2012! life after 6 months in living in ireland

Dear Reader,
I am highly embarrassed that I have not updated my blog in 3 months but better late then never, right? So I am decided to tailor my blog to focus something I love. Fly-Fishing. Atlantic Salmon season opens on February 1st and I am getting more amped as the days draw closer for opening day.  The reason I want to shift the focus of my blog is throughout out all my research of salmon fishing in Ireland I have not found a good local blog or website that reports on the fishing conditions of the River Lee, Cork's local river. Since I plan on spending most of my free time out on the river I will be able to talk about my experiences and interactions with fish and other fisher people. Now you may be thinking I, "Rob I just want to hear about your life in Ireland, not you ripping lips and slaying some chromey ATL's" but i plan on also using a fishing inspired blog to tell just a little bit about what I am doing besides fishing, so don't fret.
Here is a video and some picutres of stuff I have been doing lately

http://vimeo.com/34925780 This is a video Zach and Abe made one night when we were cooking dinner, I want to not that double shanked hooks can also be used for frog patters as well not just streamers.

But lets recap what I have been up to since my last post on November 11th. Which is a lot but here are some pictures

thanksgiving!

ROme!

ME in St. petersburg

FISHING, no public waters:(

What's the Crack?

Hello friends,

The lads excited for the tour!

Fig. 1 Color Difference in Whiskey over an 18 year period, Left to right

The first part of my blog post is a little story about Irish Whiskey. The Jameson Whiskey Factory is located in Middleton, Ireland, a small town outside of Cork, Ireland. The Middleton factory produces every drop of Jameson Whiskey in the universe. Upon coming here I have been curious about the hearty tradition of distilling Irish Whiskey so last week I went to the source. My companions and I traveled to the factory and took a tour. We learned that Irish whiskey is distilled three times instead of scotch whiskey which is distilled twice and american whiskey which is distilled only once (gross).

Brass Still for Whiskey Making

Now for all you whiskey drinkers out there go pick up a bottle of 18 year Jameson and enjoy.

Sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_whiskey

Very cool sandstone layer in there

The second half of my blog is about turbidites, turba-whats? They are essentially giant landslides create massive sheet deposits of interbedded sand, cobbles and mud. Now, turbidites are a good source rock for hydrocarbons so when we went on our Petroleum geology field trip we looked a some turbs. Turbidites look really cool in outcrop becuase they have really well defined beds and look awesome.

The pair of lines are faults from when the turbidite was just starting to compact and the weight of the front got to heavy and the front half slide down. Then you can see the new layer on top were the are no lines! Super Geology

A turbidite deposit protruding into the ocean, the shadows are for scale. Thats one big turbidite deposit I would have to reckon.

The rest of the trip was a real crack. No sleep, lots of spirits, and swiming in the Atlantic ocean.  My favorite memory of the trip was having my professor Ed Jarvis leading our class on a late night beach walk after we got kicked out of the pub. Not a bad way to spend three days.

Falling asleep on an outcrop

Cheers from Ireland, thanks for reading lasses and lads!

I am headed to Rome in a few weeks so I am very excited for this next blog post it should be a dandy!

Zeee Gerams Yaaaa

Zach and I at the Neues Palais, this cool old building built in 1750 by king Fredrick the Great

Dear Reader,
I recently returned from deutschland and lemme tell ye, when referring to stereotypes, most hold true. Most lads and lasses dressed in dark colors (shades of grey and black) and have the weirdest senses of humor but all very nice people unless they are staring at you, germans do that alot. I unfortunately did not have a chance to go out raving to euro-techno, which heart me inside.  The whole reason I was in Germany was for a G.I.S class,  G.I.S is cool. I am going back to  in the Spring time, please let me know if you have any suggestions of places to go near Berlin. Danka everyone!

    They had a 3-D lab called the "cave"  This the crew checking out some cool rock layers!

German man wearing a stylish murse

                        Coming Next week is a tour of Irish Whiskey,  hope you tune back in reader

                                                                          Peace and Love,
                                                                                    Rob

Couple more cool photos!

 I step off the plane into the zurich airport in Switzerland and I got to see my best bud! ROGER

 A wait a 50 foot picture isn't good enough

Thats him as a we boy playing tennis, with a life size picture of him watching his younger self.
Bless the Swiss and Roger

Day 15

Dear readers,
I have been in Ireland for 15 days, so I thought I should enter another blog post. I can sum up the my first two weeks here in two words, lovin it! My two buddies Abraham Schmidt and Zachary Holyman arrived shortly after I did and we swiftly found a house to live in. We go to a market every few days for fresh produce, meat and bread. The picture on the right is of the town market, Its an amazing place, like a farmers market on crack. The night life in Cork city is hopping, clubbing is a big deal here, and I don't mean the baby seals kind. On most nights of the week one can expect to see scantly dressed women parading around the city center wearing only high heels and upper thigh length dresses (they look like whores) and following closely behind them is a bunch of euro fab dudes wearing track suits, and gold chains.  (pictures of them are coming soon).   
I have also started school which had to happen at some point. I get to study geology so I have no complaints. I have classes three days a week which leaves me lots of time to travel and see stuff.













This picture is of the main building on the UCC campus at sunset. Looks like Hogwarts Ehh?

This is were I leave ye know readers, looking off towards yall. I miss America and my friends and family.

Cheers,
Rob

15 Irish men vs me

As soon as I touched down in Ireland one thought rose to the top of my thought inventory. Drinkin' a pint of ole Guinness. Now, I was not about to walk into any old pub in Cork and order my first alcoholic beverage in my life, no folks this took thought. As I toured Cork by my lonesome there was a pub on every corner and I kept saying to myself, "this one looks good...wait keep walking...there will be a more welcoming one." Of course, beer is not a new liquid to me but for some reason these 470mml of fluid meant something more to me then any other old 470 mml of liquid. So as a walked through the vibrant city, passing pub after pub I finally found one. The pub had no name and was very small. As, cornfed American me entered the small room no bigger than the size of a gas station but one of those stupid ones that don't have any food or drinks just small cash register and one cooler full of a dilapidated soda selection, most of the conversations stopped and I got many drunken "goo day chap". I walked in dragging my larger than average back pack with nalegene hanging off the side set it on the floor next to a old leather covered stool and asked a short bald man for, "one pint of guinness please." He looked at me and said tree-fifty euro (tree is how irish folk say three) I paid the man and settled in to my bar stool, listening to the sounds of old crotchety men mumble "fuk" everyother word when the news reporter mentioned the european economy. Fill in the rest, I am super Jet legged and need to sleep. Moral of the story is the Guinness was really good and I old men are funny looking.

peace and love,

Rob

Day 1

Prologue:
Dear Friends and Family,
Today I attempt to write a blog of my escapades in Europe which started yesterday 9/8/2011. The main motivation behind this risky and daring attempt is two dear friends of mine who suggested it and I was like, " well that would be fun, I guess I will give it a go." I am not much of a writer and as a disclaimer for those reading it, I have a horrible habit of switching tenses so please bear with me. I also am a awful speller. I was once giving a spelling book in 6th grade by a friend of mine, I guess I should have read it. Another thing to note for you readers out there is in the spirit of the country I am residing in is I might fall subject to entering my posts when I am blitzed, crapulous, sozzled, plotzed, or hooched-up. It is up to you to read past that fact.  With all those details out of the way the adventure begins.....