ingredients:

• 2 shallots, finely chopped
• 40g butter
• 400g fresh mushrooms, sliced
• 350g Carnaroli or Vialone nano rice
• ½ glass of white wine
• 1 litre chicken stock
• Saffron
• 1 bunch of parsley
• Salt & pepper
• 50g Parmesan cheese, grated

Method:

1. Bring stock to the simmer over medium-high heat, reduce heat to low, keep warm.
2. Meanwhile, gently fry the shallots in a saucepan with half the butter. Add in the mushrooms e let them brown for a few minutes. Then add the rice and let it toast for a couple of minutes while keeping stirred with a wooden spoon.
3. Add wine and stir occasionally until almost evaporated (2-3 mins). Add stock to risotto a ladleful at a time, stirring continuously until stock is absorbed before adding more. In the last five minutes of cooking, mix in the saffron.
4. Cook until rice is al dente, then remove from heat and mix in the remaining butter and grated Parmesan cheese. Let it stand for 2 minutes. Before serving, season to taste with pepper and parsley.

Buon appetito!

Altough less known than its internationally famous cousins (mushroom risotto and saffron risotto), I have to say this risotto is also very good – the two flavours go pretty well together.

This time I went back to Jamie Oliver and his Recipe Yearbook 2011/12, which once again – as it did with the Broccoli & Sweet Potato Soup and the Chickpea, Rosemary & Pancetta Soup – didn’t disappoint me. Here is the recipe, enjoy.

Spring Pie

Prep time 15 mins, cook 30-40 mins. Serves 6.

Ingredients:

• 270g filo pastry
• 200g baby spinach
• 3 medium leeks, sliced
• ½ bunch of chives, finely chopped
• 6 streaky bacon rashers
• 6 eggs
• 200ml milk
• 1 tbs mustard powder
• Grated zest of 1 lemon
• Extra-virgin olive oil
• Salt & pepper

Method:

1. Preheat the hoven to 180° and grease a 20cm x 30cm baking dish with olive oil. Cover with a layer of pastry, letting the edges overhang slightly. Brush with a little olive oil then add another layer of pastry, repeating until you have used it all (there should be 3 or 4 layers).
2. Boil some water. Then place the spinach in a colander and pour over the hot water to wilt it (you may have to do this in 2 batches). Push the spinach down with the back of a spoon to drain. When cool enough to handle, squeeze out any excess water with your hands. Transfer the spinach to a board and roughly chop, then place in a large bowl and set aside.
3. Grill the bacon until crisp, then set aside to cool.
4. Whisk the eggs in a large bowl with a pinch of salt and pepper. Whisk in the milk and mustard powder and snip in the chives, then grate in the lemon zest.
5. Crumble the cooled bacon into the bowl of spinach, then add the sliced leeks. Mix well to combine, then scatter the vegetable mixture over the pastry case. Pour the egg mixture evenly over the vegetables and carefully place the dish on the bottom of the hoven. Bake for 30-40 minutes, or until the pie is just set. Leave the pie to cool in the baking dish for 20 minutes before slicing. Serve warm.

Buon appetito!

This pie is very tasty – just writing this article made me want to make it again :)

After a couple of very nice soups and my personal attempt at Nonna’s famous cuttlefish with peas and potatoes, for week four I opted for a recipe that got me intrigued: seafood baked rice. My curiosity was mainly due to the fact that – whilst risotto has long been one of my specialties – I had never cooked (nor, as a matter of fact, tasted) baked rice before. It was worth trying.

Here is the recipe, as I took it from the cook book. I’ve also included some personal tips at the bottom.

Seafood Baked Rice

Prep time 30 mins, cook 40 mins. Serves 4.

Ingredients:

• 300g Arborio rice
• 1.5kg mussels, debearded and scrubbed
• 300g courgettes, sliced
• 400g tomato sauce
• 1 white onion, finely chopped
• 1 garlic clove, halved
• 150ml white wine
• 30g bread crumbs
• extra-vergin olive oil
• salt & pepper

Method:

1. Put the debearded and scrubbed mussels, the halved garlic and the white wine in a large pan. Cover with a lid and cook on high heat until mussels open. When cool enough to handle, remove each mussel from its shell and set aside. Bin any unopened mussels.
2. Heat the olive oil in a large pan and gently cook the onion for 5-7 minutes, until softened. Add the courgettes and cook for 2-3 minutes. Add the tomato sauce and season with salt and pepper to taste. Simmer for about 15 minutes.
3. In the meantime, boil the rice in plenty of water, with a pinch of salt. When still al dente, drain the rice, transfer it into a bowl and dress it with two tbsp of extra vergin olive oil.
4. Preheat the oven to 180°. Grease a baking dish with olive oil and scatter with bread crumbs. Add different layers of rice, sauce and mussels, finishing with a layer of sauce and mussels. Scatter with the remaining bread crumbs and drizzle with olive oil.
5. Cover the baking dish with a tin foil and cook in the preheated oven for 15 minutes. Remove the foil, bring the oven to 220° and keep cooking for other 10 minutes, to form a crispy crust. Let it cool for a moment, then serve.

I’d say the dish turned out well – amazing smell, very delicate flavour. Although, as a whole, I think it lacked a bit of character and, maybe, a bit of balance between the ingredients. If I happened to cook this dish again, I’d probably make the following small adjustments.

Tips

1. In step 1, filter the mussels’ cooking liquid with a cooking gauze and set aside. Then add it to the boiling water when cooking the rice (step 3).
2. In step 2, when gently frying the onion, add one or two chilly peppers (trimmed and deseeded). Also, to better bind the different ingredients together, add ¾ of the mussels to the sauce in its last 5-10 minutes of cooking.
3. Finally, in step 4 – rather than layering rice, sauce and mussels – mix the rice with the sauce first and then transfer everything to the baking dish, garnishing with the remaining mussels and bread crumbs.

Either way… buon appetito!

To say that I hate Internet Explorer would be an understatement. Quite simply, like many web designers/developers out there, I’ve wasted too many hours of precious time dealing with IE6 and fixing IE-related bugs for our relationship to be any other way.

Since I don’t like such feelings to be part of my life, a while ago I made the very healthy decision to stop supporting IE6 and IE7 in my projects. It’s something I would recommend to every web designer/developer, not only as a way to keep your mental sanity, but also in order to push – and thus educate* – people to upgrade to newer versions of Internet Explorer, or to better browsers altogether. Supporting obsolete browsers is like supporting a bad habit, and I’m done with that.

As Internet Explorer goes, that pretty much leaves me with just IE8 and IE9 to cater for, which is a walk in the park compared to the ugliness I had to deal with in the past.

Shall we bury the hatchet then?

Considering that I’ve just wasted two hours testing and scratching my head trying to solve a quite odd IE8 bug, I guess not. Not quite, yet.

To turn those two hours into something useful, I thought I’ll explain what the bug was and how I fixed it.

The issue

On a client project, I had assigned a tiled background image to the body tag. Pretty straightforward CSS, using the shorthand background property:
body {
background:#FFFFFF url(images/header-bg.gif) repeat-x 0 0;
}

The background image worked just fine on Firefox, Safari, Chrome and IE9, but was missing completely on IE8. To be honest, I had never heard of this IE8 issue with background images, nor had it ever happened to me before. Even stranger, the other background images in my CSS were all displaying correctly.

Possible causes & solutions

A syntax error

On most of the forum threads I checked, the problem seemed to be due to a syntax error: apparently, if you don’t put a space between the closing round bracket and the background-repeat value (in this case “repeat-x”), the background image won’t work in IE8 (while it still will on the other browsers). That’s good to know, although we should always use the correct syntax, regardless of the browser.

Being my syntax correct, there had to be another cause.

The image format?

Another possible cause that came up frequently in my search, was the image format. Some people had written they solved this issue by changing the background image from GIF/JPG to PNG. This doesn’t sound right to me. If IE ever had troubles with image format, PNG was surely the most problematic one and I don’t see why IE8 should have difficulties displaying GIFs or JPGs when even IE6 could (in fact, my other non-PNG background images were working just fine). For the sake of testing, I tried this solution anyway and – not surprisingly – it didn’t work.

So I wouldn’t say that the image format is a possible cause for this issue, but a wrong path to the image sure would be, so it’s good to first make sure that the image URL in your CSS is correct.

JQuery & Nivo Slider Script

Believe it or not, good old Javascript turned out to be the party pooper this time. Whenever possible, I always put my JS at the bottom of the markup, before the closing body tag, as it helps the page loading time. For some inexplicable reason, that caused the issue with my background image on IE8. Moving both the Nivo Slider and the JQuery script up to the head section made the trick: my long-gone background is now finally displaying ok on IE8, too.

I’ve only found one short thread about this background-image/javascript conflict on IE8 (and had to dig to find it) so I hope this article can help you save some time.

*Learn how to browse happy

For week III, I cooked one of my old time favourites: cuttlefish with peas and potatoes. I can’t really say this is a new dish to me – having the recipe been in my family for 3 generations now, but I had never cooked it myself before. My grandma used to make it. It was one of the amazing dishes she would cook for us, always downplaying how great a cook she was. And it’s one of the dishes we keep having as a family every now and then, now that she’s no longer with us. It’s a way to remember her, to honour her memory and her talent as a cook.

When I asked the recipe to my parents, though, they gave me two slightly different versions (the both of them of course assuring “that’s how nonna Rina used to make it”). Funny thing is, they’re probably both right. As every great cook, nonna didn’t cook following a recipe, her cooking was all instinct and available ingredients, so it’s more than likely that she made this recipe in different ways.

Since I couldn’t recall how nonna used to make it and thus couldn’t pick between one version or the other, I decided to get out of the impasse by merging the two versions together, taking from each what I thought would work best (and hoping grandma wouldn’t mind my “playing” with one of her classics).

Here is how I did it.

Cuttlefish with Peas & Potatoes

Prep time 15 mins, cook 60/70 mins. Serves 4.

Ingredients:

• 2/3 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
• 2 garlic cloves, chopped
• A small bunch of flat-leaf parsley, leaves chopped, stalks sliced
• 800g of cuttlefish, cleaned and sliced
• Half a glass of white wine
• 2/3 potatoes, sliced
• 350ml of vegetable stock
• 250g of tomato sauce
• 400g of frozen peas (= half the quantity of the cuttlefish)

Method:

1. In a large saucepan gently fry the garlic in the olive oil with the parsley. Add the cuttlefish and stir for few minutes. Once the water released by the cuttlefish has evaporated, add the white wine and keep stirring. Season with salt and pepper to taste.
2. Add the potato slices. Let them fry for a few minutes, then pour in the stock, just enough to cover everything. Bring to the boil, then reduce the heat and simmer for 15 minutes, with the lid on.
3. Add the tomato sauce and simmer for other 15 minutes with the lid on, stirring frequently.
4. Add the defrosted peas and simmer for other 10 minutes. Then let it simmer without the lid until both vegetables and cuttlefish are tender and the sauce thickens.
5. Serve hot with a few slices of toasted bread.

Buon appetito!

I don’t know if nonna ever cooked it exactly this way, but it tasted great and that’s enough for me to know that she’d be proud.

[...] the only people for me are the mad ones,
the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved,
desirous of everything at the same time,
the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing,
but burn, burn, burn like fabulous yellow roman candles
exploding like spiders across the stars
and in the middle you see the blue centerlight pop
and everybody goes ‘Awww!’.

Jack Kerouak – On the Road

So I turned to Jamie Oliver’s Recipe Yearbook 2011/12 once more, and found this recipe that seemed just what my sore throat needed: something light, healthy, warm and slightly hot.

Broccoli & Sweet Potato Soup

Prep time 15 mins, cook 35 mins. Serves 4.

Ingredients:

• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 1 onion, diced
• 2 garlic cloves, crushed
• 2/3 sweet potatoes (about 550g), cut into 2cm chunks
• 750ml chicken or vegetable stock
• 200g broccoli
• 2tsp harissa

Method:

1. Heat the oil in a large pan and gently cook the onion for 5-7 minutes, until softened. Add the garlic and cook for 2-3 minutes. Add the sweet potatoes and cook for a few more minutes, then add the stock. Bring to the boil, then simmer for 15 minutes, adding the broccoli for the last 5 minutes – cook for a little more or less if necessary, until the vegetables are tender.
2. Transfer the mixture to a food processor and blitz until puréed.
3. To serve, reheat the soup and stir in the harissa.

I couldn’t get hold of any harissa, so I used some chilly peppers instead, which gave the soup the spiciness it needed and also did their trick in numbing my throat for a little. The soup was very good – maybe not as tasty as the Chickpea, Rosemary & Pancetta Soup, but tasty nevertheless, with the broccoli flavour nicely blending with the delicate, underlying, taste of the potatoes.

Buon appetito!

We watch movies and read books on light tablets. We send emails from planes at 33,000 ft. We video-call friends everywhere in the world, for free. We work with people spread over different continents, across different time-zones. We take pictures with our phones. We share pictures with our phones. We tweet, chat, text, e-mail and do another zillion things with our phones. We can buy almost anything online and get it delivered to our doorstep, just in a few days. We have quick and free access to an incredibile amount of information and knowledge.

This is all truly amazing. What really strikes me, though, is how we actually do and consider all these things as if they were completely normal. We have got so used to new technology coming out and rapidly changing our way of life, that we barely notice that it actually does.

Don’t take me wrong, I love technology. I’m not here to condamn it or to suggest that we should hold on to a simpler, gone-by life. Technology actually does make our life a lot simpler, in many ways. I just think sometimes is good to take a moment and consider what we are losing – or might be losing – in the process.

Some things are doomed to disappear: as technology evolves they have no longer reason to be, and slowly fade away. I’m in my early thirties and I’ve already witnessed many disappearances: LPs, walkmans, tapes, portable CD players, VHS, floppy disks. In a few years we’ll probably be saying goodbye to landlines, DVDs and CDs. As soon as a new technology comes along offering a better (faster, easier, cheaper) way of doing something, the technology which originally served that very purpose rapidly becomes extinct. It’s simple. It’s natural. It’s part of evolution.

Just like within the natural world, however, even in the fields of technology and communication there might be species worth saving, and today I’m here to raise awareness of one in particular: letters. Letters as in mail (the one without the “e”). As in correspondence, paper mail, snail mail or however you prefer to call it. Messages one takes the time to write down on actual paper, add a physical address and a stamp to, and post to someone else.

When was the last time for you? Can you recall?

Pretty far back, isn’t it? With all our friends and loved ones just a quick email or text away, and all the different ways we today have to share images and thoughts in real time, writing one another by letter is – sadly – slowly disappearing. Writing an e-mail is so easy, quick and cheap that correspondence is rapidly losing ground and recognition as mean of communication.

We are forgetting about it.

And we shouldn’t.

Altough both e-mail and mail do serve the same purpose (i.e. getting a message from A to B), in fact, they just aren’t the same thing. One can not perfectly replace the other. Sure the email is quick, effective and cheap, but what about the uniqueness of somebody’s handwriting? What about the smell and feel of the paper? What about opening a box in 20 years and find the handwritten words of people you loved? What about the exciting feeling of finding something in your mailbox which isn’t the usual bill or pile of junk mail, but rather a little world of thoughts that somebody took the time to shape into a letter for you?

E-mail and mail just aren’t the same thing.

And that comes from someone who loves writing e-mails and writes them a lot.
Barring the Christmas cards I sent out few weeks ago (which were actually what got me into thinking about all this in the first place), I myself find it hard to recall the last time I wrote a letter to someone. I do remember, however, how much I enjoyed writing and receiving letters and postcards when I was younger, back in the days when that was the only way to exchange personal written messages with family, friends and first crushes.
And I do know how much I still enjoy it the rare times it happens.

Of course it’s impossible for good old correspondence to compete against email and Facebook messages. What I hope, though, is that paper mail could find a new niche where to survive, so that in 30 years – if we’d ever feel nostalgic – we could sit by the fire with a bunch of unique, personal, handwritten letters from the people we loved, rather than having to dig into a 50-year-old inbox from a computer screen.

It’s up to every and each of us.

Every time you want to give an important message to someone you care about. Every time you don’t need your message to arrive right away. Every time you want to let someone know you think of them. Every time you feel your recipient is worth of a little more effort than simply typing something on his/her Facebook wall. Write a letter.

Let’s save snail mail from extinction, one more letter at a time.

I’d love to get your feedback on this. Do you think letters and mail are worth saving? Do you reckon they can be saved? Am I that hopeless of a romantic?

I like Jamie Oliver and his approach to food. His recipes are easy to follow, use simple ingredients and often have an Italian/Mediterranean influence. Add to that a nice design, smooth groundwood paper and great food photography and I took the magazine with me to the till, together with a copy of the Lonely Planet Magazine – as my fall-asleep-before-take-off device (which, by the way, worked like a charm).

On a better look, it turns out Jamie’s Recipe Yearbook really is packed with many (365+) recipes that look very tasty. Hence one of my new year’s resolutions: to cook a new, never-made-before dish per week (hereby known as The CNNMBDPW Project – what else?). If the recipe passes the test (of my making and my liking, that is), I’ll publish it here.

But enough with the preamble, here is my first week recipe, taken from Jamie’s Recipe Yearbook 2011/12. I’ve made it today for my dad and me, and it passed the test with flying colours.

Chickpea, Rosemary & Pancetta Soup

Prep time 15 mins, cook 35 mins. Serves 4.

Ingredients:

• 2 onions, diced
• 2 garlic cloves, chopped
• 2 celery stalks, diced
• 8 slices of pancetta (4 finely chopped, 4 whole)
• 2 tbsp olive oil
• 3 rosemary sprigs
• 2 x 400g tins of chickpeas, drained
• 1 litre chicken or vegetable stock
• Juice of ¼-½ lemon
• Croutons and extra-virgin olive oil, to serve

Method:

1. Gently fry the onion, garlic, celery and chopped pancetta in the olive oil with the rosemary until the onion is soft. Add the chickpeas and cook for 5 minutes.
2. Pour in the stock, bring to the boil, then reduce the heat and simmer for 15 minutes. Season, then remove the rosemary. Add the lemon juice then transfer the soup to a food processor and blitz until puréed.
3. Fry the remaining pancetta until crisp. Sprinkle the croutons over the soup, top with the pancetta slices and drizzle with extra-virgin olive oil to serve.

It was delicious, perfect for a cold winter day.

If you are going to try it, don’t forget to let me know how you liked it – buon appetito!

I can see people rolling their eyes now. So you were leaving Australia, what’s the big deal?

In order to explain what the big deal was, I should probably start with an open confession.

I absofuckinglutely LOVE Australia.

And when I say LOVE, I don’t mean it in the conversational way. I mean it in the pulse-stopping, cheek-blushing I’m-in-love-with-you kind of way.

It’s undeniable – I’ve got all the symptoms:

• I can’t get it out of my head
• When it comes to it, I’m totally biased
• I even think fondly of those few things I didn’t like, like Vegemite or scary-big hairy spiders (Ok, maybe I don’t really think “fondly” of the spiders, but you know what I mean)
• When I talk about it, my eyes beam
• I could talk about it for hours
• I miss it
• Nothing compares to it
• When I left, it felt just like the saddest of break-ups. Wrong. And unfair.
• I can’t shake the thought that we are meant to be together

You don’t need to be a doctor to guess what I’m suffering from.
I’m a classic case of Mal d’Australie. I fell for Australia. Badly.

And here I am, almost an year later, still not over it, still longing for it.
Maybe I’m an incurable romantic, but I like to think that one day our paths will cross once more.

So long Australia. Until we meet again.

P.S. In my defense, it is an extraordinarily beautiful country. See it to believe it

Just like a caterpillar, legolinsplace.com went through different stages and today is officially leaving its cocoon to become a nice HTML5/CSS3 butterfly, settling on this new domain. Beside the new design, a major novelty consists in the Italian version, which I hope will please my Italian friends, who will finally be able to follow what I write.

I hope you’ll like this new evolution and will keep following my blog. If you had subscribed to my RSS feed, please update your subscription so you won’t miss out on any future post.

Farewell Legolin. The name might be different but the meaning* is still here.

* In Tolkien’s fantastic universe of Middle Earth, Legolin is a river rising among the Blue Mountains and flowing through the region of Ossiriand. Its name, Legolin, means free-running.

Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds and shall find me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.

William Ernest Henley – Invictus

It is never too late to be what you might have been.

George Eliot

I ran into this quote twice this week, from two very different and quite random sources.
I wonder if I should take it as a sign. I wonder whether that’s true.

O me! O life! … Of the questions of these recurring,
Of the endless trains of the faithless, of cities fill’d with the foolish,
Of myself forever reproaching myself, (for who more foolish than I, and who more faithless?),
Of eyes that vainly crave the light, of the objects mean, of the struggle ever renew’d,
Of the poor results of all, of the plodding and sordid crowds I see around me,
Of the empty and useless years of the rest, with the rest me intertwined,
The question, O me, so sad recurring,
- What good amid these, O me, O life?

Answer.

That you are here – that life exists, and identity,
That the powerful play goes on, and you will contribute a verse.

Walt Whitman – O me! O life!

Herbed Pea & Pancetta Risotto

Prep time 35 mins, cook 45 mins. Serves 4.

Ingredients:

• 750 ml (3 cups) chicken stock
• 30 ml olive oil
• 60 gm butter, coarsely chopped
• 1 onion, finely chopped
• 4 garlic cloves, finely chopped
• 250 gm vialone nano rice
• 50 gm diced pancetta
• 100 ml dry white wine
• half bunch each spinach and rocket, trimmed
• 1 cup each (firmly packed) mint and flat-leaf parsley
• 200 gm frozen peas, defrosted
• 40 gm finely grated parmesan

Method:

1. Bring stock to the simmer over medium-high heat, reduce heat to low, keep warm.
2. Heat oil and half the butter in a casserole over medium heat. Add onion and garlic and stir occasionally until very tender (8-10 mins). Add pancetta and rice, stir to coat, and cook until rice is just toasted (1 min). Add wine and stir occasionally until almost evaporated (2-3 mins). Add stock to risotto a ladleful at a time, stirring continuously until stock is absorbed before adding more. Cook until rice is al dente (20-25 mins), remove from heat, stand 1 minute.
3. Meanwhile, blanch spinach, rocket and herbs in a saucepan of boiling water until just wilted (1-2 mins), then drain, refresh (i.e. plunge in plenty of iced water to stop the cooking process) and squeeze out excess water. Process in a food processor until finely chopped, add peas and pulse unitl coarsely chopped. Stir into risotto with parmesan and remaining butter, season to taste and serve hot.

Yumm… buon appetito! :)

The result is this vintage travel diary of my trip in New Zealand.

If you’d like to make your own travel diary check out the tutorial and give it a try, it’s fun and some of the tips might come in handy in other projects. Oh, and make sure you post a link to your travel diary here in the comments section!

My great trip around New Zealand ended 15 days ago on a cloudy early morning.
That day, before landing on Sydney, I was excited: ahead of me the Unknown, with its full, scary, amazing potential of new opportunities. And oh, if they came. Not even 8 hours after landing I was having an interview with one of Australia’s fastest growing and well-known digital companies. In four days I was offered a job and started working at Reactive. Everything happened so fast I still find it hard to believe. I felt a bit as a pioneer arriving to the New World, and realizing that everything is possible.

It does feel like a new world here in Sydney somehow. It’s so different from anywhere else I’ve been so far, and yet it’s so easily familiar. I surprised myself yesterday evening, when almost without thinking I put on my flip-flops, went down to the near-by pizza place, ordered a pizza and waited there reading The Sydney Morning Herald. As if I’d been doing that every week of my life.

It was a nice feeling. That’s probably what amazes me the most about Sydney: you can be here for just few days and already feel home. I think the reason lies in the people: every face you come across in the street, in the shops, on the train – no matter what nationality, color, age, gender or sexual orientation – seems to smile you back, totally at ease in this vibrant, dynamic, multicultural city.

There is no feeling foreigner in Sydney, and I really like that.

A lake with the most amazing turquoise water, gem-set in a ring of gentle mountains. A quiet shore. A chair under a friendly tree. The sun passing through the branches, burning my feet.
A little perfect moment.

I’m sitting in our camper van. Outside it’s raining. Yes, no kidding. I’m in New Zealand, it’s Summer and – to borrow a figure of speech from the Irish – it’s pissing rain. Something is deeply wrong with this sentence – and no, it isn’t the figure of speech.

The camper van is kinda cosy though, and the rain hitting the roof creates a nice soundtrack to my thoughts.

We’ve been on the road for a week now but somehow it feels much longer than that. Sometimes I feel like, by landing on Auckland, I entered a new temporal dimension, like a parallel universe with no calendar, no seasons, no days of the week, no time except the one imposed by day and night. I wake up when birds start twittering and I go to bed when it gets dark, and every new day is a discovery. I love that. Just heading South, deciding what to do along the way and enjoying the different landscapes the street welcomes us with. It’s great, I feel I could do that all days of my life.

We are now half way through our (rough) itinerary around the North Island and so far it’s been great fun. We had a swim in Waingaro’s Hot Springs, went surfing at the vast Ngarunui Beach near Raglan, visited the impressive Glow Worms Cave in Waitomo, relaxed on the black and feet-burning sand of Oakura Beach, went hiking on the beautiful and difficult Mount Taranaki and followed the slow bends of the Wanganui River. Some of the pictures that I took along the way are already online on my Flickr page, I will keep adding them as we go along.

Today, since the miserable weather, we locked ourselves in the Te Papa Museum, where we had the chance to learn more about this amazing island. When the rain finally ceased we had a stroll in Wellington, which reminded me a bit of San Francisco but didn’t impress me much to be honest. For tomorrow the plan is to reach Cape Palliser, the southernmost point of the North Island, before pointing the nose of our camper van back to North and begin our journey back to Auckland. I reckon the day after tomorrow we should hit Hawkes Bay, where hopefully we’ll find plenty of sun and good waves again.

That’s all for today folks, good night or good morning, depending on which side of the hemisphere you’re reading this.

So here I am, a rolling stone ready to roll once more.

[...] follow your heart, even when it leads you off the well-worn path.

To know more check out envato.com and the very handy Tuts+.

This is how we met Jonathan.

He was obviously quite scared and covered with dust and soot, but seemed to be all right nonetheless. Thus I gently picked him up and put him outside on our terrace, hoping he would pull himself together and fly back to his nest up on the roof. Unfortunately we soon realized he yet doesn’t know how to fly.

Then is when I decided to name him Jonathan, after the famous and unconventional seagull Jonathan Livingston.

Jonathan has been with us ever since and seems to be doing ok considering he can’t go back to his nest. Luckily his parents spotted him on the terrace and are often coming down to feed him. I’ve been taking care of him as I could, leaving him some food and fresh water every day. I’ve also been studying his behaviour, the way he’s getting used to the new place and all the effort and the frustration he puts in trying to learn that one thing that he probably feels with each of his feathers, but still can’t get.

I thought how Jonathan is not that different from all of us after all. Sometimes in life we might tumble down a chimney and find ourselves stuck on a terrace, and sooner or later we have to decide whether to stay on the safe, known, maybe unexciting terrace waiting for something to happen, or rather lean out the edge, take a deep breath, spread our wings and jump towards the unknown.

Some people stay. Some people jump.
Either way is fine, as long as you don’t stay just because you’re afraid to jump.

I like Jonathan. Even though he is incredibly noisy.
But every morning I go to the office and hope he won’t be there.

design delighters and Easter eggs, about hiding clever little gems in websites which people will find, enjoy, and share with their friends.

In this talk entitled Oooh, that’s Clever! (Unnatural Experiments in Web Design), Paul  Annett, lead designer at Clearleft, presents several examples of websites that include small features or effects that functionally speaking are pretty much useless, but are intended to make the website (and therefore the user’s experience) more delightful and fun. Simple tricks, often well hidden and unexpected, that when discovered literally will make you say “Oooh, that’s cool!”. The idea is adding to your website that little something that will impress the users and will most likely make them send your URL to their friends, creating

an intangible viral marketing effect which will help engage your audience and build hype around your product or service.

Andrea has just posted an article about this on CSSglance, listing the most entertaining and clever examples presented by Paul Annett in his presentation. Make sure you check it out.

On Mozilla Labs’ Blog, Ubiquity is introduced as an

experiment into connecting the Web with language in an attempt to find new user interfaces that could make it possible for everyone to do common Web tasks more quickly and easily.

Translated into plain English, that means Ubiquity is going to make your web experience better and easier. The main idea (and goal) of this new Firefox extension – at its alpha version – is to empower users to control the web browser with language-based instructions, that allow them to do their common and simple web tasks faster, easier and in a more effective way:

With search, users type what they want to find.
With Ubiquity, they type what they want to do.

If you, too, like to find ways to make your life easier and get better results with less effort, then you might like to install the prototype and give it a try.

If you want to know more watch the introduction video.

Enjoy the power and beauty of your youth.
Ah, never mind, you will not understand the power and beauty of your youth until they’ve faded.
But trust me, in twenty years you will look back at photos of yourself
and recall in a way you can’t grasp now.
How much possibility lay before you, and how fabulous you really looked.
You are NOT as fat as you imagined.

Don’t worry about the future.
Or worry, but know that worrying is as effective as trying to solve an algebra equation by chewing bubble-gum.
The real troubles in your life are apt to be things that never crossed your worried mind.
The kind that blindside you at 4pm on some idle Tuesday.

Do one thing, every day, that scares you.

Sing.

Don’t be reckless with other people’s hearts.
Don’t put up with people that are reckless with yours.

Floss.

Don’t waste your time on jealousy.
Sometimes you’re ahead. Sometimes you’re behind.
The race is long, and in the end, it’s only with yourself.

Remember compliments you receive, forget the insults.
If you succeed in doing this, tell me how.

Keep your old love letters, throw away your old bank statements.

Stretch.

Don’t feel guilty if you don’t know what you wanna do with your life.
The most interesting people I know didn’t know at 22 what they wanted to do with their lives.
Some of the most interesting forty-year-olds I know, still don’t.

Get plenty of calcium.
Be kind to your knees, you’ll miss them when they’re gone.

Maybe you’ll marry. Maybe you won’t.
Maybe you’ll have children. Maybe you won’t.
Maybe you’ll divorce at 40.
Maybe you’ll dance the funky chicken on your 75th wedding anniversary.
Whatever you do, don’t congratulate yourself too much,
or berate yourself, either.
Your choices are half chance. So are everybody else’s.

Enjoy your body. Use it every way you can.
Don’t be afraid of it, or what other people think of it.
It’s the greatest instrument you’ll ever own.

Dance. Even if you have nowhere to do it but in your own living room.
Read the directions, even if you don’t follow them.
Do NOT read beauty magazines – they will only make you feel ugly.

Get to know your parents. You never know when they’ll be gone for good.
Be nice to your siblings. They’re your best link to your past and the people most likely to stick with you in the future.
Understand that friends come and go, but for a precious few you should hold on.

Work hard to bridge the gaps in geography and life-style,
because the older you get, the more you need the people you knew when you were young.
Live in New York City once, but leave before it makes you hard.
Live in Northern California once, but leave before it makes you soft.

Travel.

Never mess too much with your hair, or by the time you’re 40 it will look 85.

Be careful whose advice you buy, but be patient with those who supply it.
Advice is a form of nostalgia.
Dispensing it is a way of fishing the past from the disposal, wiping it off, painting over the ugly parts and recycling it for more than it’s worth.

But trust me, on the sunscreen.

From the movie The Big Kahuna
Inspired by Mary Schmich’s article Wear Sunscreen, Chicago Tribune.

…
Happy  birthday my friend : )
@

I’ve just finished watching Mamma Mia! and I really enjoyed it. I don’t normally like musicals but I think this one is really well done and when actors suddenly start singing and dancing it doesn’t feel THAT weird. Well ok, in Pierce Brosnan’s case, it does a little but in a funny way. The songs are keeping the whole story together, the cast is great and the choreographies are just hilarious. I think that most of the credit, though, goes to the ABBA songs which simply make this movie a colourful, enjoyable and passionate hymn to life. Basically impossible not to be taken by the rhythm. Definitely impossible to watch it without ever tapping your foot or shaking your head or singing a few lines.

A special thanks to my flatmate Ilda for suggesting to watch this movie tonight. With this crap weather, the recession atmosphere and everything’s been going on I really needed something to cheer me up.

Happiness is a how, not a what. A talent, not an object.

Herman Hesse

Dies slowly he who becomes the slave of habit,
who follows the same routes every day,
who never changes brand,
who does not risk to wear a new color and doesn’t talk to whom he doesn’t know.

Dies slowly he who avoids a passion,
who prefers black to white and the dots on the “i’s” to a whirlpool of emotions,
the kind that make your eyes glimmer, that turn yawns into smiles,
that make the heart beat in the face of mistakes and feelings.

Dies slowly he who does not overthrow the table when is unhappy at work,
who does not risk the certain for the uncertain to follow a dream,
who does not allow, at least one time in life, to flee from sensate advices.

Dies slowly he who does not travel, does not read, does not listen to music,
who does not find grace in himself.

Dies slowly he who destroys his own self-esteem,
who does not allow himself to be helped.

Dies slowly he who spends his days complaining of his bad luck or the incessant rain.

Dies slowly he who abandons a project before starting it,
who fails to ask questions on subjects he doesn’t know
or who does not answer when being asked about something he does know.

Let’s avoid death in small doses,
always remembering that being alive demands a much bigger effort than the simple fact of breathing.

Only a burning patience will lead to the attainment of a splendid happiness.

Martha Medeiros – Who dies?
Original Title: A Morte Devagar

We trained hard
We were good enough
We were fast enough and
We went out there to prove it

It was also very good to stop in Carlow on the way back, to eat and celebrate together with Master O’Toole (whose smiling even if impartial presence was comforting during the competition) and Mr. Hannigan (whose help and support as coach was priceless).

Excitement, contentment and big laughs, what a great weekend.

In the past 2 weeks I’ve been working on redesigning my website, I was a bit bored by the one I currently have but most of all I felt it was just shameful for me – probably the earnest CSS supporter after Ben – to still have a website built in tables. I was hoping to get it live this week but unfortunately my free time seems to become less and less, so I guess it won’t be live before next week or two. Who will live will see, as we say in Italy.

This week I will be super-busy again as my dad comes to visit and on Saturday I’ll be going to Tramore (down in Waterford) to take part to the National Taekwon-do Championship, which is basically the reason why I finally decided to write a new post: so that I can leave my last will. I’m quite excited about the competition, I’ve never done something like that before – swimming or running in your own lane is a bit different from actually facing your opponent in sparring. Hopefully I’ll have a good time and won’t get injured (too much). Today I finally managed to wear my gum shield without choking…it’s a start.

More news to follow (hopefully) – now bed time.

On the way back from Enniskerry I was ordered asked to write down my impressions about the day, so that we could post them on the Taekwon-do Centre’s website. So here they are.

Your legs are sore. On your body the marks left by the bullets remind you the adrenaline, the silence of the forest broken by the shooting, the pain, the good fun. Your ears still echo with the sound of bullets hacking the air and smashing against the bark of a friendly tree, few inches from a short but acute pain. Of course if your name is Pat, Pavel, Rory or Lii you might just hear bullets hacking the air and then smashing against your chest, back, legs and bum, but I am sure someone else is going to tell the story of the proudly-self-called “suicide squad”.

What I did really like though, beside the game, are the good laughs, the nice and friendly atmosphere, the way playing together made us know each other better and feel part of a group. That was really nice. And that was also the aim of the TKD Social Club, which seems to have had the amazing power to turn classmates into friends.

A couple of weeks before leaving Italy I wrote on my diary that, despite all doubts and fears, I wanted to trust that feeling which, through the sadness for what I was leaving, was whispering me that I was doing the right thing.

Ireland will be a great experience, a good test, an unparalleled teacher. And this can’t be wrong.

Well, it was indeed all of that. Ireland has been and keeps being a great experience and an amazing teacher. Sometimes I can barely believe all the things I’ve done, and discovered, and learnt here. Everything happened so naturally that sometimes I forget how much I’have changed and gained during this year. I feel I’m a better person – happier, stronger, more open, more conscious, more confident. So thank you. Thank you for the new friends, the laughs, the discoveries. Thank you for giving me the chance to still amaze myself.

It was cool joining the yellow belt class this evening, quite tough and many new movements to learn. I felt like a true beginner again.

I was quite curious to see how the grading would have been and I have to say I liked it. Quite surprisingly, I wasn’t even that nervous. I liked the formality of the whole cerimony, there was a serious and solemn atmosphere I didn’t expect. I did and enjoyed many different sports in my life but with taekwon-do it is the first time I’m doing something that has such a strong tradition, important rules and all-round philosophy. And I love that.

My exam was so quick I don’t even know if I made any mistake. I was so concentrated in doing the right thing the right number of times that I didn’t pay too much attention to the single movements, but I kinda felt they were coming naturally so I hope I’ve done everything properly. We’ll see on Monday what Master O’Toole will say.

Many bruschette, few drinks and a huge hamburger later, I left to go back to the city centre. I was going to meet up with some other TKD students that were gathered at Ross & Walpole in Exchequer St to talk about the idea of a TKD Social Club (official reason) and to have some pints together (unofficial reason). When I arrived my first impression was that everybody was having a good time, the official mission was uncertain but the unofficial one seemed to already have been accomplished. It was good because as soon as I sat down and indroduced myself I felt like I was with friends. Maybe that’s because we all had something in common, maybe we all were a bit tipsy, but it was cool. I really hope we will get the Social Club up and running, because I think all students could have great fun together. The ideas that came up are good (paintballing, a website, a summer camp with Mr. Hannigan), I think we just need to put them into action, spreading the word, gathering new members and officialy giving birth to the TKD Social Club.

We’ll see. For the moment it was a nice evening with nice people.

So, where to start… oh, yeah, my Easter holidays in Italy. It was really good to go back home for a week. Even though I had to work a little, it was like being on holidays: no alarm clock, free-time, sun, friends, shopping, good food. Re-charging week. I’ve been really happy spending some time with my friends and family, I enjoyed every day, especially those things I miss here in Ireland, such as laughing with my brother, going out for a pizza with my friends, driving, walking with my dog, talking with my parents. On the other hand, though, I was missing Dublin, too. You know, that mood you have sometimes on holidays, that besides all the fun you’re having makes you miss your everyday life? In my case I missed speaking English, going to tae kwon-do, easily meeting new people from all over the world, having a pint in a proper Irish pub. It was actually quite weird for me to feel on holiday being home and to feel home once back in Dublin. It was nice and sad at the same time. It’s not easy reading in your friends’ and parents’ eyes the worry you won’t never come back. But I can’t feel guilty about living where I’m happy to live. And I know that even if they miss me, what they want more is for me to be happy.

Once back in Dublin, then, I found a beautiful surprise: Spring had come. The weather has been amazing these past two weeks and every moment I have I am at the park relaxing in the sun and trying to get my skin darker than the ghost-white I’m at the moment. I really love Dublin in this season, with everybody going back to the parks and outside the bars, beautiful flowering trees popping out everywhere and a nice, warm sun.

Another news is that I finally bought my do-bok. The do-bok is the official taekwon-do uniform and you really feel very official wearing it. I still have to get used to it and to learn how to fast the belt properly, but I love it already. You should see me, I’m so funny with this large white pijama. I can’t wait to go for my grading next month and start learning new things. In the meantime tomorrow evening I will meet up with other students and instructors to talk about the TKD social club, a very interesting project I would like to help with. I’m really curious I have to say, we’ll see.

Tomorrow I’m also going to a barbecue in Kilmainham, at Elisabetta’s place. It’s kind of a goodbye party, as she’s going back to Italy for a while because of her thesis. I’m a bit sad she’s leaving, as I had a really good time with her lately, but I know she will be back, and I feel it will be sooner than later.

The forthcoming weeks will also be very busy, because two friends of mine and then my cousine will come to visit. Can’t wait! So there’s a lot “boiling in the pot” as we say in Italy. Hopefully I will post something during the weekend, stay tuned.

But let’s leave my digressions and go back to my Paddy’s week-end. It actually started on Friday evening, with the extremely dangerous afterwork-pints with the office. Dangerous for two reasons mainly:

1. “afterwork” starts at 5.30 pm
2. my colleagues are (and therefore drink as) Irish

It was good fun though, especially because everybody was already in Paddy’s mood, which means happy, friendly and nicely drunk.

On Saturday my hangover wasn’t too bad, so my plan was to see a bit of the parade and then move to Doheny & Nesbitts in Baggot St to see Italy playing Ireland in the 6 Nations. When I left my flat and found myself in St. Patrick st (the street where the parade was going to end), I realized that it wasn’t going to be so easy. In fact, it wasn’t. There were so many people I couldn’t believe it. Everybody was happy and smiling and the atmosphere was really involving. At the first chance I didn’t resist and bought myself a green cowboy hat and a small Irish flag. Proud of my new hat, I kept walking toward O’Connell st where I was planning to meet the parade as well as Elisabetta. Myself and the parade arrived at O’Connell Bridge at the same time and the place was so packed I couldn’t see anything. I don’t know how I managed to meet up with Elisabetta or how she managed to recognize me under the big cowboy hat. Fortunately we happened to be on the same side of the parade. Unfortunately we were both on the wrong side. We tried to find a poach to cross the parade and move South toward Baggot St but it was impossibile: from Parnell square to St. Patrick st it was just a long snake of people and barriers: the parade was cutting the city in a half.

While walking I tried to see something and take some pictures but there were just too many people so I gave up pretty soon. Since we were both more interested in the match than in the parade and the match had already started, we ended up watching it in Temple Bar, at Turk’s Head. It was hard seeing my two favourite teams playing one against each other, but it was good fun and supporting Italy brought me back to the feelings of the worldcup. In the end I was happy with the result, because Ireland was having very good chances to win the 6 Nations. After the match we catched up with Elisabetta’s boyfriend, Trevor, and moved to The Old Edward in Christchurch Place to watch France vs Scotland. That’s a good pub to be at on Paddy’s day, truly Irish. There was even a group of ladies in their fifties sitting in a corner singing traditional songs. I didn’t get the words as they were singing in Irish but it was a nice and touching background. Unfortunately Scotland wasn’t good enough and France won both the match and the tournament, stealing Ireland the chance to win the 6 Nations on St. Patrick’s day – how great would it be? That didn’t affect the general mood anyway, it seems like nothing can piss Irish off on Paddy’s day.

On Sunday the weather was bad, it also snowed for something like 5 minutes, so I took it easy and stayed in. That proved to be a good choice because Monday was again a long and alcoholic day. Being on holidays on my birthday was great: no alarm clock, time to catch up with my friends on Skype and to make a tiramisu, a nice walk to the city centre for some shopping… everyday should be like that. My birthday party was also really nice: we had some drinks at The Market Bar and then we went to Boccaccio, the Italian restaurant I had chosen. Luckily it turned out to be a very good choice: the place was nice and cosy, the food and the wine were good (and truly Italian) and the service was great. I even got a little candle on my tartufo nero, as well as all the staff and my friends singing happy birthday, in both languages. It was a lovely evening and I have to thank my friends for that because they really made me feel at home.

The illusion that the new wireless card had solved my problem, in fact, lasted just one day, and not even completely anyway, because even though the speed was better I was still having problems using skype and surfing the web. It was nothing more than an illusion in fact, because I knew there was no reason for the problem to be solved with a new card: I was sure my in-built card was working fine and the problem had to lie somewhere else.

So this evening I was struggling again, I was connected to my network but Internet wasn’t working, with neither the new nor the old card. So annoying. Thus I removed the new card and enabled back the in-built one, determined to find a way to make it work. I decided to change the TCP/IP properties, setting up a static IP address (instead of getting it automatically from the DHCP). I had already tried this solution without success, but I thought to give it another try. I put in all the details and saved – and then I saw it. An “Advanced” button. I don’t know why the other times I didn’t pay attention to this button, but this time I decided to have a look. And between stuff I didn’t even understand, under WINS and some obscure settings, there was a little paragraph about the NetBios, that by default was set to be managed from the DHCP. There was also a message though, saying that if you are using a static IP address OR your DHCP doesn’t manage the NetBios settings, you would need to enable the NetBios on TCP/IP from that panel. Well, thank you very much! Why don’t you hide such an information a little bit deeper next time??!?

That’s it by the way. I enabled the NetBios and after 2 seconds I was connected, faster than ever. I immediately tried to use Skype (which was the application I had more problems with) and I called (once again) the skype test calling service, recording my usual dummy message. But this time, after the bip, I finally got my message played back to me, my voice cleaner than ever. I’m so happy! And so proud of myself!

So, here is what I’ve learnt: if you are experiencing problems with your wireless connection and you know the problem is not the router, nor the wireless card, nor the firewall, nor the Zero Wireless Configuration or everything else you may think it could be, go and check the NetBios settings. Here is the path:
Start > Connect to > Show all connections > Right-click on the wireless connection > Properties > Under General select Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) and click Properties > Advanced> WINS > Enable NetBios on TCP/IP > Ok.

I hope this can help some other poor newbie who is struggling like I was.

I tried everything to get my wi-fi connection to work (router settings, port forwarding, WEP and WPA keys, firewall, proxies and so fort) but nothing worked. So this morning I decided to get to the bottom of the problem. I went to Dixon, I bought a wireless network card and here I am, connected to the network again – so glad to be back!

I’m sick tonight. Sick of computers and their endless ways to drive you mad. Sick of clients who blame you because you haven’t done something they never asked you to do. Sick of living far from my friends. Sick of working hard all day and then being too tired to do anything else. Sick of my messy and lazy flatmates, who have been walking by that bag of rubbish sitting in our living room for two days without even considering to take it down. Sick of Microsoft Windows and all its useless updates. Sick of my wi-fi connection that never works.

Well fuck it. Fuck the computers, the clients, fuck work. Fuck my flatmates and the fucking Ntl connection.
Hey… it’s true, it works. I already feel better.

Happy birthday my friend, hope you had a nice birthday party today, with good friends, good food, good cider and not too many snuuze (snoose? snouz??). I wish you all the best for this 24th year you’re going to spend on this crazy world, I kinda know you’ll enjoy it!

It’s amazing how a city you didn’t know at all can become the place where you feel home. I wonder whether it happens every time or I’ve just been lucky so far. The only thing I’m sure is that wherever you are, you feel better if you are with friends. I know, it’s pretty straightforward, but I think we often take that for granted, forgetting how important it is.

I had a really good time last weekend, with Norb and Ben back here. I had almost forgotten how cool it is, just spending time with good friends, simply talking and laughing. It’s definitely what I miss the most here in Ireland.

But I keep looking forward, knowing that good friends are hard to find but are also what’s most worth looking for.

Life is like a box of chocolates,
you never know what you gonna get.

Mrs. Gump – from the movie Forrest Gump

So let’s the blog-adventure begin!