Flour Power

There's more to the 2010 Irish budget, but what most people notice is signs like these at pubs:

It's not a major reduction. Actually, it's just about 15-20 cents per pint, but it does feel good paying less than €4 for a Guinness.

Well, my friends, it’s all nice and fun to go out and drink “a few” beers but if you add that to the fact that I haven’t done any kind of exercise in something like half a year (and my work consists of sitting down in a chair for 8 hours), you can imagine that the abdominal area is starting to grow. Oh, and eating a lot of junk food kind of helps…

Before you start criticizing me for eating a lot of junk food let me point out that I do it because it’s very cheap at the supermarket (I can get a pizza for 2€) and I just don’t have the time to waste on cooking. For example, today’s dinner, a simple steak with rice and an egg took 1 hour to cook, eat and then wash the dishes. If I did cook frequently I would have much less time to update this blog, for example. And let’s not forget about Facebook, Twitter, reading blogs (my Google Reader counter shows a scary 1000+ blog posts unread) and watching Lost, Heroes, How I Met Your Mother, Family Guy, The Big Bang Theory, and a movie every once in a while. But I digress, let’s go back to the original subject.

So I decided to stop being lazy and start exercising. Well, at least trying to burn enough calories to counter the effect of the beer (Guinness is quite heavy on those). The plan was set in motion last week, when I bought some cheap runners and running jacket at Aldi. The plan is to do some running and also some pushups and situps.

Starting with the running, the first “jog” was yesterday. Sketched a route on Google Maps and there I went, hoping not to break halfway through it. Surprisingly, it went pretty okay, and I even managed to extend the route a little bit. And since I like statistics, here’s what MapMyRun has to say about this first run:

Date: 15/04/2009
Time Taken: 00:17:00
Total Distance: 3.06 km.
Burned: 89 (kcal)
Speed: 10.78 (km/hr) (avg)

Not so bad for a sedentary bastard, right? But quite weak otherwise. The objective now is to gradually increase the distance, while at the same time increasing the speed. And I’ll need to look into how much calories a pint has, because that 89 looks quite low.

And as you can imagine, my legs are hurting in a way that makes me limp while walking…

I mentioned in this blog how to make green beer a few days ago. And then while we were wandering around Dublin during St. Patrick’s Day we happened to enter The Church where they were actually selling it. So of course I had to try, right?

And I do mean green. The color, not the environmental-friendly thing.

Over at WikiHow there's a tutorial on how to make green beer. All you need is some green or blue food coloring (or even "Blue Curaçao"):

1. Get a light beer. This can also be done with a dark beer, but it'll require so much food coloring that it turns your teeth green when you drink it.
2. Pour some of the beer into a glass or mug.
3. Place 4-6 drops of green food coloring in the beer. The blue coloring and the "Blue Curaçao" also work because the beer is already yellow and mixing that with blue makes green.
4. Pour the rest of the beer. The pouring action should mix in the food coloring, but stir lightly if needed. (Stirring too much can make the beer flat.)
5. Drink!

And, of course, there are videos on Youtube to show you how it's done:

Enjoy your green beer!

Next time I'll ask what's the price

After 2h30m in an airplane to cross more than 1600Km and another 3h40m to cross the 200Km that separate Dublin from Galway (hooray for Irish buses!), I finally arrived at my destination. And what's the best way to celebrate the fact that I arrived safe besides the fact that these folks drive on the wrong side of the road? With a pint of Guinness, of course.

But only after dinner! Never have a drink on an empty stomach...

Dinner was at the Charcoal Grill, a kebab place that I'll probably be visiting a lot in the next few months, since it's one of the few places that stays open until late (perfect for a snack on the way back home). The meal was very nice, but I have the feeling I missed something.

After dinner, the tasting of a proper Guinness, in a proper Irish pub, in Ireland, took place in The Dáil Bar. And I have to say this will be the first of many... Even though it might take a while to get used to the price... €4.20...

That was the first day. Nothing too exciting, because I was a bit tired from the trip. There will be plenty of time to explore Galway's nightlife in the next few months. I could sense some... let's say... potential for lots of fun...