I don’t do silly blog antics much, but I got tagged by Mat for the Four Things meme. Looking around, it is indeed a bit more interesting than things like the usual LJ quiz, so why not!
I wrote this on the plane from LA to Dublin, which may have affected some of the selections in 4 places I would rather be right now at least ;)
4 jobs I’ve had:
I was Iona Technologies’ first employee, and stayed there for no less than 7 years. I got to see the company grow from a handful of people, most of whom weren’t getting paid (hence how I wound up as the first employee ;), all the way up to a 300-strong multinational, while the company itself formed a core of Ireland’s mini dot-com boom. That was fantastic fun, and educational to boot.
my Dad’s gun/fishing/sporting-goods shop. Was it really a good idea to have a teenager working near firearms? At least I wasn’t the one who unplugged the fridge where the maggots were kept, so that they all hatched over the course of one weekend…
A horrible teenage job — picking tomatoes. I can still feel the orange dust under my fingernails every time I smell fresh tomatoes :( I didn’t last very long at that at all.
writing an Amiga-based kiosk system for virtually no pay whatsoever, at the age of 18 or 19. Ah, exploitation.
4 movies I can watch over and over:
Koyaanisqatsi — it’s dating a little now, since every ad agency through the 90s ripped it off. But still, the invention of a new format. I remember looking at the 405 freeway in LA, and thinking “looks like something out of Koyaanisqatsi” — of course, it was.
Princess Mononoke — either that, or Nausicaa. I just love the way the characters are coloured in shades of grey, rather than black and white.
the Lord of the Rings trilogy — oh dear I’m a hopeless Tolkien fanboy.
Spinal Tap — pure genius.
4 places I’ve lived:
Melbourne, Australia; around the time of the annoying TV drama, The Secret Lives Of Us;
Newport Beach, CA; around the time of the annoying TV drama, The O.C.;
Dublin, Ireland; no annoying TV drama — so far
University of California Irvine, CA; while Irvine itself is the most soulless suburban hellhole I’ve ever visited, living on the UCI campus is quite fun by comparison. Take about 1000 grad students, post-docs and lecturers from around the world; put them all in the same square mile or so; remove all fun (and bars!) from the surrounding areas; watch them make their own entertainment, or go mad.
4 tv shows I love:
4 places I’ve vacationed:
Annapurna Base Camp, Nepal; we trekked our way up to there, then trekked back down again. Unforgettable. I really want to do another Nepal trek as a result
car-camping around the Australian state of Victoria; they have some fantastic national park campsites, which most tourists overlook
learning how to dive in Ko Tao, Thailand; great setting, great dive sites, pretty cheap too!
Yosemite; amazing, world-class natural beauty. Californians don’t realise just how lucky they’ve got it ;)
4 of my favourite dishes:
A good Thai green curry
Laos-style green papaya salad with sticky rice
a good meaty cassoulet, from Fandango in San Luis Obispo. At least, that was the tastiest meal I’ve had in recent months ;)
Mangosteen — the queen of fruit, according to the Thais. I could, and probably have, eaten hundreds of these
4 places I would rather be right now:
spending New Year’s Day with a bunch of friends in rural West Cork or County Galway; until I moved to the US, this was one of my favourite annual traditions.
the Stag’s Head Bar, Dublin, in the snug, again with a bunch of friends
sitting on the grass outside the Pavilion bar in TCD, on a sunny summer’s day (hmm, that’s a lot of bars!)
Chiang Mai, Thailand
4 sites I visit daily:
4 people I’m tagging: