An Irishman abroad

Welcome to my world

WELCOME TO MY WORLD

Well folks, here I am, as the clock slowly drags itself towards 10pm, Wednesday evening, 05th Feb, 2003, sat in a lonely hotel room.

There is a bar downstairs, but I do not even feel compelled to go down and join in with all the other lonely people sat staring at their drinks. In fact what I feel compelled to do is share with you, Dear Reader, my experience of this evening.

So sit back, as I am, grab a drink, for it is with Bud Lite in hand that I share this tale of what it’s like to be on the road with a bunch of computer geeks.

Yesterday afternoon, it was mentioned that there was a bowling night organised for this evening. Seeing it as a good opportunity to get to know some of the other people on the project and of course not wanting to miss the opportunity of getting in a bit of practice for myself, knowing full well that the rest of my friends back in belgium were out tonight, honing up on their bowling skills, I asked if I could join in.

After spending two nights in my hotel room without speaking to a sinner and being fast asleep for 9 and 10 pm respectively, I decided that my body could do with a little bit of a shake up.

I pictured the scene – a huge bowling alley with hot dogs, fries, huge colas, plenty of beers, surrounded by lots of obese Americans taking it far too seriously, whooping and a-hollering whilst ‘high fiving’ each other, any time one of them manages to get their lardy arses out of their seats.

I was to sample the real America - surely this would give me some material to share with the folks back home!

I was not to be disappointed.

Strangely enough, thanks to another shitty stressful day at the office, by about 5 pm this evening I had made up my mind that I wouldn’t go. I had plenty of work to do and, to be honest, was quite tired.
I resigned myself to spending another couple of hours in the office followed by taking a sexy bird to my hotel room. (The KFC variety – what did you think I was talking about?).

Then, just before six, I got a phone call from my ‘good mate’ Dennis – he of the Road Trip to New York fame. It turned out that he was going to go along as well. He offered to give me a lift there and back to the hotel afterwards – so I figured what the hell! I could have a few beers and be chauffeur driven into the bargain! We arranged to meet back at the hotel at six thirty.

As we set of for the extravagantly named “Park Place Lanes”, Dennis explained that apparently it wasn’t the type of bowling that we were used to playing.
“It’s not 10-pin bowling, but something called ‘pin bowling’.”
“What’s the difference?”
“Apparently, there are still 10 pins and the ball is smaller but you get three bowls”

Three bowls? This sounded like the preverbal piece of piss!

After about 15 minutes driving and a crossing of the state borders between Massachusetts and New Hampshire we arrived at the venue of our bowling team-building event.

When we walked in, I was not disappointed. It was wall-to-wall fat Americans, sucking on cokes and eating all sorts of fast foods. There were hot dogs, nachos, chicken wings, onion rings, bucket-sized colas and various other types of fast food. Nearly every lane was occupied, but we couldn’t see anyone from the project.

“Do you wanna go and grab something to eat?”, Dennis asked.
Not wanting to repeat an incident similar to our Friday night in New York, I went along with him to the lounge. There was no-one there apart from a couple of waitresses.

“Can I help you guys?” one of the waitresses asked.


Folks - it is now 10:30 pm and my Bud Lite is empty. Rather than continue with this little tale, I am going to go to my bed, read a couple of pages of my book and be in the land of Nod before 11:00 for the third night in a row. I hope you can forgive me. I will continue this tomorrow, hopefully during a quieter moment in my day’s work.


So now the time is approaching 18:00 and the work just keeps on coming. I left my desk for a brief 15-minute lunch but apart from that it’s been another busy day. Changed times indeed.

So now, where was I?

Ah yes – the restaurant. So we asked for a couple of beers and a menu for food.
“There’s a proper lounge next door if you want to go in there” – pointing to a door that said “Jonathan’s Lounge” on it. I was sure that it was a sign, and as I looked closer I saw that it was indeed a sign, embossed on the glass of the door. (HA! HA! – couldn’t resist that one).

We went into Jonathan’s Lounge. Now I’m not sure what constitutes a ‘proper lounge’ in New Hampshire but, this did not quite fit my description of one. It was a strange affair, with the circular bar at a lower level than all the stools and tables that surrounded it.

Suspended from the ceiling all around the circumference of the bar where shiny pink hearts, and signs screaming “Happy Valentine’s Day!!!”. The bar was full of smoke, even though there can’t have been many more than 10 customers in it.


I bent down to order a couple of beers (back on the Bud Lite) some typical American food (chicken strips with barbecued sauce) and we sat down at a table. Apparently we were the first ones to arrive. Looking out the window of the bar we were able to watch some people already playing.