Irish Summers

well... they just don't exist really do they? At least, not with any consistency. We were luckier with our BBQ weather this year than we were with the last two... but it wasn't anything to write home about. Now, on the final day of August, cookout season seems to have abandoned us completely, leaving us Island dwellers in our familiar cocoon of damp and dim. Thanks mother nature! You rawk!

If you're like me and you really missed the whole grilling season, I have been advised that there is a new (tho probably expensive) line of cookwear that can give you that searing sensation without fear of rain. Excellent. Sent to me from the Tasting Table daily email, it can be found here: "new cookware has all your problems solved"

In the spirit of grilling, I'll leave you with one of my favorite recipes: Grilled Spicy Ginger Lime Pork Tenderloin, or as the locals over here call it, Pork Steak - that can be found on my other blog, complete with a music mix to cook your din dins with- just scroll down past the music to find the food: http://loveactionluvs.blogspot.com/2009/06/friday-mixtape-8-time-of-season.html

Soon I'll also post one of my other favorite recipes... which is also often cooked over the coals. It's my mom's most awesome Shrimp Pierre. Ok, better go before I drool over the keyboard here.

Below it's getting a satisifed "liked it" vote - it'd be higher if I was able to cook these things outdoors!

Honey honey! How you thrill me...

Showing support for our buzzy buddies

It's widely known that bee numbers have been declining quite a bit in recent years. This is bad bad news for many reasons (namely growing food for earth creatures to eat!). There are a number of contributing factors in the suspects corner: climate change, pesticides, mono-agriculture... all the things that are unfortunately a way of life in modern culture.

Uggggg.

Last night I watched a good but disheartening documentary on the Beeb (no pun intended), "Who Killed The Honey Bee." It looked into the widespread phenomena of bees dying in their droves - known as colony collapse disorder.

I had a few favorite bits - including the profile of the bee exporters from Australia (imagine putting big aul boxes of bees on an airplane!) - the whole hierarchy of bee colonies, from the foragers to the 'cleaners' and of course the queen. But my absolute most favorite bit was the profile of the 'urban beekeeper' in London who has had no decline in his population for over 5 years. The logical explanation? Cities are actually filled with greenspaces and gardens planted with colorful flowers at all times of the year as opposed to giant mono-cultured farms covered in pesticides and a lack of plant variety.

Coincidentally, this morning I came across a locally produced doc about colony collapse disorder, which is about to hit the big screen at the Toronto Film Fest. Ooooh - it looks beautiful.


It nearly makes me want to try my hand at beekeeping when I somehow buy my dreamhouse with large back garden. *sigh* Until then, I'll have to just continue providing some much needed color to my local urban bees. I do get regular visits from some bit fat fuzzy bumble bees who seem enamored with my windowsill nasturtiums, busy busy violas and fushias who have returned en force since I re-potted them a few months ago. Oh and my newest project... the incredible growing clematis! Lahvely no?


And Below you cans see my Bumblebee buddy who came for a visit just this very morning.


Lets go bees! Come on the bees!

Sunday Sunday Here Again In Tidy Attire

Recipe: Local Irish Easy Pea-sy Pie

Sunday Feeding Time! I love a nice feasting after a weekend of fun. Problem is I'm often veeeeeery tired on a Sunday evening, and laaaaazy. Luckily this Shepard's pie is real simple to make. Hey, leave the dishes til Monday, and relax! The other thing that makes this an awesome dinner for us Irish residents, it can be completely locally sourced in nearly every season. Huzzah. Guilt free!

Preheat your oven to about 180C (350F). First things first - make some mashed potatoes! Boil them spuds in garlicy salty water till they're soft, then squash em up with a bit of salt, pepper, butter, an egg yolk (helps em get nice n brown), milk (or cream if you're feeling a bit decadent) and my favorite lil trick is to add a bit of grated cheese. I'm a cheddar fan myself but parmesan or even a blue cheese might be kinda nice if you're into more of a stronger taste (but beware over powering the overall dish!). If you're looking for a lower fat option, skip the cheese and just use skim milk to get them creamier. Set the spuds aside for later.


On to the meat. Saute about 2 cloves of crushed garlic and a chopped onion in olive oil in a big aul pot. Throw in a couple of chopped up carrots and get them all nice and warmed up and sweaty and bright orange. Throw in some lean minced beef (or lamb or turkey or quorn, whatever floats yer boat) and get it nice and brown.

Add a bit of beef broth, tomato paste, herbs & spices, salt & crushed black pepper to taste, if it's looking a bit watery add some flour to thicken the broth - but not too much, you might need to counter-act the flour taste with a bit more herbs & spices.

Pop in some peas (frozen or fresh) wait til they get nice and bright green. When you're happy with your meat mixture, throw it into your baking dish and then spread the mashed potatoes evenly on top. On Sundays I'm usually feeling in the need of extra comfort food, so I grate a bit of cheese on the very top that gets all nice and brown and crusty when baked. Mmmmm....

Pop it into your preheated oven, you don't need to bake it too long - once the potatoes are warmed through and the top gets nicely browned it's ready. Eat. Enjoy. Watch Entourage. Sunday Night Bliss.



This entry get an angelic "loved it" vote for it's tasty and sustainable nature. Goooo pie!

Friday crazy busy crazy time

Eeek!
It's Friday and I'm not nearly done with my work, I have so many little shizzly things to do before leaving the office and I haven't posted to the blog in like... two days. ARG. I do have the excuse that I posted a new mixtape on t'other blog today which can be found here: http://loveactionluvs.blogspot.com/

And... I have a few questions and annoucements:

Question 1. Who keeps stealing the cutlery from the office kitchen? Capel Building residents, you know who you are. Return the forks to the diswasher, I'm not looking, all will be forgiven.

Announcement 1. I might be moving... eeek!

Question 2. Why is it that the time between 3:30pm and 4:30pm simply disappears? Where does it go?

Announcement 2. The band is super busy. Four gigs in the space of eight days... eeek! We've also been selected for HWCH. Yay! But busy!

THAT IS ALL
Hopefully I will actually have some content to add to this blog tomorrow

Rating: only one star for today - I don't like being so crazy busy :(

Save The Irish Film Board

I am a very opinionated person, although admittedly I'm not usually one to stick my neck out. However, that changed a wee bit just over a month ago when I received an email from The Irish Film Board saying they were under threat from Ireland's 'Bord Snip' - basically a board set up to save Govt. funds during these trying times. When looking into the facts, it's quite easy to see this is a completely short sighted plan as any money saved would be lost again straight away with the resulting unemployment. And that's just one area of short-sightedness.

I quickly got to work setting up a Facebook group through 'Causes' and invited my friends. I've never been involved in lobbying, and wasn't sure setting up this group would have any actual impact on the decision. A good friend then mailed me today to let me know that Bord Snip's decisions were taking place this week and would I kindly inform the members of the group... well, I logged in to discover that our cause had become over 3,600 strong (Update: 3,707 by 6pm today!)

I promptly messaged the group to get proactive! And got proactive myself, emailing over 10 local Dublin TDs/Councillors with some facts and opinions surrounding the recommendations of Bord Snip. I encourage EVERYONE to get involved in this incredibly important cause. No matter how you feel about the IFB's policies, funding process & decisions, economically speaking this would have a huge negative impact on Ireland's economy.

If you want to look at the facts, you can find them on a recent Irish Audiovisual Content Production Sector Review, which has key facts about the value of the BSÉ/IFB. This report can be found here:
http://www.irishfilmboard.ie/about/Irish_Audiovisual_Content_Production_Sector_Review/24

We need to make our voices heard to support The Irish Film Board. A few simple steps could make a significant impact.

If you wouldn't mind joining the cause here:
http://www.causes.com/SavetheIFB

For information about who your local Councillor or TD is, visit this handy website: http://www.dublin.ie/dem.aspx - The simple practice of writing them a short email with your opinion on the matter is all it takes. And feel free to send me a message if you would like a copy of the letter I've written to my local Govt.

I encourage everyone to take into consideration the long-term effects of disbanding this very important cultural organization. Cutting the €18 million spent on the Film Board will destroy a 600 million Euro industry!

Skint as a Rat

Not sure I'm feelin this latest taxidermical art piece... I keep picturing feeling around inside my handbag only to grab this little guys balls. Although I am quite liking the winged headpiece found elsewhere in the artist's portfolio. I wonder could it be re-created without, y'know... wings.

Here's a link to the Dazed article about the artist, Reid Peppard (any relation to Hannibal Smith?)

Going In For The Kill

I Heart Phoenix Park

For those unfamiliar, Phoenix Park in Dublin is a sprawling 1,760 acres of parkland (fields/garden/zoo/swamp) and is the largest urban enclosed park in Europe. And it has deer.

Deer!

It's my favorite place in Dublin to go for a run, in fact, it's probably my favorite place in the world to go for a run - and that's sayin something for a person who grew up in Santa Barbara.

I just love the way it allows you to be immersed in complete nature, while still in the middle of a capital city. My favorite area is the grassy paths of the deer field - soft and winding, magically picturesque and yep, literally full of deer.

As an aside, announced via twitter this morning, Lance Armstrong has invited the public to join him on a cycle through the place - suh-weet! I'm hoping the fella leaves work early to join the party as he's getting well into bicycling with his fancy Specialized Allez 2009. Schmancy. If you want to join Lance, he's meeting at the roundabout next to the big obelisk pillar at 5:30 pm. I sure wish I could go myself! Say hi to my deer friends Lance!

Here's some recent photos of my favorite run spot:

The verdict on IRMA v Eircom v Pirate Bay

I just read a fantastic editorial column written by Una (Rocks) Mullally that had a particular connection to me and what I'm doing with my weekly mixtape podcast.

I wrote a little bit about how it relates to my other blog on that blog, but I wanted to include it here as well because I feel it is significant in the whole quest to become a better person. Can you consider yourself a good person if you occasionally partake in illegal activities such as file-sharing and downloading? I know I've never lost sleep over it, but it is certainly something I have thought well and hard about. Well, I feel a bit better about myself now after reading one quote in particular that I have to agree with:

"...people who download music illegally aren't complete freeloaders. According to a study by BI Norwegian School of Management illegal downloaders and filesharers buy 10 times more music legitimately than those who don't download illegally. Why? Because people who download large amounts of music are huge music fans, and have no problem parting with their cash for a decent product."

So so true! Well, at least in my case. Looking at my Last.fm stats - I've listened to nearly 21,000 songs and over 1,500 artists since October 2006. And those are just the times that I've listened while sat at a computer using iTunes. You could probably realistically double that amount of plays when trying to count my "offline" music listenership. So I can sit here, hold up my hand and say "I have downloaded music and films illegally," and I will say that as a musician and filmmaker and not feel like a hypocrite. Why? The amount of times I do make a point of buying the music legally is actually pretty significant. I know I've spent hundreds on the iTunes shop, Amazon knows my taste to a t... and record shops? Well you just can't beat a cozy record shop on a lazy Saturday afternoon can you? Admittedly, I haven't done it in a while, but nothing beats the satisfaction of going and watching a band, and buying their album afterwards - especially knowing that they're getting a much bigger cut than they would if I were to hand my money over to HMV.

My current favorite "downloading is evil" story of the moment is to do with those dim-wits Aslan who are convinced that downloading has significantly affected sales of their most recent album. Really Aslan? Really? Maybe you're just a band that's past it and trying to hock a terrible covers album. I doubt your fans are even interested, let alone the general downloading audience which is mostly made up of teens and early 20s. You could always try what the Saw Doctors did and do an ironic cover of a girly pop group... but really, at this stage it would be a bit sad, no?

Anyways, Una sums it all up in a much better way than I can, so go a read the full article here: http://www.tribune.ie/news/editorial-opinion/article/2009/aug/23/una-mullally-there-are-a-couple-of-reasons-why-irm/

A ginger you won't mind takin home

Recipe: Ginger & Lime Chicken Stir-Fry

A little something for the weekend - a fresh and super quickie & easy & healthy yum-bot-one-pot dinner with stuff you can find in most shops. In Ireland, nearly all of the ingredients were locally produced and in season. Rice, ginger, limes - these will never ever grow in Ireland... so what can ya do?!?

I'm not big on following recipes to the t - if you've got an idea about how cooking & portions work, and have an idea about what you like, feel free to add/subtract from this recipe to your own taste. The portions I've got below are approximate for two, but we also had a bit leftover.

Whatcha Need:

• 2 Boneless skinless chicken breasts chopped up
  (For vegetarian version swap for firm tofu or quorn)
• 1 Medium sized fresh lime - cut in two
• 1 or two tbsp of finely chopped up fresh Ginger Root
• 2 Cloves of garlic finely chopped or pressed
• 2 Carrots - finely chopped/peeled/grated
• 2 Cups chopped up broccoli
• 3 Cups or so of cooked rice, (150 grams uncooked) whatever type you prefer. I went with 10-minute brown rice, though jasmine would be de-lish.
• Light soy sauce
• 1 or 2 tbsp vegetable oil
• Ground black pepper to taste

optional bits:

• A sprinkling of sesame seeds
• Pickled lemongrass to taste
  
• Oyster sauce or some other Asian-y flavory sauce
• Cashew nuts
  

I did this up in a wok, but a large frying pan or sauce pot will do just fine. Heat up your oil, throw in a clove of garlic and half the ginger. Throw in the chicken, add a dash or two of soy sauce, squeeze the juice of half the lime. If you feel like it, throw in a bit of oyster sauce and some sesame seeds. Grind some black pepper into it for super duper flavor explosion.

When the chicken's browned, throw in the broccoli & carrots. Add any more sauce if you feel it's all looking a little dry, and add the other clove of garlic & the rest of the ginger. If you've got pickled lemongrass throw in a few teaspoons. Don't forget to constantly taste to make sure the proportions and tastes are right (once the chicken's cooked thru that is!).

When the broccoli's gone all super bright green, add the rice, stirring it well into the chicken and veggies. Squeeze in the other half of the lime, throw in a few more sesame seeds if you fancy it and taste. Is it nice? Need anything? More sauces? Are the veggies cooked to your liking? If it all tastes good to you, go for it! Serve in a bowl....

My favorite thing about cooking is that most of the time there's no hard & fast rules. Experimenting with different flavors, or finding an amazing flavor combo and seeing what else it works well with. Ginger & Lime is my current favorite flavor marriage.

Here's what is all looked like cooking, before the rice was added (happy boyfriend not pictured).

The Greatest Story Ever Rolled

Every Friday I put together a mixtape of 10 songs I'm feelin at the moment. These are published on my other Blog: LoveActionLuvs.blogspot.com - and can also be subscribed-to podcast stylee on iTunes and other podcast aggregaters...

Today, I'm in a roller disco mood - hence the latest mixtape: Keep On Dancing

Here's to Roller Disco... and Scott Baio... and Patrick Swayze:

Change More Than Your Clothes: Re-Dress

As posted previously, I went along to Castlepalooza - a music and arts festival in Charleville Castle in Tullamore. While there, we met and chatted with the incredibly cool folks behind Re-Dress, a non-profit organization dedicated to the fashionable side of the ethical/sustainable/recyclable movement. As their tagline says, "change more than your clothes." I LOVE love love their ethos: you don't have to compromise fashion for your ethics and vice-versa. Just check out their gorgeous and stylish website: http://re-dress.ie/

The site is a little hard to navigate, but once you get stuck in, it's really a treasure trove of information, tips, ideas and a forum for like-minded individuals. Later this month they are hosting one of their "Crafternoon Tea" events, which they are calling a Fashion Skills Crash Course. It's Saturday the 29th of August from 10am-5pm and will set you back 60 clams, but lunch is included.

What to expect? "A full day of workshops with top Irish designers that will take you through the design process; from designing garments from scratch to upcycling old ones." It sounds ah-may-zing and is actually quite a bargain when you think about it. I am actually gutted that I am going to be out of town for the event. *crai* Hopefully they'll have another similar even soon.

MayFly: Affordable & Ethical in Dublin

Just reading the latest issue of Ireland's Le Cool online magazine/event guide thingy and came across an article about new shop MayFly. Nope, it's not a trout fishing shop, it's a retail boutique that deals exclusively in fairly-traded ethical clothes, accessories and more. According to Le Cool, it's all priced pretty affordably - which might just make you break that Penneys habit - at least for a little while.

I haven't been yet, but I hear it's out Camden St. way, near to the Daintree building/Cake Cafe, other havens of sustainable building & slow food goodness which I shall be talking about later in this blog. To be specific, MayFly is located at 64 Pleasants Place, behind Camden St, Dublin 8. A sampling of the children's clothes range available can be seen on this site here: http://www.fairlytraded.ie

Gym Challenge

I'm a "regular" gym goer in the sense that I've had a membership to a gym for the past five years or so, but realistically I only go about once a week, which might seem good to some, but I know it's not exactly going to give me any 'results' to speak of. I do occasionally go on an evening run in Phoenix Park, and I walk or bike to or from work on a regular basis, though this isn't really as noble as it sounds considering walking from the door of my house to the door of my office takes me exactly 17 minutes.

I've been saying for what seems like ages that I'm going to get myself into the habit of going to the gym a minimum of three times a week. Thus far, it has not happened. So here I go, in the spirit of "change for the better" I hereby am publicly challenging myself to go to the gym three times a week. Starting today.

Let's see how we get on shall we?

UPDATE: 1 hour 30 minutes in the gym down, only two more visits to go

A recent project...

A few weeks ago I found myself heading to Castlepalooza with the Irish Music TV crew and did a bit of camera work with them... here's a little preview of how we got on. Lots more to be found on their YouTube channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/IrishMusicTV

Kashi Challenge: Grow One Thing

As mentioned in the previous post, cereal company Kashi are the main sponsor of the Sundance Channel series Grains of Change. On their website they have a handful of challenges, little things you can do to make a positive change in yourself & the world... well, doesn't that just suit this blog then? Here's a good one to share with you, despite it probably being a bit too late in the season:


Kashi Challenge: Grow One Thing
Not a green Thumb? Think again! Herbs, Cherry tomatoes, zucchini, strawberries - depending on your area, various foods can be effortless to grow yourself. Start with something relatively simple and see how far you can take this wholesome habit!

Today, challenge yourself to find out what grows in your region and take steps to get what you need to start a planter's box or home garden for this single item.
--------

Now... admittedly, I have been attempting to grow strawberries in my little cement yard for a few years now - last year probably would have been a success had I not had an adolescent kitten who found the green baby berries too tempting as toys - he basically pulled every single berry off the plant before it had the chance to become even slightly pink. This summer I was a bit more successful and ended up with a grand total of 8 edible strawberries. Hey, it's a start right?

Unfortunately, I'll have to admit eating the strawberries was a bit of a disappointment. Despite the hard-earned satisfaction of eating something that I had grown myself, the berries were pretty much bland and flavorless... add to that the gross fact that the fluff of the neighbor-cat seemed to have permeated every surface of every berry despite having been thoroughly rinsed. Hairy flarvorless strawberries were not exactly what I had been hoping for. Here's to trying again next summer.

To illustrate, here's my harvested strawberry pot, as modeled in an action shot with my cat Noel on the right, and the neighbor's cat Bob on the left


Oh look, you can actually watch Noelie and Bob hair-ify my Strawberries right before your very eyes by clicking here

I'm Loving This Idea

http://www.sundancechannel.com/grainsofchange/

Living in Ireland I don't have the Sundance Channel, so I am certainly a bit late in discovering this program - especially seeing as it is already in season 2 - but the idea of it is pretty much along the same lines of what I'm hoping to achieve with setting up this blog...


It focuses on a handful of people who are spreading the good & sustainable food/lifestyle gospel. Sounds very very inspiring. Here's my favorite quote from one of the plow to plate ladies:

"Everybody can be an agent for change. It just starts with the desire to do one thing and then another thing, and the next thing you know you've created a whole shift in the way you think, and the way your community thinks."

The whole thing is sponsored by Kashi cereal company, and I love the little challenges, tips and recipes they include on the website. Later today I'll post one of the challenges here, and my attempt to try it out.

LATF Whimsical Eagle Shirt!

Now I am ALLLL for taking boring clothes and adding your very own homemade flair to them, but this is taking it too far!

The question remains, is it whimsical... or witty?

Imagine if someone came across this monstrosity of a puffy shirt/man blouse in Brooklyn's Beacons Closet. Be afraid, be very afraid... or possibly just rest assured they'd end up on the LATFH blog:
http://www.latfh.com/

Well thank God for that.

Photo: Horse shoes

I know this is just so wrong... but I can't stop looking and thinking it's amazing. So wrong it's right.


Credited to Iris Schieferstein, and found on the Crappy Taxidermy site: http://crappytaxidermy.com

Nau that's what I call sustainable!

Man-friendly email list Thrillist has just pointed my attention to Eco-friendly clothing & accessories shop Nau.

http://www.nau.com/

Items are made from either sustainably sourced or recycled materials (recycled wool eh?) and although it's called "activewear" (which is usually where I would turn off), there are some basic pieces that look pretty comfy & are actually quite fashionable... To make their little halo glow a bit brighter, they give 2% of sales to social/environmental organizations. You choose where it goes.

The wallets/courier-bags/man-bags aren't too bad either, but... be warned, it's all a bit on the pricey side.

Hang Sangich = Bowel Cancer?

BBC News has just reported that a diet high in processed/cured/smoked meats is a strong contributing factor for bowel cancer later in life. Nice. It'll be no surprise then that a diet without processed foods and more raw foods/vegetables is recommended.

The report was aimed at mothers packing lunches as back-to-school season begins. I wonder how many kids will be excited to open up their lunch box to find a houmous n roast veg dee-lite. Hopefully a few.

Here's a link to the full report: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/8202188.stm

Debate: Mexican Coke vs. Regular Coke

So apparently Coke manufactured in Mexico is sweetened with Cane Sugar, as opposed to High-fructose-corn-syrup, making it taste better/more authentic. Foodies are purchasing it from specialist importers, trendy bars are using it in their cocktails... It is even being stocked Stateside in CostCo supposedly.

I haven't tried it, but I'm curious... although admittedly, I don't even drink full-fat coke in general as I prefer to keep those 200-some-odd calories on standby for excess food. (I know having a diet coke habit is just as bad for my gut/bones/teeth/carbon footprint, but I'm only human).

There's the whole "corn mono-culture isn't great for the planet" debate too - but is sugar cane a more earth-friendly crop? Then again, it's Coke we're talking about here, so I doubt sustainability in their crops, be it cane or corn, ever comes in to play. I'm curious to see if the difference is noticable, but the thoughts of importing it to Ireland from Mexico leaves a different taste in the mouth (expensive/plane emissions etc.)

The debate will remain unanswered so...
If you are curious enough, you can buy it here: http://www.drsoda.com/mexicancoke.html

The foods we eat...

Eating, cooking & food choices/dilemmas will play a large role on this blog - so I might as well get started.

I suppose growing up in California has always had me in the "save the planet"/"watch what you eat" headspace my whole life. Without question, most of that can be attributed to my mom, who has always been a food & lifestyle hero - even though I'll admit I only appreciated once into adulthood. She recommended the book The Omnivore's Dilemma by Michael Pollan, and that's when I really started to be more conscious about food choices based on multiple levels such as industry, export, fossil fuels, humane treatment and not just "Is this gonna make me fat, how much does it cost?"

The book deeply troubled me, made me really re-think my lifestyle, and inspired me to sketch out a million documentary ideas. In fact, it was a big factor in making me start this blog. Luckily for the rest of the world, a company with a much bigger wallet has gone and made the film Food Inc. which hopefully will inspire a few more people to think objectively about the stuff they put in their bellies.

Now, I haven't seen the film as it isn't out in Ireland yet, and admittedly, the opening sequence below does look a bit heavy handed, which ultimately could turn off a lot of people from taking away the message. As I've said before, I'm not vegetarian, I buy most food from large supermarkets, but I'd like to make a conscious effort to eek out food produced in a more sustainable/friendly way.

Below you can watch the opening credits, but def check out the full trailer here: FOOD INC. And the film's website: http://foodincmovie.com/

Welcome to the Experiment

Ahem... well... how do we get started here. Perhaps, it's best to explain the point of setting up this little blog.

I'm no journalist, and certainly not the most expressive writer out there, but I felt I had a lot of ideas rattling around in my head and I wanted a place to keep them. I also wanted to journal my adventures in making myself a bit of a better person.

Yep. A better person. You see, I'm a pretty average urban-dweller for my age: Decent education, liberal-views, long-term-relationship but unmarried, home-owner, a "professional", with a slight perpetual childhood. I like to have fun, I do what I want, but I also would like to try to make the impact of my existence on this planet for the good. My "experiment" is to see how possible it is to make choices that are good for the world, while still leading a normal life, enjoying myself, not going broke and well, without becoming a crazy preachy hippy. Is it possible?

Realistically this blog is going to be my placeholder for the little projects I'm working on and all the interesting tid-bits I've come across in my daily life. I'm hoping that over time I can look back at see positive changes in my life, and the world - even tiny ones.

And just who am I? I'm a California-raised, former New York blow-in, who is now an ex-pat living in Dublin for nearly 8 years. I went to film school and also have a grad degree in interactive media. Professionally I consider myself a filmmaker, I make short films & music videos and work as a video editor/multimedia manager during the 9 to 5 to pay the mortgage, put food on my table, shoes on my feet and treats under the nose of my cat. I play music in a band which is not my profession, but is certainly more than just a lark as it is quite time-consuming and expensive, but still the greatest fun.

Being at a computer for the majority of the work-week I spend a lot of time online and certainly know a thing or two about it's inner-workings and have more than a handful of websites, profiles and blogs that I look after, probably to my detriment, as The Internet is my biggest time-burglar, but also a huge source of a passing daily amusement. Expect links to funny from time to time.

Anyways, here's to the adventure... x jessie