No.142 Of Clocking the Miles & The Years

Wow! Torr Head to Malin Head to Fanad Head in the MG in two glorious days of sunshine. I'm not sure if life gets much better than this.

I've discoverd that it doesn't matter how much you cover up when driving a convertible the sun or the wind will get you somehow. Presently my nose is as pink as the shirt I was wearing for the East to West leg of the journey.

When I was first in Donegal about 12 years ago I happened across a lovely couple Martha & Tom Kilbane who ran a guest house just over the border in Fahan. It was superb Irish hospitality at it's very best. They took it upon themselves to look after this rare man who suddenly appeared one day to look for somewhere to live before he started work over the border in a few weeks' time. On Saturday I tracked them down. Now living in Buncrana and well into their 70s they would hardly let me go - not that I wanted to - a more wonderful couple you're unlikely ever to find.

Today is different. We're working flat out to finish our training centre and it's meeting after meeting to get ready for season 2 which starts on Thursday as well as year 2010 which starts all too soon. If only we could work by the Donegal clock things would be so much easier....

No.141 Of Trusting Illusionists & Weather Forecasts

So Brown let us down last night and didn't afterall tell us how he predicted the numbers. Mr B I really admire what you do and your skill but I think there are trust and confidence issues kicking around here which you ignore at your peril.


I'm here looking incredulously at the weather forecast : three days of full sunshine - all of which I plan to make the very most of. Already on my itinary is three laps of Donegal, including twice round the Atlantic Drive and twice round the Innishowen 100 with stops for dips in the Atlantic. Throw in 20 Mr Whippy ice creams, 4 picnics, a day surfing and 30 prize winning sandcastles and I might just feel I've had a summer by Monday.

No.140 Of Life's a Lottery

All this talk about the lottery and Derren Brown prompted me earlier today to think about lotteries, gambling and the fact that when I was about 8 I was given a pile of Premium Bond Numbers as a birthday present. Knowing that I've moved around so much since I was 8 (in fact 26 times to be exact) I thought there was a good chance that I may have won a load and have never known and there's a pile off wonga waiting for me to collect. Alas a search on their site where you can find out if this is the case by entering your numbers informs me otherwise. That's 36 x 12 x 100 and at least 42,3oo draws I have been in without winning a penny! Clearly the luck of the Irish is not rubbing off on me and I need to watch Mr Brown this eveing to see what I can learn.


It's a glorious day outside with a forecast of 2 more to come. All well made plans are being abandoned on behalf of a trip to Donegal this weekend in the MG...

No.139 Of Brown & Blackberries

Yes! Started today with a bowl of porridge with fruit (courtesy of Legal-Island's very own "wild" blackberry bush) followed by 20 lengths of the Antrim pool. Question is will I be flagging by lunchtime and think by then that such activity so soon after a lazy holiday was actually a very silly thing to do?

Derren Brown you are a Master Self-Marketeer. I've no idea how you did what you did last night but everyone is talking about it. Its hot in Twitter, on the web and the radio. As I drove to the pool Cool FM was talking about it. When I drove back half an hour later they were talking about it. My guess is that there's a technical explanation here - perhaps numbers on the balls can be changed remotely.

There's loads happening this month at Legal-Island. Twitter seminars, the opening of new facilities here, an Education Law Conference - the first of it's kind and an MG this Saturday if I can find out where by then. Onwards in fourth gear with the override button on.

No.138 Of Powerful Salutes

Wow! What a way to finish off a day. Gareth Malone in "The Unsung Choir - South Oxley" - if there's a bit of better tele on at the moment that I'd like to know. He's modest, understated, highly motivating and clearly deeply passionate about what he does without edging towards evangelism. Yes I've no doubt the programmes are edited to carry a pre-determined message and I suppose he does play to the camera but it no less powerful because of it. Gareth I salute you.



I finished last night by reading Jonathan Dimbleby's "Russia". This is a book that offers the reader what can only be described as alost perfect articulation. It's well reasearched brutally honest, observant and his ability to describe what he notices is masterful. Jonathan I Russian salute you.

No.137 Tuning In and Out

I attended a half day seminar this morning in Belfast. It consisted of about 30 people representing about as many organisations all with a common interest : innovation.

I decided right at the start I would volunteer for every job going. If we were asked for questions I'd fire one in and possibly more. If they required a volunteer to facilitate a breakaway session and report back to a plenary group that would be me. I find it's the only way I can engage nowadays and be sure that I'll stay tuned in to these types of events. Is this a reflection on the quality of seminars nowadays or is the explanation more simple and personal than that I wonder? I fear the latter.

Presently I'm busy preparing a presentation for a company strategy update tomorrow. It's very hard to resist the temptation to play around with the knobs and whistles that come with Power Point 2007 thinking that it will significantly improve what I want to get over.

No.136 Of Unplugging

Wow! Two weeks away from the Internet on holiday and not once did I miss it. No cravings. No trembles. No irrate moods - not cold Turkey related at least. What message should I take from this? That life unplugged is possible. Enjoyable even?

Today, however, was payback time. As I tried to juggle 26 balls in the air at once more staff appeared with yet more balls and so the day continued.

Last night I wrote down a few personal objectives for the next three months on the Island. The first is to lose weight. The second is to spend less time (and preferably no time) watching rubbish T.V.. Last night I was watching that stupid "Guest for dinner show" on C4. I was fuming with myself by the end of the programme that I had wasted a whole 30 minutes of my life on it. So why didn't I just switch off my tele and do something less boring instead? (Wasn't that the name of a kids T.V programme in the 80s? I think it was). The third PO is to read more. I'm currently reading Jonathan Dimbleby's "Russia" and it is just wonderful. He's so articulate and his vocabulary so strong that he has me dashing for the online dictionary at the turn of every page. See, I knew life without the Internet wasn't so easy afterall....