Fantonim.com

This neighbor of ours has been sending me off to work for the past two mornings!

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Some people ask me what it is I do and how the new job goes. Once I attempt to answer their first question their interest in the answer to the second one fades. Nonetheless, let me tell you a few curiosities.

Although I work for a life insurance company we are more of an investment company with some life insurance added to the investment products. I deal with longevity (godforbid the policyholder lives long enough so that we have to keep paying him) and mortality (godforbid the policyholder doesn’t live long enough so that we don’t get a chance to make money from his policy) and attempt to find a fine balance between the two.

There is really a very small amount of ill-wishing to the policyholder that I engage in every day. In fact, I do not deal with people, just accumulated numbers from past experiences. Don’t worry, if you are our client you are not just a number to my company, just to me in my spreadsheets.

There are a few shocks that jolt me to remember that I am in fact dealing with people here, not just percentages. Death claims list is just a list of numbers, until you get to a comment for one of the values that clarifies that this policy was not a death, but a suicide. Or a special request that asks for the policyholder surrender because he is trying to keep the money away from his wife, whom he is divorcing. Things like that remind me that there are people on the other side of the contract and that this can be but should never be lost in the daily routine.

With this banal observation, I go back to the numbers!

• Five card stud, nothing wild and the sky is the limit! #

• When I grow up I want to live in America – I will have access to ALL the cool gadgets! Good bye, disposable income… #

you’re not really following the interwebs:

Watching Canada kick American ass at an Australian sports bar in Dublin! 2:0!!! Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless handheld

I was waiting until I could add this feed to Google Buzz before posting this because, like a true sellout, I was craving a bigger audience!

So here you go, a list initially titled “You Know You’ve Studied Abroad In Ireland When…”, but since some of these items are lost on me and I ain’t no erasmus/exchange student, I picked a more generic name. If some of these items sound like complete gobbledygook, I will attempt to elaborate on the ones that make sense to me in a few posts later. By all means stick around ’till the end for a video treat!

1. You know what “craic” is and that it’s not a drug.
2. You’ll pay 4-5 euro ($8) for one pint and not even bat an eye.
3. You know what the “off-license” or “offy” is.
4. It’s not “good” it’s “grand.”
5. Hurling does not mean throwing up.
6. Going to the pub between classes is not unusual.
7. Rain is a way of life.
8. You begin to end your sentences in “like” like.
9. You’ve washed your clothes in your sink because laundry is about 12 US dollars.
10. The biggest going out nights are Sunday and Thursday.
11. Everyone carries around their own bottle of alcohol.
12. A “rebel gig” is not a stray carriage.
13. Drunken roommates is just the beginning…
14. You’ve said “Cheers!” in place of Thank You back home and gotten odd looks for it.
15. You know what “slainte” means and you say every time you take a drink now.
16. You’ve sung Galway Girl in a pub.
17. Penny’s is AMAZING!
18. You know that Supermacs (or Superdine if desperate) are the places to go after a night out.
19. You know the difference between a naggin, shoulder, and litre.
20. You don’t think it’s weird to drink cider, especially druids!
21. You’ll pay 20 euro ($35) for a large pizza.
22. You get all pissy when you go to a “pub” in the states and they don’t pour the Guinness right.
23. If the idea of leprechauns now makes you roll your eyes.
24. You survived Stab City! (AKA: Limerick)
25. You start saying “Erasmus” instead of “study abroad” because everyone you met that wasn’t from the US looked at you funny.
26. Legend = Cool / Der = There / Dat = That
27. Father Ted is your new favorite comedy.
28. When you’re back home you find yourself forgetting that you can actually grocery shop past 6:00.
29. You get Ireland sick at home much more than you got home sick in Ireland.
30. You feel like never eating chips (french fries) again!
31. You suddenly became a “lad.”
32. You actually end up moving to Ireland permanently just to continue the dream…
33. Dunnes is amazing.
34. Your voice goes down instead of up when asking a question.
35. You go to a cafe and ask for a cup of tea and get REALLY confused when they ask “What kind?”
36. When a three mile walk takes you 10 minutes (walking Irish style).
37. You can’t walk barefoot anymore, cause the kitchen floor is sticky, or has other hazardous objects on it!
38. When make up, mini skirts and high heels don’t have the same meaning back home!
39. When the sun finally show up, you cant do anything else than “nothing”, and the insular can’t do anything else than playing hurling or football in the streets.
40. When seeing an Irish buy an ice cream in the middle of January from a petrol station doesn’t seem weird!
41. You spent HOURS on the bus and walking trying to see every piece of the Island. Of Course, Bus Eireann or JJ Kavanagh and dear Son were your best friends.
42. When you at least waited once for a chicken roll or a smoothie at Spar and juicebar!
43. When you wanted to party all night long, but last calls in pubs were at 12pm and in clubs at 3 or max 4am!
44. When you went up and down the stairs eyes closed at Blarney’s Castle to make a wish, and kissed this cold dirty thing, head down, or when you obviously imagined yourself falling from the cliffs of Moher (and took …a picture across the sign saying “you can’t go further…)!
45. When at least 4 times a week the Facebook of your Irish friends or/and Erasmus friends was saying “i am totaly hammered”, or “Big hungover, i should stop drinking”!
46. Back home you went several times on the wrong side of the car, and looked several times on the wrong side of the street first before crossing a road!
47. When u say Jeeeesus!!!!! after being surprised.
48. You love gingers!
49. When it’s normal to skip classes and to have a guard asking for your ID before entering your village during rag week.
50. When you love eating a hot chocolate muffin at Supermac’s!
51. When you discover FRED and now, love them !
52. When you know what “Garda” is and cross your fingers that they don’t show up in your party!
53. You have to pull a string in the shower to get hot water.
54. You have to take a cab home anytime after 11pm.
55. When Tesco only sells mac’n'cheese in a can.
56. You cannot do anything business-related between 12 noon and 1 p.m. because everything is closed for lunch.
57. You don’t think twice after seeing a speed limit sign that says 120.
58. You start to believe that a traffic light is really nothing more than illuminated advertising…
59. You come home 10 pounds heavier and don’t know why until you look back at your pictures and realize that you drank every night of the week.
60. You jump into the river Liffey…and lived to join this group!
61. When going to bed when it’s light out is not considered strange anymore whether it be at night or in the morning!
62. When you see new people you don’t know in your own house you wait a couple of days before ask “do you live here?” and then know that they’re actually your housemates and not the usual unknown random people that for some reason are just wandering around the house.
63. You desperately tried to find an outlet in the bathroom and then finally realized that you have to blow-dry your hair over your notebook.
64. You put a pot on the stove to cook then walk away for 20 minutes and when you return to check on it you realise you forgot to turn the wall switch on.
65. Half-nine = nine-thirty.
66. You get up at any time of the (late) day and the first thing you drink is a pint of Guinness.
67. You started to say “rubbage bin” instead of “trash can.”
68. You’ve had to make s’mores with digestives.
69. You’ve watched your friend, drinking all the way thru Rag Week, sit at the table and make a tin foil helmet to protect himself from the “alieums.”
70. You find yourself saying feck instead of the other one…
71. You were stressing about studying for exams whilst being ’social’ over a few pints, you often heard the phrase “she’ll be grand” or “it’s grand” and decided feck it, drink now cram later!
72. You now understand the following: gaff, your one, it’s grand, the “tea-shock” is a muppet
73. It now seems perfectly normal to spend half the night drinking and dancing with people you’ve never met before, or have invited you out during a random encounter (you were on the same bus, you walked past their on-campus window etc).
74. You stocked up on goodies from Carrolls before going home so your parents think you did more than drink when you were there.
75. You’re still trying to work out why that one soap opera stops halfway through to let people watch the other one on another channel.
76. When cigarettes that cost less than 5€ are “cheap” Everyone knows real cigarettes cost 8.40€.
77. When you come home you get completely baffled by your friends who say that cider would be something girly.
78. You know that the real off-license of Dublin is Lidl and it’s the place where you buy in BULK. Excelsior here I come.
79. You know who Jedward is and you know how much better than American idol x factor is.
80. You came home askin’ for some crisp!
81. You hear the entire country is paralyzed by two inches of snow, and could totally see that happening.
82. You can cook 100 different types of pasta, and have, just for variation.
83. You’ve seen Ireland winning the Grand Slam in a crowded pub and you know you won’t feel that atmosphere at home.
84. Taco fries at 3am….perfect!
85. You love Citylink and its 1€ tickets.
86. You’ve seen hundreds (if not thousands) of people gathered in Cork City Centre just for a Hillbilly’s breast in a bun at 2 a.m.
87. The name Patrick Dempsey has so much more meaning.
88. You get asked by an Irish friend if you “scored ‘em” and need to ask for clarification.
89. Getting a “ride” from someone only has ONE meaning.
90. When the sugar in your morning coffee is now replaced by Jameson.
91. You get to your host families house and within the first hour you’re offered a Bulmers.

Aaaaand, relating to #16 as promised:

• Twitter, Facebook status, Gtalk status, Google Buzz, blog – now if only I had something to say… #
• Fire in a Dublin head shop ("legal" smoking paraphernalia) this morning will have firefighters lining up in McDonals after they're done! #

• Listening to the Dean Blundell Show podcast while shaving – no the brightest idea… Still, a little piece of Toronto on my ipod!!! #

Guess where I am? Wrong, still in Dublin. Global colding is upon us!

Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless handheld