roryosullivan.co.uk

As we edge to towards the end of May I thought I’d recap on what has been going on with my resolution. I’ve been hunting far and wide for the piece of paper that I wrote down the monthly short list on but to no avail. So I shall now regale you with a short rundown of how things went over the past few months.

January: Well I’ve already gone into detail on launching of the first Mobile Voting App in the UK previously but on top of that I also went to my first ever Qype event. For those who don’t know Qype is a very handy website and Mobile app that provides reviews and information on restaurants, bars, museums and most other types of venue and events. Users can review and submit their own photos and I have found the app really useful for finding out more about places. I was lucky enough to get onto the list for one of Qype’s events, this one at All Star Lanes where we got treated to food, julep cocktails, bowling and Kareoke. You can read more about the event here – Qype Does Booze And Bowling

February: Whilst being a short month also proved fairly difficult one in terms of the resolution. I had very little time as I was working quite hard and Sundays were being taken up with work as well which is why this months first was to work on a live final and backstage at a large event. During the month I had been lucky enough to work at Pinewood Studios in one of their offices but not actually behind the scenes.

I had been luckily in my previous resolution in my trip to New York that I got to stand backstage during the Filming of So Graham Norton thanks to the friend I was visiting however this was the first time I had worked backstage at a major event. I was luckily enough to be sat with colleagues in our makeshift office at Olympia and got to see the massive queues of people waiting to get in, meet the winners afterwards who came round and said hello to everyone as well as catch up with a friend in the green room who happened to be there to see the show.

There was also the first of living in the kind of property I am now living in. I won’t say where or what it is but let me say it’s a fun place to live and I’m enjoying being there so far. I can also say I had my first ever Martini as well, I tried a Vesper Martini but wasn’t really to my taste however the Borough Marketini at Village East was amazing!

Borough Marketini At Village East

March: This was the big one, and I will go into detail about the years worth of firsts I did another time but my trip to Australia was a massive first in that not only was it there first time in Australia but there was several events, drinks, and adventures that were a first for me.

Standing on top of Sydney Harbour Bridge

April: April was mainly a food based month for me. I tried a couple of things that I had never tried before in cooking (well preparing as well). For those of you that know me, i’m not the slimist of people and salads aren’t generally the think eat as I find them horrible and boring and cold and bland. After a bit of nudging I had started to have the odd bit of Italian Leaf Salad (thank you Sainsburys) with my food and had a dressing on it. So first up was my attempts at making a vinaigrette dressing. I was surprised at how easy it was, red and white wine vinegar in equal measures, olive oil and mustard and a massive shaking up was all it took. I’ve made it again several times since.

Bacon And Egg Pie - Before going in the oven

The second food related thing was making a pie from scratch. As part of an Easter weekend including some quiet bank holiday weekend drinks I made, using the Speights Southern Man Cookbook their massive Bacon and Egg Pie. Having never made a pie before I managed to pick a nice easy, and very very tasty, recipe. It seemed to go down well with the guests at the party and no one mentioned they didn’t like it so hopefully it was well recieved

Bacon And Egg Pie - Fresh out of the oven

As part of that Easter weekend I also attended for the first time ever and Easter Choral Eucharist at Southwark Cathedral, a very interesting event and procession, whilst it wasn’t my normal kind of thing it was good to see what goes on and did make me think a little.

May: Well that is still to come… I need to get myself on a Boris Bike by the end of the month to complete this one.

The other things initially planned (Some of them might change slightly) are

June: Being away for my birthday for the first time and going somewhere unknown

July: Still TBC…

August: Tea at the Ritz

September: Bass lessons

October: Cook a 5 course dinner

November: Put on a photography exhibition

December: Christmas out of the UK (well SW England) for the first time.

If you think you can help with any of these then feel free to let me know…

We are now well on the way to midway through February and I still haven’t mentioned what I did that was brand new in January. It’s a work project and is ultimately a bit of lots of peoples work not just mine and it’s sort of not the first time I’ve done it more around what the project is, to make it a bit simpler here are the are new and aren’t new parts.

What isn’t new:
I released an iPhone app (done a few of these)
I went to a tv studio

What is new:
The big part of the application, voting, has never been done before in the UK on this platform  (and possibly the world) and I managed it’s design/development and release from start to finish!.
I’ve been working in a production office in a tv studio (I have been in tv studios before but not really worked in one)
I’ve been to Pinewood.

There was also a couple of little things that haven’t really counted as they were things like trying a particulaer beer for the first time (Stella Black since you asked).

I also spent some time writing up the list for the rest of the year. I’ll publish the intended list soon and hopefully some people might be able to help me achieve some of these things

*please note these views above and in this site are my own and not that of my employer in any way.

It’s amazing how family and friends and can help you sometimes, tiny little things can play an important part in realising how good a friend they are or how close to your family you really are.

I won’t go into it too much but the really big thing that was in my resolution for 2011 – Going to Australia for a friends wedding, is now a reality! I’ve managed to get the cost of part of my flights covered which means I am going! I am stupidly excited about flying all the way over, about being in the sun and of course being at the wedding.

I’ve still got to cover my internal flights or alternative travel plus my accomodation and living costs whilst I am out there and I’ve got a little over 2 months to sort that! It’s been through the generosity of family and friends, a pair of whom are funding me to walk over the top of the Sydney Harbour Bridge as a treat, that I am going to be able to do this and for that I’m eternally gratefull to them that they would do something like that for me.

I’m still to decide what to do with January, I’ve not got much planned as I need to keep money very tight after christmas and need to fund the trip but this does allow me the freedom to be flexible should an amazing opportunity arise.

You can read about my previous attempt at the resolution in 2004 and what I am trying to do here – http://roryosullivan.co.uk/2010/11/07/resolutions/

If you have any suggestions, ideas or want to offer me an opportunity just add a comment to this or the other post, email me or get me on twitter.

I’m looking forward to this resolution and to 2011 – I hope you are too

After a couple of crap months for me in what has been a mediocre at best 2010, things seem to be slowly sorting themselves out. I won’t go into the details of stuff but lets just say a bunch of stuff that I didn’t want to happen did, and load of stuff I wanted to happen didn’t, all quite closely together after a long slow start to the year.

Waiting for ideas

Things are looking up though, and after several conversations with people and sorting out a few things I’ve decided to resurrect my New Years resolution from 2004 for 2011. It’s a simple principle and should hopefully prove fun. the principle…

Do something brand new I’ve never done before each month.

I’ll be writing up these things as I go, sharing the planning and the results but before I start the first thing in January I need to work out at least some of the things I’m going to do, I want some of the things to be sporadic and unplanned as that should be part of the fun but a small amount of preparation will no doubt be needed for some of the things.

This is where you come in, hopefully there are some of you out there that have done some odd and amazing things in the past or have some skill or talent in something that you think you could teach me or an opportunity that you think I should get involved with

in 2004′s resolution I did some simple things and some fun things. Below is some of the things I tried to give you an idea of what I am trying to achieve.

January – Got my first Tattoo
February – Did proper painting on Canvas (I still have some of them)
March – Went to New York
April – Driving a racecar (single seater) around Brands Hatch
May – Speed Dating
June – Bungee Jump
July – Proper Barbers cut throat shave
August – Played in a band (Well as the”Bez” character, also whilst dressed as Jimmie Krankie – don’t ask) & went wine tasting
September – Customised clothing
October – ? I think this was cooking fish for the first time
November – ? I can’t remember this one
December – Dance Lessons (Rock&Roll/Jive type stuff)

You may notice that October and November are sort of absent, my mind has gone a little blank on these, I think October was the cooking month and November has perplexed me. I tried the wayback archive and I only have 2 blog post title for those months however it didn’t actually archive those pages. Octobers was titled “Who needs Gordon f*****g Ramsey” so I’ve failry sure I got that right. Novembers was titled “Shape and Form” and it has really drawn a blank so if anyone who knows me from back then can remember then please let me know!

So, with a couple of months to go and some planning already started, I want to go to Australia in March for a Wedding (never been to Oz) but without taking out a loan (done that before!) it’s not really looking possible (unless some strange benefactor decides to give me a load of money for no reason or I win the lottery) so the 12 months of 2011 are open for suggestions… write a comment, email me or get me on twitter and tell me your suggestions.

Well I’ve just had another amazing long weekend in Pilton for the 40th Anniversary Glastonbury festival.

The view over the Pyramid Stage

Highlights were

Flaming Lips
Stevie Wonder
Muse
Lou Rhodes
Ray Davies

I’ve created 2 spotify Playlists

Pt1 – The Highlights
http://open.spotify.com/user/rawedge/playlist/0auJ6272FOKDcShh0zXQy8

Pt2 – The Emotional Bits
http://open.spotify.com/user/rawedge/playlist/1CLNRu1w7t3eZGlXiBB1uB

You can also see my photos from my trip here

http://www.flickr.com/photos/raw-edge/sets/72157624258148835/with/4745570890/

I’ve been looking over the sites that I have found most useful, entertaining or inspirational in 2009 and thought i’d share these. Some are just plain simple, some are services, others are, well, probably old hat to some people but have made an impression in 2009. So in no particular order are:

http://www.twitter.com

Twitter has enabled me to keep better contact with lots of people, and take some conversations out of their normal environments and into a public area where others can get involved.

http://www.facebook.com

Another obvious one but it has enabled me to get back in contact with people, even in short spurts, that I haven’t spoken to in a long time.

http://www.lamebook.com/

Lamebook follows on from Facebook nicely, it’s amazing what people will admit and not realise what their privacy setting are like!

http://xkcd.com/

One of the funniest online comics there is

http://30-f-london.blogspot.com/

An interesting and well written woman’s take on love, life and sex in London (probably NSFW for some people due to language)

http://www.holymoly.com

Always funny, sometimes harsh but the best UK gossip site there is. I especially like the Rules and Corner sections

http://www.gizmodo.com

I’m a geek, I’m not ashamed to admit it, whilst I can’t afford a lot of tech I can drool over the gadgets and potential technology that Gizmodo

http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/

The Big Pictire is the Boston Globes photogrpahy blog of amazing photographs from all over the world. Some stunning photography

http://www.passiveaggressivenotes.com/

Passive Agressive notes is simply a great peice of entertainment

last but definitely not least

http://postsecret.blogspot.com/

Post Secret can be an awe inspiring source of inspiration and what people are willing to admit is amazing, one day I’ll get the courage to send something of my own one day

In my attempts to pull back some creativity in my photography I’m setting myself a monthly photography project. The idea is simple. The lucky dip. What does this involve you may well ask. Well it involves the list below. Each item is printed onto a bit of paper and folded up. They are all stuck in a hat and on the first of each month 2 bits of paper are pulled out, these two words form the basis of the project, at the end of each month I inted to post up on here a link to the flickr gallery for each project aiming for 10 shots for each project.

Below are my initial bits and pieces, the idea is there will be more than 24 items so that some will be missed and it gives a greater chance of a random project being created. Please feel free to add some suggestions in the comments or If you fancy joining in then let me know.

Adventure/Action
Animal
Architecture
Artistic
Black & White
Camera Phone
Commercial
Documentary
Event
Macro
Nature
Night
Panoramic
People
Pinhole
Scenic
Sports
Travel
Time-lapse
Red
Green
Blue
Yellow