February was a busy month for me, and I must admit I kind of neglected my blog a bit. However, I could not miss the opportunity to write a post on 29th of February - my next chance at that would be 4 years away!
And what’s even better, I even have a lot to write about. First things first: my excuse for letting my blog go rusty is that in the meanwhile I was working on two other full blown websites: JCI Dublin and my very own!
I joined Junior Chamber International Dublin back in December, and started to get deeply involved in January and February. I found it while looking for some management and self-improvement trainings. There are quite a few companies that provide that in Ireland, however at steep prices, tailored for corporations rather than individuals. Maybe my company will sponsor that kind of training for me one day. Until then, JCI proved to be a perfect match, and love at first sight: their motto is “Learning by Doing!” and their purpose as a nonprofit organization is “to contribute to the advancement of the global community by providing the opportunity for young people to develop the leadership skills, social responsibility, entrepreneurship and fellowship necessary to create positive change”. Long quote, but hey - I think it’s worth mentioning it, as I fully agree with that.
I have a feeling I’ll be blogging about JCI some more in weeks to come 
Other things that kept me busy were Philip Pullman’s trilogy “His Dark Materials”. An excellent book, that kept getting more and more interesting as I read on, practically devouring my way through the 1000 pages monolith. The book is a wonderful example of modern magic realism, touching on issues ranging from religion to biology, archeology, physics and metaphysics, all wonderfully wrapped around the architecture of a bildungsroman.
In the beginning of February I went to Scotland to take part in two events organized by the Glasgow and Edinburgh JCI chapters respectively. While waiting in the airport on the way back, and browsing through a library, my eyes caught sight of Intelligent Life, the lifestyle magazine edited by The Economist. Since I am a great fan of the Economist, I bought the magazine, and the first thing I read was the cover story on Pullman’s book and how it came to be. I had heard of the book before, and my interest was already raised, so from there to actually getting the book it was just a small step I saw the movie adaptation of the first volume as well - special effects aside, it was disappointing.
I also saw a movie called Juno this month, the story of an unwanted pregnancy, with a funny twist, a far cry from the bleak “4,3,2″ story, which I was blogging about a while ago. The main plot in both movies is very similar (a young girl is faced with an unwanted pregnancy), but they are set in two different eras and in two different worlds, thus with completely different outcomes.
And that was my February, in a lot of words actually, but still fewer than what it would take to tell the whole story.
