Wheres me jumpa

• morning all. torrential rain, thunder and lightning,there goes the weekend #
• @drtaz what flavour were they? #

• morning all, change in the weather last night, granted its raining as always but it was cold last night/this morning #

• mmm nearly 4 weeks waiting for an RBN to be processed, who has contacts in the cro?! #

I agreed to spend my Saturday travelling from Carlow to Dublin on a bus full of under 11 soccer players. Six of these players had been selected to be mascots on the day, which meant they would meet both teams and walk out with one of the teams.

The bus journey was surprisingly painless. Arrived in Dublin around 4pm and made a beeline for Fagans of Drumcondra. It was then the heavens opened up. For about two hours, there was torrential rain which caused the Tolka river to burst its banks.

Eventualy the news we were dreading came, the match was called off. The Tolka Park pitch was flooded also. Then came the tears. We got our bus back as quickly as possible. Jumped on at 7pm, expecting to be home pretty quickly. Little did we know that the drains around Dublin were giving in to the rain. It took us nearly three hours to get from Drumcondra to the M50. The M50 itself was also badly flooded, the roadworks here assisted the flooding.

Got home late last night, never drinking Guiness before a bus journey again:(

Read about the cleanup of the floods here.

Images can be found here.

Before we got on our bus, a/the marketing manager from Sunderland was also in the bar. He broke the news about the match being cancelled. However he also tried to arrange a meeting for the young’uns with the Sunderland team. This was a long shot which didnt happen but he suggested we contact him regarding a trip to Sunderland to watch a live game, play a game against their academy team and tour the ground.

It was a very nice touch and ties in with the way Sunderland go about their business. They really know how to make fans appreciated, ref: several moments involving Niall Quinn and his generosity.

• Breakfast, run, lunch, shamrock rovers vs sunderland, pints. #

Due to a repeated issue with my dish, repeated call outs to fix (including a fee each time) and Skys repeated unwillingness to resolve this issue without charging me. I decided to cancel my subscription. Cutting off my nose to spite my face, I know.

I am aware of how frustrating their phone based customer service can be and I was dreading calling to cancel. I have also read several articles on issues with cancelling your subscription. A friend of mine, who happens to work in the industry, told me to drop an email to Sky. This is probably a well known method of contacting Sky, however from I have read some people would have appreciated knowing more about it.

So I emailed skydigital@sky.com with my account number, personal details etc. Just got an email confirming my account was cancelled. Quick and easy. Just thought Id pass on the information to anyone else who has experienced Skys phone based customer service.

I overtook a truck one day last week. Its trailer was branded with an advertisement for Drive Beer. I laughed out loud. Below is an image from Flickr of a similar trailer. You can see why I found it so funny. Drive Beer does exactly what it says on the tin, you can drink and drive. Its a clever spin on the low/non alcoholic beer market, however it really is a name and advertising campaign that will raise some ridicule.

This was video was posted on the Carlow forum on Boards.ie. It was created by CroppyBoy1798. It is a series of pictures taken from days of yore, compared to modern day pictures. Great watch for Carlow locals.

My sisters boyfriend is living my dream. He has acquired a Volkswagon Kombi van. For the past year or so he has been working on getting it roadworthy. Now the moment has come, where he can take to the road on this four wheeled legend!

The Cat Laughs Comedy Festival is held every year in Kilkenny. I try to get down to a show or two every year. This year I went to see Des Bishop, Arj Barker and Russel Howard in the Kilford Arms.

Arj Barker started the show off. Ive never seen this guy before but I will definitely try see him again as he was probably the best on the night. He seems to have a care free natural approach to the show, i.e. you dont get the impression he is reading from a script and often went off on bizarre tangents. They type of comedian, when he tells you about some crazy story, you actually believe it happened to him.

Next up was Russell Howard, a young English comedian who although was very entertaining, I wasnt overly impressed with him. I have seen him before on TV and many of his jokes were repeated in this show.

Des Bishop rounded off the night with an effortless performance. He included some material related to this recent Irish language revival show but also had some fresh, unrelated material. After some recent shows and years of touring, it is possible that Bishop is, or is about to, reach the peak of his powers, which made for a side splitting set.

Tickets were €31 incl. booking fee. Would like to have seen more shows but the atmosphere the festival add’s to the town mean’s just being in the area is worthwhile.