Back to Prague - Part 1

We went back to Prague for a four day trip around last weekend. We had a great time walking around, revisiting old haunts and spending time eating, drinking and chatting with our friends.
We also managed to go to a surprising number of places which were new to us.

We stayed at the Ibis which claims to be in Mala Strana but is actually at Anděl. This was no problem for us as Anděl is a great local centre for restaurants and bars as well as being within easy reach of the tourist parts.

On Friday night Jay and Vladka managed to get most of the old crowd together for a pub night near our hotel - though they hadn't realised we were staying so close when they booked it!

On Saturday we walked up through the park from Štefánikova náměstí and followed the hill to near the Strahov Monastery. It was mid-morning so we stopped at the Strahov Monastery Brewery as we had never tried their dark St Norbert beer. I enjoyed it but Sue ws lamenting the fact that she didn't have a hot drink as the weather was cold and the beer had chilled her.
We remedied that later with hot soup and fruit dumplings on our way from the castle to Mala Strana.

In the afternoon we met up with Jay and went out to Spořilov to the Prvni Pivni Tramway.
This unlikely-looking place was rated in The Guardian's top ten bars in Prague but Sue regarded it with deep suspicion as she has this unjustified belief that I always seek out the dodgiest bars in town.

Jay knew of a small lake near the tram station so we had the bonus of a pleasant little walk in the sunshine before going for a beer.

The exterior of the bar is an ugly concrete block, but one of the rooms inside is fitted out like an old tram. The beer was good, particularly the Primator wheat beer. We couldn't stay long because the tables were all booked from 5pm. So we and Jay headed back on the tram to town and went our separate ways.

More from the weekend in the next entry.

And the winner is ...

I wrote recently about McQuarie Dictionary's contest to find the word of the year for 2007.

The winner is -
pod slurping
noun the downloading of large quantities of data to an MP3 player or memory stick from a computer.

I still prefer arse-antlers myself.

I also wrote a while ago about textonyms, words which are different, but use the same keys in predictive text mode on a mobile phone, eg 'home' and 'good'.

These have now gained some academic credibility. David Crystal has been studying them and the UK press picked up the story last week. The Telegraph's report is here.

Some examples of textonyms here.

Farewell Sheldon Brown

Sheldon Brown was an American cyclist who ran what I regard as the best technical website for cyclists. Whatever the topic, his site would have excellent advice and how-to guides. He did a nice line in April Fool jokes, and introduced me to the Sheldon Shake, an effective way of cleaning a cycle chain by putting it into a bottle half-full of solvent, closing the cap and shaking vigorously.

Sadly I read that Sheldon died of a heart attact a few days ago. He will be sadly missed.