When I was first in Madrid in April/May 2009 I was blown away. One of the first things we did after checking into our place in Chueca was to go in search of some food. Not speaking the lingo at all we looked at various menus outside restaurants all mentioning a “Menu del Dia” (Menu of the Day) We picked a place not the most chic and what I’d probably classify as a working mans restaurant. I had Spag bol as the First Plate (what would be a main in Ireland) followed by I think it was a plate of Eggs / Gammon steak and chips … this came with a bottle of wine … a desert and a...

Just came across this RTE article about Civil / Public servants in Ireland getting a half day leave to go shopping? http://www.rte.ie/news/2010/1202/pay.html Pardon me but … W.T.F. Now my numbers are no doubt off but these are just rough calculations 60,000 civil / public servants all taking a half day … which would be 4 hours … and by the minimum wage would be what exactly? 60000 x 4 x 8 = 1,920,000 million euro assuming they are on minimum wage (again rough calculations) so lets just round it to 2 million euro. Given just how ****ed the country is … erm … this is...

Those who know me probably think I’m some kinda cat obsessed maniac of some sort and I guess you might be slightly right. 3 years ago give or take a few months my wife wanted a cat and we got Yoda (stage name Squishy). I was never a big fan of cats growing up I have to be honest so it came as a rather major surprise to like the little guy so much. 3 years on we’ve clocked a lot of miles and done a lot of work together (working from home and himself being an indoor cat means we’ve spent much of those 3 years together). Squishy has his own facebook page now with 300+ followers which I...