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 Charlie Knox26, m, resident of spa, northern ireland, a thinker, who tries to be real, enjoys the company of nala(left), indebted to jesus for his grace and instruction in life and whose, amongst other things, studying sports science at UUJ. enjoy rugby a whole lot! |
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Thursday, April 29, 2004 More evidence that choice has it's downside (this article perfectly describes some of what i feel when i have to go shopping) 'Choice is good. And the more choices, the better. This simple American credo lines the shelves of grocery stores with 162 varieties of breakfast cereal, turns ordering a cup of coffee at Starbucks into an Olympic challenge, makes selecting a phone company an enterprise requiring a business degree and supplies dating services with an endless stream of hopeful customers. It also underlies the way many economists think about human behavior. Human beings, according to traditional economic theory, are rational creatures who, faced with a choice, weigh the costs and benefits of each option and pick the one they prefer. And the more options people are given, the theory goes, the more satisfied they will be. Yet in an article published last month in The Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, two social psychologists dispute this view, arguing that at some point, multiplying the number of alternatives people are given becomes counterproductive. In a series of studies, Dr. Sheena S. Iyengar, an assistant professor at Columbia's business school, and Dr. Mark R. Lepper, chairman of Stanford's psychology department, have demonstrated that providing too many options — particularly when the differences between them are small — can make people feel overwhelmed and overloaded, and as a result, less likely to buy or pursue any of the options available.....' via j cooper posted by charlie | 4:08 PM | Wrestling mate I visited Friends Reunited for the first time in a while today. Found out that one of my mates from school whom I've hardly seen since we left has started up and is promoting his own Wrestling Company in Ulster. The fella who i knew in GCSE classes as Stevie Ferguson is now known as 'Stevie Shaker Baby Maker.' Judging by the picture he's also spent some time in the gym and has tightened up a fair bit! He's also running a fitness company selling nutritional supplements amongst other things. Can't believe it all really - it's made me laugh just thinking about it all. posted by charlie | 3:22 PM | Wednesday, April 28, 2004 Watched 'The Pianist' on Sunday night. It's a true story based around a Jewish Pianist in Warsaw during WWII. It highlights alot of the horriffic treatment that the Jews went through, from being unfairly treated in their normal commmunities, to being caged into Jewish ghettos, being eliminated if they didn't serve any practical purpose and then eventually shipped off to concentation camps. The film brings all these events to light through the experiences of the pianist. In the end he miracously survives the Nazi regime, partly due to an encounter with a German officer whom he played the piano for and in doing so impacted him enough in order to be let to live. A must watch. posted by charlie | 9:16 AM | Here's a few legendary sayings that I've picked up recently in school from some of our well established teachers...... '...it's about as much use as standing on Tyrella Beach with a pitch fork and trying to stop the tide' '....I'm so thin when I take a shower I have to run around to get wet' posted by charlie | 9:03 AM | Monday, April 26, 2004 Schumaker's in the making On Saturday evening a few of us headed up to Superdrive near Portadown for Graham Spence's stag night. We had a great nights craic. Young Nevin Spence was a flyer but forgot about those things called brakes when it came to the corners! At the end of the night i managed to bag 3rd place - although in fairness i had got the quickest kart several times in the heats which gave me a good starting position for the final. This was the second time i've been karting in a few months, although at two different venues. In March i went to Formula Karting in Newry for Greg's 18th. Both venues cost £30 for the Grand Prix setup but otherwise are quite different. Formula is indoor, is very twisty and presents a few more opportunities for taking people off the track by means of crashing into them! Superdrive is outdoor, a fair bit faster, a has stewards who are a wee bit stricter - although we still had a few smashes on Saturday night. I suppose both venues have their advantages and both worth a visit. On a side note i would love a go at the rallying that Superdrive offer. posted by charlie | 9:14 AM | Had a go at the Ballynahinch Lions Club 10k on Saturday. Finished in 43rd place in a time of 48 minutes. Happy enough with that time, without any training. Was a nice run. Always a pleasure to run round Montalto and also to see lots of people you know around the circuit. After the race my feet hurt the most, now it's my legs - it's in such circumstances that we could do with a bath in the house. posted by charlie | 9:02 AM | B'mena 11 - 8 Hinch The Hinch men could hold up their heads with pride at the end of their second Senior Cup Final, having pushed the Ulster and former AIL champions Ballymena all the way. This was a spirited performance from the Hinch side having been on the end of a 60pts – 19pts defeat at the hands of Braid men in the Ulster league earlier in the season.........more posted by charlie | 8:41 AM | Thursday, April 22, 2004 Senior Cup Final Tomorrow night at Ravenhill, 7:30 kick-off, Hinch are taking on Ballymena in the Senior Cup final. If you're free come on down and lend the boys a bit of support. posted by charlie | 4:02 PM | Junior Wine Taster..? Probably shouldn't be nosey. However there's a kid sitting next to me, here in the Ballynahinch Library at the minute. He can't be any more than 9 or 10 years old. The strange thing is that he's looking at a website entitled 'Spain's Finest Wines', and even stranger he seems to be there on purpose and looking for some wines in particular. i know he could be looking at much worse, just thought it was a bit random. posted by charlie | 3:56 PM | Tuesday, April 20, 2004 One for the diary posted by charlie | 12:57 PM | Monday, April 19, 2004 Back to school Started back to school today. Will probably take a few days to transition although looking forward to the new term. Easter holidays were superb. Here's a few of the highlights.... Trip around Co. Down - got out last Wednesday with a few of the rugby boys touring a few of the sites in Down (Drumkeeragh, Legananny Dolmen, Castlewellan Aboretum, Drumeena Cashel, Spelga, Hen Mountain, Dundrum castle and Brennan's for Ice Cream). Weather was great and the craic 90. North Coast on Easter Monday - Headed up to the Kell's caravan on the North coast. Pete and Hannah cooked a smashing fry for lunch, we took a dander along the coastline between Portbradden and Dunseverick, which has some absolutely stunning scenery. Stayed in Dunseverick for a while hoofing about the rugby ball. Then headed back to the van, got some pizza and started a game of Monopoly which lasted for over 4 hours (and i won which made it all the more pleasurable!). I got left there at 1:00 and arrrived into the House at 2:08 - driving at night is so much better - no codgers on the road slowing things up. Monopoly at Colesy's - Friday night past. Played and got stuffed. Stan Kelly won in the end. Complete contrast to the game earlier in the week. This time i was first out. The game is a cracker. Although it definitely reflects pretty acurately how the world works, with the rich getting richer and the poor getting screwed over. Playing the game definitely got the message through to me much better than any sermon will. Debut for the 1st's - On Saturday past i got to sub for the 1st XV for my first time at Barnhall, west of Dublin. Needless to say i was real happy. I've watched the 1st's play since i was a kid and it was a bit of a dream come true to get into the set up. Even better i was fortunate to get on for 15 minutes and got a fair bit of ball to work with. In the end we did loose and that was fairly miserable but i was just happy to get the shot at it. posted by charlie | 10:16 PM | Saturday, April 10, 2004 Had a very lazy day yesterday and somehow managed to clock up 4 movies. Finding Nemo, Back to the Future, Jungle to Jungle and Anger Management. Not far from information overload! posted by charlie | 3:50 PM | Fun easter link (turn up your speakers!) via Dave Dunlop posted by charlie | 3:42 PM | Tuesday, April 06, 2004 Liking Anastacia's new song, Left outside alone. Out of interest does anyone know if it's her who sings the intro? It seems that her voice would have to make some major changes from the intro to the main part of the song for her to be able to sing both. I did see her on TOTP last week and it seemed like she sang both but they are both fairly distinctive sounds. Whatever the case she has a dang good voice. posted by charlie | 9:42 PM | Out of sight, out of mind? Decided to clean the inside of my car out today for the first time since way before Christmas cos it was an absolute tip and beginning to smell pretty bad. Whilst cleaning i stumbled across some walking/hiking magazines that Weeksi had given me when he left for ozzie land. As i flicked through i found an article about drinking water in the mountains. This is something i have always done fairly frequently when in the Mournes provided the water was flowing, there was no obvious contaminant and no apparent human dwellings above the point i was drinking from. The water up their tastes pretty good and always brings out a sense of the rugged, hunter gatherer in you. However the article talked about all sorts of invisible microbes and bacteria that reside in the water, alot of them stemming from decaying animals and also their waste produce whilst alive! I must admit having read about some of the goodies in the water and what they can do to your body i now feel slightly less keen to continue drinking the water that i've always drunk and had relatively little negative consequences. I suppose i will probably continue to drink it though. There's alot of things we wouldn't do in life if we thought about them too much (Like driving for example) - although i'll probably not take that view if i come down with a good dose of the backdoor trot! Anyway heading into the mountains tomorrow with a few rugby mates. First time i've been up them in a while. Probably going to climb Hen. It isn't that streneous and doesn't really offer too many watering holes so i probably won't have to worry about the water tomorrow. posted by charlie | 9:28 PM | Thursday, April 01, 2004 A couple 'o flicks On monday night i watched Love Actually. It was just alright. Some bits made me laugh but i think on the whole it was a wee bit patchy, too much all over the place. I supposed compared to Notting Hill it was a bit of a let down. On Wednesday night i went to see 'The Passion..' movie. Being honest i wasn't blown away. I think this goes down to a few things. Firstly this story is one that i would say i've sadly become over familiar with. I think i've heard, read and watched so many sermons, books, films and dramas about the same thing that it has kind of lost it's freshness on me. Secondly and more related to the movie itself, i think i'd read so many reviews/critiques/opinions of the movie that i had a rough idea of what to expect and they buffered some of it's potential impact on me. Now these aren't to say the movie didn't impact me at all. Very definitely some scenes really were very powerful. Personally i found some of the scenes with dialogue in them were much more powerful than just the graphic and gruesome scenes, many of which felt so far from my life experience that i found them hard to associate with at all, however perhaps it was these scenes that gave the dialogue scenes some of their weight. Particuarly i found the scene where Jesus told Mary he was 'making all things new' and also the scene where the thief on the cross dialogued with the High Priest and also asked Jesus to remember him in his kingdom. I suppose on the whole the few things that struck me most were. Jesus humanity, his very real suffering and strong desires not to be and then out of that the power of his difficult choice to endure through the suffering for the sake of what was in front. posted by charlie | 9:50 PM | |
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