Scotland + Haggis Tours = Pure Sex

11-23-2008

For real, have you checked her blog yet? it rocks.

Scotland, Sexiest Country Ever

11-21-2008

For now, see Elizabeth’s blog, because it is extremely detailed and I won't be able to match that for while.

and the following picasa albums tell the story via pictures:

http://picasaweb.google.com/Elizabeth.Bertke/Scotland?authkey=hwbgTMzIjLM

http://picasaweb.google.com/shawnmconnelly/Scotland#

Scotland Gets Sexier

11-22-2008

for now see Elizabeth’s blog

Thursday's National Express Hell

11-20-2008

I never want to sit on a bus again. After waking up a bit tipsy still and hopefully throwing in my bag what I needed, I took the National Express 591 from Victoria Station to Edinburgh Scotland. Nine hours, too long to be sitting with a wailing baby two seat up from you. The only reason this was any better than a flight was that we stopped every 3-4 hours for a break. Which was one of the reasons it took so long as well. But it was cheap. Can’t really complain. I made it into Edinburgh right when I thought I would and made it to the hostel where I met up with Elizabeth!

Elizabeth and I met this past summer at a Jimmy Buffet concert. After a little chit-chat we realized we were both going to be in Europe this fall. The following Monday we added each other as Facebook friends and didn’t really communicate again until two weeks ago.

I was on Facebook and saw that she was as well. So I messaged here with this:

“Wanna go to Scotland?” Her reply, “yes.”

The rest we figured out over many emails and Facebook messages. Thanks, Mark Zuckerburg.

So we hugged at the hostel after only ever seeing each other once before in our lives. That night we walked around a windy, cold Edinburgh and made our way to a restaurant that gave discounts to folks staying at the hostel which we were laying our heads that night.

I had the Haggis, a Scottish delight. I had heard of it, but had no idea what it actually was. Our waitress came to our table and highly suggested it. I asked what it was and Liz informed me that it was sheep brains and entrails. In disbelief I said, “Liz, let’s have the waitress tell us, I’m pretty sure she knows.” The waitress replied, “Well that’s pretty much what it is.” But it was also mixed with mash potatoes and gravy and was served in this nifty cake formation so I couldn’t complain. It really was delicious.

We polished off our Stellas and headed back to the hostel for bed. As we had a long day ahead of us on Friday.

Life wins

11-19-2008

By the end of the night, I had earrings and a plastic princess necklace on, a jar of pickled onions, a huge boxes of jellybeans, chocolate milk duds, Cadbury cream eggs, and a hard bodies calendar. I was smiling ear to ear and was sticky with champagne. Couldn’t have asked for a better night in London. Again, l’m trying the Tarentino thing.

About a month and a half ago, I spent a week at work going through the stations achieves. I was to compile a 30-minute audio sample of the stations best from the past year. This audio sample, along with a on-air schedule, 5-page write up, and an hour of on-air material from a randomly selected hour of their choosing, was sent to the National Radio Academy for a competition. It was a long monotonous week. But a week ago something came of it.

The National Radio Academy called my boss Gabriella and asked her if someone representing Life FM was going to be at their panel discussion and awards ceremony tonight. She assured them there would be, although until that phone call, there wasn’t going to be.

So tonight, Gabriella and I, after looking for the place for about 45 minutes, sat in on the panel discussion the Radio Academy arranged on radio station imaging. It was extremely informative. I love hearing people talk about radio sound and the psychology behind it, because it’s totally what I’m into. So it’s great to hear people who are as nerdily into it as I am. However, these people weren’t nerds. They were hip, professional audio producers who came from all sorts of backgrounds and worked in all different angles of radio. Before the discussion tonight, they were all given an assignment in another panel members job, and the results were extremely interesting.

After the panel discussion came the announcement of the winner of the Radio Academy’s Nations and Regions Award. I have to admit, as they were describing the eligibility requirements of the award, my heart started pumping a little faster. Finally, it came:

“And the winner of the 2008 Nations and Regions Award is, Life FM.”

Gabriella, in a not-so-quiet whisper said, “Oh my God!” and draws the attention of the entire room. The presenter continues, “I believe we have a representative from LifeFM here tonight.”

The award presenter described the station and why we were chosen:

The judges described Life FM as a community radio station which seems entirely at ease with itself because, first and foremost, it knows and understands its target audience.

Like all entrants to these awards, Life FM was required to submit an hour of continuous output (specified at random by the Academy), along with a highlights compilation and supporting written submission.

The judges felt that the output they heard demonstrated that it is possible to achieve high level of local awareness without sounding parochial - citing, as the best example of this, a feature called ‘Battle of the Brands’, which pitted local businesses against each other for a chance to win some free advertising: the judges felt that this was an excellent mechanic for building listener loyalty, and very well executed.

The judges were also impressed by the standard of the on air presentation, the station sound, and by the written submission that accompanied the Life FM entry. Significant time had clearly been spent compiling this entry - and it was time well spent. Congratulations!

Gabriella went up to say a few words. She thanked me for gathering the audio and gave props to everyone at the station. We were both ecstatic. Afterward, virtually the entire room of audio producers went to a little pub two doors down and I was able to catch up with some of the panel, as congratulations were being thrown our way from all around the bar. Gabriella even had a few of her friends come out and join us. After socializing and exchanging contact info for a while (in hopes of a possible job lead), that pubs started to feel a little tiny, since it was. So Gabriella, her friends and I headed to a pretty crazy basement club, which turned out to be a haven for homosexual men.

Meh, I was in a good mood and had enough alcohol in me to not care about getting hit on, so I hit the dance floor. Before too long though, came the competition portion of the evening.

After listening to a big black drag queen sing, she (he?) took onto the little stage two girls and two guys, one of which was me. We passed a wrapped gift down the line in a musical chairs kind of fashion. When the music stopped, whoever was holding it got to unwrap the first layer of paper and keep whatever they unveiled. I just to happen to be the last one. However, I didn’t get off so easy. In order to earn my prize I had to eat a pickled onion out of the person’s mouth who had the present before me. Luckily, this was an attractive woman, so I had no qualms.

Needless to say, I won. That pickled onion taste is still in my mouth, but I won. On top of the prizes mentioned at the beginning of this post, I also got a bottle of champagne which I shook up and opened in a festive manner all over the dance floor which I then shared with my fellow contestants.

I stumbled home down an empty Regent’s street. It was sweet because they were doing some construction / cleaning I was able to walk right down the middle and take pictures of the stars above.

And I saw a designer clothing store for pregnant women, where you can spend a couple hundred pounds on an outfit that you’ll where for 7 months tops!

Upon arriving home, I awoke my roommates and told them of my night, and it was a night indeed. I had to get some sleep for the next day I had a 9 hour journey to Edinburgh, Scotland.

Shaolin Children are Nucking Futs

11-18-2008

Being employed at a radio station certainly does have its perks. The best one being free tickets to concerts, shows, movies, whatever. Tonight I was given comp tickets to see Shaolin: Wheel of Life.

It was a unique show. It kind of told the story of the Shaolin monks, a peaceful order of monks who lived in seclusion in China. However, when enemies started invading China, they saw the need to learn combat and defend their country. They imitated their fight styles off of animals: snake, tiger, eagle, and rat.

The cast was made up of boys aged 6-18 and a few older guys to play the part of emperors. The tiny boys were the most impressive. I’m not kidding, literally 6 yeas old and these kids were doing flips of each other, performing intricate fighting sequences, and even doing flips where they used the top of their heads to propel themselves into the next flip.

It was like watching a kung-fu stunt show with a storyline thrown into it. Then once the storyline was complete, there was another 20 minutes of even more crazy stunts: walking on axe blades, breaking bricks with their heads, laying ones body on six sharp spears, you know the usual.

Once the self-mutilation was complete and we began filing out of the theatre, Kallie and I agreed that it was cool to see, but we are both pleased we didn’t have to pay for it.

La Clique Monday

11-17-2008

Work was the same as work could be. My night was as bizarre as bizarre can be.

Kimberly, Aurelia, Chad, and I went to wildest show I have yet to see in London. It’s called La Clique, the circus. We had £10 standing tickets, yet in this intimate little theatre, it was all we needed. Basically, the show is a series of small acts:

• Mario the flaming, Queen-loving Juggler
• David O'Mer the wet, muscle bulging gymnast
• Captain Frodo the absolutely hilarious contortionist, who awkwardly stumbles about stage
• The English Gentlemen, two acrobats who display incredible strength and balance
• Yulia Pikhtina, the drop dead sexy hula-hopping lady
• A woman who did magic and stripped at the same time
• and the comedic Miss Behave who entertained the crowd with acts that "don't have you asking how? but why?"

The show was absolutely hilarious, stunning, and extremely entertaining. If you are ever in Londontown, swing by the Hippodrome and check it. You will not be disappointed, guarantee.

Ancient Civilizations and No Stripper

11-16-2008

With only a few weekends left in London, I need to budget my time wisely and hit up what is absolutely essential. From what I had heard, the British museum is one of these such essentials. So today Luke and I gave ourselves a little education and soaked in thousands of years of art.

But first, food was necessary so what better for brunch than a pie from a delicious little Italian place off of Goodge Street.

The museum lived up to it’s reputation, full of priceless artifacts from ancient civilizations like friezes from the Parthenon. I learned today that those actually would have been painted. There was a computer simulation of what the Parthenon would have looked like with these strips of painted sculptures at the base of the roof. There were many scenes throughout the gallery that were either completely or 75% intact. The ruins were actually set up in the gallery approximately as they would have been in the Parthenon, so with the right amount of imagination, I felt like I was there, sandals, tunic, and all.

We even got our feet sandy as we headed back to ancient Egypt via a tour with a lovely volunteer. She told us all about the different dynasties and how the empire evolved with each new pharaoh. While their civilizations were evolving, some of their supposedly ‘new technologies’ didn’t quite work as well as those of old, particularly when it came to burial rituals. A very primitive Egyptian burial was simply a pit dug in the desert sand in which the body was places with whatever objects he or she made need for the afterlife. No sarcophagus, no tomb. Just sand. This preserved the body incredibly well, however, left the body susceptible to tomb raiders and scavenger animals. Hence, why they moved to the sarcophaguses and embalming to attempt to preserve the body for use in the afterlife.

Those with servants even had them killed upon their death, because you wouldn't want to lift a finger in the afterlife. One pharaoh eventually saw the cruelty in this, and since he was god after all, declared that servants could carve a figurine of themselves which would act as their masters servant in the afterlife.

We also saw some samurai armor and Japanese art, an entire collection of African art, and even Indian Jone’s Crystal Skull…. not really, but it is a glass skull that is debated to have supernatural powers.

Oh and the key to decoding text of the ancient world, the Rosetta Stone.

The British Museum also rotates some commissioned contemporary art pieces that are displayed amongst the permanent collection. We were lucky enough to see:

Anthony Gormley’s Case for an Angel I

Damien Hirst’s Cornucopia

Ron Mueck’s Mask II

Tim Noble and Sue Webster’s Dark Stuff (various mummified animals, collected on a metal stand with a light projector showing shadow faces)

Marc Quinn’s Siren (Solid gold statue of Kate Moss in a yoga pose)

We felt a lot smarter after leaving the museum, but we didn’t want to feel too pompous. Lucky for us there was a comic book store right across the street! They had some amazing comics, graphic novels, and books. My favorite was the comic of Firefly, a sci-fi/western series that was on Fox for not long enough.

We arrived back at MTH just in time for the guy’s floor party that was being held in the basement. I was really jacked to go because there was rumor that a stipper was going to be there. Truth be told, it was actually kind of lame. They ran out of beer way too fast and the pizza they promised the 40 of us that were there came an two hours late and in the form of four 8inch little pizzas. Certainly not enough to feed a basement full of hungry buzzed guys.

But meh. Got to play some foosball with pantsless little guys, watched the Packers play Chicago, and played cards with some cool guys from all over the world. It was cool having them ask, “where are you from?” Then I’d point to the screen and say, from where this game is being played.

The night ended at ISH bar with great conversation with Deb.

Saturday at the Office

11-15-2008


I went into the office today. I feel like a real employee coming into work on a weekend. Before I went in though, I had to hit up Primark once more for some essential cheap yet smart clothes. Upon my walk there, I passed by a department store, whose name I can't recall, yet it resembles a Harrods. Anyways, the point is they had this slogan in there impressive window displays. The phrase disgusts me: "The More, the Merrier," implying the more crap you have the happier you'll be this Christmas. Because let's face it, that's what the holidays are all about right.....(hope you picked up the sarcasm there)

I was asked if I wanted to come in today, so I was going in under my own free will. I figured it wouldn't be the end of the world coming in for a panel discussion with some of the local community, and would actually be beneficial. The goal was to get feedback from invited youth and artists in the area to find out how LifeFM (soon to be Bang radio) can better cater to the needs of the community. Unfortunately, do to a very low attendance (no one from the community came at all) the meeting was cancelled. But it wasn't a complete loss since there was in fact work to be done, as usual, so I did some of that.

Did I ever mention this whole Life turning to Bang thing? It's actually been quite exciting lately. Life FM will be changing to Bang Radio on Dec. 8th, a complete re-branding. The music format / target audience isn't changing but the station is streaming-lining quite drastically. I've seen a lot of presenters that I've come to know well be let go as their show didn't quite fit the sound Bang Radio will embody. It's definitely been a good learning experience.

The other excitement of today was seeing a friend's band play at the Barfly off New Oxford Street. The first night I went to the opera with Luke, we were interviewed by a couple who worked for the English National Opera. We had a drinks with them afterward and we agreed that we'd go out on the town some night and see some live jazz. Turns out that the cameraman, Roney, was in a band back in the day that was playing a sort of reunion gig tonight. So I went out and saw him play at a tiny little basement venue that was way too loud. Pretty sweet gig though, they had quite the local following for a little band from a big city.

En route home, I stumbled upon Newman Street and one of the most famous, and believed to be the largest, pieces of graffiti art done by the genius man known only as Banksy. This guerrilla graffiti artist does works all over London and I believe the UK. Done in his very recognizable minimalist style, Banksy's works are always thought provoking and make wonderful statements about the corporate world we live in. If they don't do that, they are random for the sake of random. He puts a little extra spice to life. Turns what would be a blank, dank, dark alley into a work of art. Check out some more of his works here.

Cambridge, It's Not Just for Scholars Anymore

11-14-2008

There he was. I haven't thought about him since my childhood, and even then, I never thought I'd ever come face to face with him. Never thought I'd come face to face with a legend. A man who built a dream. A man who took science and played god.

A man who would spare no expense.

Who is it you ask? We'll get to that later in the day. We're going to Tarantino it. The suspense will kill you.

I voluntarily got back together with the majority of the UWSP International Programs travel group, despite the fact that towards the end of the two week continental tour, I was not looking forward to traveling with that large group again. But it was a Friday, I had off work, nothing to do, and Cambridge sounded like a splendid little day trip. So, after about an hour and a half drive we made it to one of the world's first college towns.

Every building looks like a different section of the Hogwarts campus, beautifully ornate buildings with immaculately well kept grassy knoll courtyards surrounded by the four wings of a particular college. This grass is no ordinary grass. It is privileged grass. Only professors of Cambridge can walk across it, making those tiny blades educated sacred ground.

My understanding is that there is somewhere around 20-30 different colleges as a part of Cambridge University. Each college has it's own name, symbol, subject of study, great hall (for dining and socializing), flag, and each has their own dorm-like building that serves as both living quarters and small group class sessions.

As nifty as it was learning about a University that I am no where near smart enough to go to, my favorite part of this town was the gondola-like punts that slowly floated up and down the Cam river. We rented one and piloted ourselves around, seeing this lovely little town of about 100,000 from a completely different view.

Mike, Chad, Michelle, Shannon, and I wove ourselves through the river on the punt. When I first heard that you can pilot one of these bad boys on your own, I envisioned a row boat. I was pleased to find out, however, that we got to take the same boats that we saw the guided tours taking. The only way to maneuver them is with a 15 foot pole that is used to push off the bottom to propel oneself and dragged behind to rudder in any one particular direction.

Right off it was a bit of a challenge getting the punt headed in the direction I wanted it, but a few meters down river and I had the hang of it. The other guys in the punt didn't quite have the same experience I did and we simply spun in circles. We wanted to make it back within our one hour time limit so we wouldn't have to pay more, so I took the helm again so we could get back in time. All that summer camp canoeing paid off.

As did all those voice lessons. Since I was standing on the back of a boat with a long pole steering people down a sexy little river, I felt it most appropriate to sing whatever oratorio or art song came to my head to complete the gondolier persona. I also gave an amazing tour full of fun facts that couldn't have been further from the truth and came to me just as fast as I was saying them.

We walked around a bit, did some shopping at a sweet flea market where I found a Waupaca police patch! For those of you who don't know, Waupaca is a town in Wisconsin and here I am finding a patch from there in Cambridge. As we walked we also found an Irish piper named Dicky Deegan:

I still count my blessings for seeing the legend. At first no one believed me, said it just looked like him. But it WAS him. John Hammond, billionaire tycoon who built Jurassic Park....well, the actor who played him at least. His name is Richard Attenborough, and had I known his name at the time, I would have ran up to him and asked for a picture. But I didn't know. I just knew him as John Hammond, the man who harnessed DNA from mosquitos to create dinosaurs on an island off the coast of Costa Rica. Since I didn't know him name, I had to suffice for the candid picture:

I also didn't wanna disturb the walk he was having with what looked like a wife and son.

Here he is close up, Mr. JP himself. I first saw him earlier in the day as we were on a guided walking tour. We popped into the King's College Cathedral and were seated while the guide told us about some centuries old graffiti on the walls in the church. I, on the other hand, was way to occupied with this man who looked like John Hammond.

My friends all doubted me, until we saw him again in the street, and one said, "hey is that the guy you're talking about?"

"Yes it most certainly is," I replied, and I ran to get the picture. Later that day when we got home, Chad IMdb'ed Jurassic Park and we found out that Mr. Attenborough was born and raised in Cambridge. Yes it was most certainly him that we saw.

We finished our day with an Evening Sung done by the boys choir of King's College. Incredible. I even got a seat right behind the choir and was reading the music over their shoulder and becoming immersed in their sound as I felt like a member of the choir. They did an absolutely unreal Tavener piece called Magnificant and Nunc dimittris Collegium Regale. Simply brilliant.

A lovely day in Cambridge.

Joyful Thursday

11-13-2008

This evening rocked harder than I expected it to. I did expect some rocking, more than a baby in a crib kind of rocking, but not quite as much rocking as I got.

Kaity and I made plans earlier in the week to see The Joy Formidable, whom we saw open for Does it offend you, Yeah?, a couple of Sundays ago. After 'Formidable' finished there set that night, we decided we'd have to try and find them again before we booked out of London.

Before we went to see them though, stopped by the ISH bar and saw posters for the World Dinner put on by the International Student's House which was starting just as we were entering the building. Down in the theatre, they set up a buffet on each side of the floor, one side veggie and other other with meat, and in the middle large bean bags served as seating. For a free meal, this buffet had it all: shrimp, chicken legs, deep fried meat on a stick, barbecue wings, all done with a unqiue flair from somewhere around the world. Plus free sangria and another ethnic alcoholic beverage that included a lot of crushed leaves and fresh spices. They even supplied a DJ who was spinning clubbing tracks from around the world. The atmosphere was very clubbish as you had to yell over the music to talk, which was rather odd for a dinner. But all around a pretty solid meal.

After the food, which rocked, we got our socks rocked off by The Joy Formidable at the Wilmington Arms just off of Farringdon. A solid show of which I will post some video eventually. Super nice folk as well. We chatted a bit after the show. Gotta love down to earth indie artists.

And probably the best part of the night was the munchies afterward, as Kaity pulls out

her McChicken and it was missing a bottom bun. High quality eating.

Work Getting Old

11-12-2008

Ended up pulling a late night at work this evening. However, I was determined to not just go back to MTH, so I walked around Westminster. I found a bar. Not just any bar, but a little hip place beneathe a book store. The best part: they served Old Fashions, the local Wisconsin favorite consisting of brandy, bitters, and club soda. However, at £7.50 a glass, I decided just going home would be better on my left hip...that's the pocket that carries my wallet.

Learning at Life

11-11-2008

Weekdays have been nothng but work as usual. Lately, I've had the pleasure of working with a new senior manager who is responsible for the highly functional, all new LifeFM site.

I am, after all, doing this work experience to learn and since Chinazor has been here, I've been soaking in all I can from his vast depth of knowledge when it comes to website optimization.

A Lite Monday Night in Camden

11-10-2008

Following a wild day in Camden yesterday, I decided to see what Camden was like on a Monday night. It was just as I hoped, nice and quiet. I popped into a cafe, had myself an Irish Coffee, and further made my way through The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini. Definitely want to read the book before I see the movie.

A chill night indeed but the Fleet Foxes concert I wanted to go to was sold out. Still a lovely evening. Mr. Hosseini entertained me thoroughly.

The best part of today, however, didn't even take place in London, or even on this continent. It actually didn't take place until I was asleep. Sometime last week, I can't recall when, my roommate Chad and I were guests via Skype interview on 90FM's Can You Digg It? public affair's show, and it aired today in on WWSP at 5:30pm CST. My good friends Scott 'DJ Albino' Clark and Daniel Craig Capito host the show every week and talk about news stories taken from digg.com. Each week they also have a featured guest (or in our case guests). Chad and I were pleased as pickled onions to make history as Can You Digg It's first phone interviewed international guest. 

Thanks for making history with us Capito and Albino. You truly are serious business. 

See just how serious it is.

Following the show, Albino even used a clip of me for a promo:

A Second Reading According to the Gospel of Fosters

11-9-2008


I took it easy last night anticipation for today. After all, today is Sunday, and that means going to Church. The group of Wisconsinites heard of the escapade Luke, Kallie, and I had a few Sunday's ago and now wanted a taste. Chad, Kim and I walked our way to Camden, which is just a few blocks walk from MTH and stopped to enjoy three beers with the highest alcohol content we could find.




As usual the pews (a.k.a. dance floor) were full. The congregation (drunk people in their 20s) sang (yelled) hymns (pop songs) of praise (party hits).


The body (a stripper) and blood (beer) was shared with all to unite us as one. The priest (comedian) used lessons (jokes) to show us the way to the truth (the toilet).




Some were even more moved by the service than others. These gentlemen were so entranced, they turned smurf.











Some of the Wisconsin ladies were so moved they converted to nuns of the church as they joined almost every lady in the room on stage for one last drunken dance.






Wow, this is the most sacrilegious thing, I've ever written....do take it lightly.

Following Church, we had our Sunday Brunch at a little hookah bar in Camden. Then around 7:00pm, I rested (passed out).