Last night I went to see Fuerzabruta at the Camden Roundhouse. It's an absolutely stunning show. My mouth was dry at the end because I'd spent the whole hour in slack-jawed amazement. It's impossible to classify it by genre as it's a series of remarkable visual images that would look incredible as photographs: as moving images they were just amazing.

I heart Chicago! I've had the most marvellous day, in glorious weather exploring and taking it all in. The buildings are amazing and Millenium Park is the best public park I've ever seen. Not only does it have TWO Frank Gehry shiny wonders but it has Cloud Gate by Anish Kapoor (Brit!). It's the most wonderful sculpture and I was watching the crowds mill around (and under!) it - they were all entirely enraptured with it. It's like to some giant metalic bean but what seems other-worldy about it is that there are no visible joins or panels. So despite being shiny and metallic it seems organic and natural. On a sunny day like today the reflections were quite amazing



More pics here.

I've always wanted to visit San Francisco. Unfortunately the roadshow schedule meant that we weren't even going to spend the night there - we arrived at noon from Salt Lake and got the red-eye to Chicago that night. But in the meantime I did find an hour to explore downtown. As it was "Spare the Air" day all public transport was free - even the cable-car trams: how cool is that!



In fact it was boiling - very unusual SF weather I was told. But it was great to wander around for a bit and I did see a tantalising hint of the Golden Gate bridge without ever seeing it properly

Finally a moment to sit somewhere that's not on an airplane. Right now that somewhere is the Marriott in Salt Lake City, Utah. It's a BEAUTIFUL day - warm, sunny and a light breeze. Any city with snow capped mountains round the edge is OK in my books.

I've managed to actually do some sightseeing and there's no doubt that there is something slightly spooky about all the Mormon institutions. There's one massive, Albert Speer meets Ministry of Love tower block that is apparently the church "office". Dude - somethings going on in there and I have a feeling it's the Da Vinci Code 2.

Pics are on Flickr - but here's one that made me smile. If you need a good lawyer in SLC, I know who I would choose:


And what exactly is a water audit?

Brasil - land of football legends. Pele, Garincha, Socrates, Ronaldinho, Robinho and Fred. Fred? Love it :)

I've worked out that I will spend each Thursday this month in a different country due to the TW global roadshow that I am co-ordinating. First up was my two days in Bangalore and this week it's Calgary. But joy of joy's I'm here for 4 days, which is great.

On Friday I presented my talk on Agile Software Development and Improvised Comedy a.k.a Who's Line of Code is it Anyway Eh? (<<- for the Canadian audience) at the ThoughtWorks Canada away day. That went down really well and although it's hard to run a comedy workshop for a group of over 50 people, 50 ThoughtWorkers actually makes it easier. On Saturday TW Canada had organised a day out in the mountains and there was hiking, horseback riding or whitewater rafting which I chose. It suddenly dawned on me that the Kananaskis river on which we would raft was probably a glacier two days ago and likely to be fairly chilly (to put it mildly). I was VERY relieved when they gave me a wet suit :)

The rafting was fantastic. After a few days of rain it was warm and sunny and the guides were loving it too. The river wasn't too extreme - I think we went over one class III rapid which was perfect for my first time (and a group ageing in range from about 6 to 74!). One thing I learned that I found really mind boggling is that the Kananskis river flows from a hydro-electric project at Barrier Lake and they turn the river off at night! That must be an amazing sight as they close the barrier and the river just drains away. And then again in the morning when they start the flow - what a sight that must be! Anyway it means that the people who run the canoeing and rafting operations on the river can wander around on the riverbed and arrange the boulders and rocks in such a way as to make the ideal rapids and hits for aquatic fun. That seems both very wrong and kind of fantastic as well. What a world. The other key fact to take away is that Barrier Lake was the lake used in the X-men films. Nice.

Having the weekend in Calgary has also meant having the chance to catch up with Ashley and Turner and meet their gorgeous daughter Sloane who is even lovelier in the flesh than in the photos. I also got a chance to watch some World Cup action round at Ashley's dad's place on his incredible home theatre system. The screen was probably 8 feet wide - it was like sitting in the 5th row. Talking of sport let me just say - Come on England! Come on you Oilers!

Two more nights in Cowtown - next stop Malvern, PA! And my next Thursday location will start in Salt Lake City, pause briefly in San Francisco and then end up in Chicago. Ayee Caramba.

I love good writing in magazines or on the web. I love a good book too but if you can write something short, and probably inconsequential but make it witty, original and fun then sir or madam I take my hat off, put it on the shelf and I don't go thinking about putting it back on again.

The person I turn to first in these matters is the incomparable Giles Smith. And today in the Guardian once again he's turned the sow's ear of a car review into a silk purse of wit! Anyone who describes carbon emissions on the new Mercedes thus: "it pumps its carbon dioxide with a rare insouciance" deserves some hatless applause. http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,1796849,00.html.

Props also to Heather at gofugyourself for coming up with "on the days when we're retaining water like it's the best divorce lawyer in town": http://gofugyourself.typepad.com/go_fug_yourself/2006/06/fug_lively.html

As seen from the office last night. My friend Chris Brown deserves all the credit - I just lent him my camera!

Do you find that traditional, run-of-the-mill water is caught up in the mechanistic limitations of Newtonian Physics? Because this bird does >> http://www.infinitywater.us/.

Yes from the land of Miracle Whip and Wonder Bread comes Infinity Water: "a Highly Potentized Living Water Concentrate".

If you like your new age mumbo-jumbo freshly potentized - you'll love it!

.. is not enough!

But it was great. I loved it: it was certainly a good time not a long time.

In my first 24 hours I'd experienced some crazy driving, taken my life in my hands crossing the road, been to an Italian restaraunt where the pasta tasted remarkably Indian, met some fantastic folks and pulled some Bollywood dance moves (and I did do the Crouch as well bien sur). My Indian ThoughtWorks colleagues are an amazing bunch - bright, interesting and SO friendly. The average age in the office is pretty young - midish 20s I think and they can certainly cut a rug at a Hindi Disco.

I'd love to go back for maybe more than 2 days next time. But for now it's a relief to come back to a country that hasn't gone overboard about the World Cup: in India they are absolutely MAD for it.

If it's Thursday then it must be Bangalore.

I'm in India for a whole two days for work. Not really long enough to get to grips with centuries of history and it's ancient culture. In fact on arrival it struck me that I don't know anything about India - not really. Luckily there is a well thumbed Lonely Planet in the appartment and I will be reading up on the history section tonight. Did Hinduism last night - 'seasy: it's non-proselytising and everything emanates from Brahman. There you go.

I flew Lufthansa via Frankfurt. On the second leg I made a little polite conversation with the India gentleman on my right. The German chap to my left kept himself to himself. That was until about an hour before we got to Bangalore. He was listening to some music on his mp3 player when he started to chortling and saying something along the lines of "Zis is gut! Zis great!" at which point he took off his headphones and suddenly thrust them over my head! I had the shock of my life as the burly Teuton offered me his musical choices. Turned out it was Rod Stewart singing Maggie May. "Very nice" I told him "- can't beat a bit of Rod. "

Turns out I was wrong. A few minutes later the chortling started again and before you knew it he had thrust his headphones over my ears again. This time it was some unidentified Bagpipe music. Was he listening to "The Greatest Scottish Airplaine Album... EVER!"?

Well it's been and gone. Since the begining of the year my aunt Anne and I had been planning a Grand Charity Event at my parents' old house in Oxford. On Saturday we had it, and it went rather well.

The idea was that I've inherited way more stuff than I need now or will ever need. Books, pictures, crockery -you name and we've got it (twice!). Whatever I did with the house I was going to have to clear out most of it. Rather than getting a house clearance agency in the idea hit me that we could have the mother of all car-boot sales in the house itself where everything still on site was for sale, for charity. I had the idea round at my aunt's house as we were discussing her fundraising efforts for OXPIP so they were the obvious candidates. June 3rd was the date selected and so I've had 6 months to slowly go through the house and find all the things that I wanted to keep or pass on to friends and family. It turned out to be just the right period of time - not too long to go on for ever and not too quick to keep me in Oxford at every free moment.

The success of the sale was largely down to my aunt's sterling work. She organised a team of helpful volunteers (thanks everyone!!), brought in a celebrity guest (thank you Geraldine Peers from BBC South Today) to open the event and masterminded a superb media offensive. On friday there was a story about the sale and a big picture in the Oxford Times and on the day itself she was on Radio Oxford spreading the word. It worked! When I opened the doors at 10am the queue was 30-40 people long.

There are pictures on my flickr account but here are a couple:


So my old Marillion picture disks didn't sell. But pretty much everything else did. It was absolutely amazing. We had fantastic weather which obviously swelled the crowds and they were in a mood to buy. One woman cleaned me out of sporting equipment buying a cricket bat, a pair of 200cm skis and two fishing rods! All the pictures went, all the crazy african carvings, loads of books, tea pots, china, napkins, clothes. Like I said amazing.

The total raised was absolutely staggering. I believe we've banked over £5,500 in cheques and cash for OXPIP! When you add on the 28% gift-aid bonus on the cheques we took then that must be over £6,000. Wow.

Best of all is the knowledge that mum and dad would be so chuffed with the idea, and especially the result. In fact a number of people came to see me on the day, people from the road and the church who knew my ma and said how much the event reminded them of her - it was just the sort of thing she would have done. I don't hope for more than that.