Phil

If you've not yet, read the book. I read it whilst in Thailand and thought it was very interesting. I've not managed to catch the film yet but I will do at some point. I remember that about your plans for a bike trip. Good luck in getting that sorted.

Try scanning with Ad-Aware also. A HijackThis log might help too.

I am using firefox 3. nothing changed since I downloaded it. It's only happening on this page? no others? What does it say when you use IE or another browser?

Rough Guides or Lonely Planet guide books will help in getting things organised. Really though the only things I had organised beforehand were the major flights, visas if needed, jags for specific places and bank stuff. Once I got there I just decided what to do really and where to go from place to place. But yeah I would have been completely lost in some places without the guide books. I found it was best not to be too organised once I was out there that way you can easily change plans and head any direction you want to at any time. Actually doing it was a lot easier than I thought it was going to be. Yes I worked for about a year and a half in a bar/restaurant after uni to save up for it.

Thanks man. I don't know what it was about Perth, I met others who loved it there (maybe I was just angry that it stole our name:P). There was maybe parts that I missed. I just preferred Melbourne and Sydney over it. Don't get me wrong though I absolutely loved the journey northwards from there, where the beaches stretch most of the coastline. I'd say the standard of living was generally high in all the major cities that I saw on Oz.(Well the prices of things tended to be that way) Meat pies! Oh what a treat, I'd nearly forgotten about them, I agree with you about them. :P

If you think there's a video that deserves it's own thread then there's probably a related story behind it that might be worth a new thread anyway. The vast majority of videos that would be posted don't deserve a new thread as there wouldn't be much discussion.

Cheers all. Why not? :P I just wanted to see some of the world before it's too late and I'm stuck in a job for the rest of my life. I've always been interested in far away lands so decided this was the thing to do. Both my sisters have done similar things so it was very easy for me to just do it without too much thought. Pier 39 is one of the major tourist attractions in SF. Was good to see it. Enjoyed the audio tour on Alcatraz, thought it was better than a human led tour as you got to hear all the different sound effects and you could walk around at your own pace and not run around after someone. That audio tour was a highlight of Alcatraz for me. I think it has even won some awards. edit - I forgot one picture from New Zealand there. Added it in now.

Thanks. I'm not sure on the exact amount. One thing I need to sort out properly is my finances. I think around the £8000 mark, It can't be far off that. I had no problem with the languages. Most people in the areas I went to spoke English, though somtimes poorly but still well enough for me to get by. Worst place for that would probably have been just into the Thai border, not a lot of English written or spoken about the place. I stayed at backpacker hostels mainly. In Malaysia and Thailand though it was cheap enough to stay in a hotel room most of the time.

Of course I remember you and thanks :) I met a few people in the hostel in Boston and ended up getting a tour pass for a one of those open-top buses that run round the city. It included Harvard and MIT and a boat trip. The ticket lasted 2 days so we saw quite a bit of the city. Also liked just sitting in Boston common and watching random things like an open air cinema there! Lots of pretty cool buildings in Boston too.

Well some of you may know I had been away travelling round the world for the last 6 months by myself pretty much. I said I would post some pics so here a few. I've tried to upload a few from each place, but didn't want to bore you lot too much with holiday snaps. If you want to see some more in detail I can always post different ones in higher detail (taken with my crappy camera though) I'll try to provide some commentary with them too, but please ask if you want to know something. [hide=Hong Kong, Singapore, Malaysia & Thailand]I started my first month in South East Asia. Hong Kong was first for 4 days, which was long enough I thought. Was pretty cool just walking in amongst all the skyscrapers. In the photos - Downtown from Kowloon The Big Buddha - had to queue for hours just to see this. Hundreds of Chinese tourists were here. Think it was worth it though. Loved the little lanes running off the streets. Packed between towereing skyscrapers. The nightly light show of downtown from Kowloon. I spent about 4 days in Singapore then. Was fun seeing some things there like Raffles Hotel and having a Singapore Sling - which was quite tasty really. Don't have too many exciting photos from here. Moved on by bus into Malaysia and up to Melaka. Very historic place with a few nice buildings. Then up to Kuala Lumpur. Huge city. Didn't do too much here really. The Petronas Towers View of KL from the KL Tower After that is the island of Penang on the west coast of Malaysia. Another historic city. Met a nice Austrian guy here and we walked up Penang Hill, which was quite a hike especially in the humidty and heat. We then walked down to a Chinese temple called Kek Lok Si. Was pretty huge and quite impressive. Then on again up the coast and to another island, Langkawi. This place was the picture perfect beach type place with warm sea Moving on northwards and into Thailand - Trang, Krabi then the island of Ko Phi Phi Don. This island was badly affected by the 2004 tsunami in the area, and an estimated 3 to 4000 people died on the island. By the time I was there the island had pretty much recovered, but there were still little things reminding us of it. Picture of the island after the tsunami posted on a church on the island. That aside this island was one of my favourite places I visited. Saw Phi Phi Ley - the island where they filmed "The Beach" was pretty cool. Met a great bunch on folk and had a good time with the Chang. Ended up spending a week here and was sad to leave at the end. But time to move on. The notorious tourist resort of Phuket was my next desitination. Didn't particulary like it though it was an eye-opener with all it's seedy bars and streets... Then a dash up to Bangkok via Ranong and Chumphon and an overnight train in 3rd class with the locals. Bangkok was a huge, mad city. Loved the old temples, monuments and things, loads of them there to see. Though the traffic wasn't so great. Gridlocked most of the time. [/hide] [hide=Australia]Next on my travels was Australia for the next 3 months. I began in Melbourne and met sister and her fiance there who were doing a little travelling also. Out of everywhere I've been I'd have to say it was the best city for me. If I was to move anywhere it would probably be here. Something always going on here. The weather wasn't so great though more like home as I arrived in April, the begginging of their winter season. Anyway I joined my sister in a rent car and drove to Sydney, passing through lots of interesting places on the way. Including a camp with friendly Kangeroos Sydney I met up with a friend from uni and ended up joining them in renting a camper van and driving back to Melbourne via Canberra this time. Good fun these road trips. Managed to fit in the Great Ocean Road which has a lot of great scenery. Back in Melbourne I met up with Tanya - an ex? tipiter, and her boyfriend, was fun meeting them. Also managed to see Ramsay St. - from the tv programme Neighbours (I think only British and Oz people would know about that?) Still lots of rain here. Flight to Perth here at the begging in of May. (bit strange here since I am from Perth Scotland, it was good confusing everyone with that) Nice city but not really for me, not sure why. Lovely view from the huge parks they have though. Got on a tour bus to travel up the west coast for the next couple of weeks. Was travelling with the same bunch of people for that amount of time and made some really good friends who I'll probably stay in contact with for years. I think the people really made the west coast such good fun. Lots to see on the west coast but it's not over touristy. If you go to Oz I'd recommended it. Lots of scenery including Nature's Window Karijini National Park, lots of gorges. The pictures don't do it justice really. Me with some of the group on 80 mile beach south of Broome. Sunset on Cable beach at Broome. Amazing beach. And up near Darwin feeding crocs in a river. Could have posted a million photos of drunken folk but thought better of it ;) Next up was the east coast - From Cairns I travelled by Greyhound down the coast eventually ending up at Sydney. Stopping off at some places along the way. Mission Beach, Airlie Beach, Hervey Bay, Noosa, Brisbane, and Byron Bay. Did a few things on the way down. A few days sailing and living aboard a yacht in the Whitsunday Islands. Awesome scenery and great beaches like Whitehaven Beach. From Hervey Bay I joined a group and did a self drive trip round Fraser Island for a few days. The SS Maheno which ran aground years ago. Our lovely 4x4 which I was lucky enough to drive on some of Fraser's beaches. [/hide] [hide=New Zealand]Next up New Zealand for a month. Got a great view to start with on the flight in. Flew into the South Island and immediately headed for Queenstown as I'd heard that's the place to be, which was true. Nice little town set in some of New Zelands highest mountains. I tried to get a job here but couldn't as everyone was trying to the same and stay for the ski season. Ended up getting a tour (Kiwi Experience) and seeing the rest of the South Island, where's there's lots more to see. Met some great people along the way. edit* Nearly forgot - Had time in Queenstown to fit in a 15,000ft skydive. Was very fun. Would do it again if I had the chance. Milford Sound (really a fjord) with amazing views. Franz Josef glacier which we did full days walk up onto. Then went to Auckland and would have loved to see more of the North Island but I couldn't as by this point I was broke, so bring on Fiji and some helpful loans from my family :P[/hide] [hide=Fiji & USA]Only spent a few days on Fiji, was too expensive and touristy for my liking to be honest. It has some great beaches, but to be honest I had done the whole beach thing in Thailand and Oz. Ah well I went on a day trip to a little desert island called Mala Mala, was very nice here. I then flew onto LA from Fiji where I was spending a month and travelling across it. I ended up seeing LA(Holywood), San Francisco, Las Vegas, New York, Boston and Maine. LA was just mad, so huge and it's not the easiest places to get around. ended up doing some touristy stuff like tours. Was good seeing Hollywood and Universal Studios though. SF next where I ended up meeting up with Ami (ForsakenMage) and Necro from these forums for a couple of days. Was good seeing them also. We ended up going to Pier 39 and the Golden Gate Bridge. Also manged to see Alcatraz whilst I was there. I flew to Las Vages next which was crazy also. Thank goodness I was only there for a few days otherwise I think I would have lost all my money. Got a trip to the Grand Canyon which I really thought was amazing. Seeing it in person is so much better than seeing the photos. Then onto New York. Now I think everyone knows everything about New York :P Great city. Loved just relaxing in Central Park. NY at night from the Empire State Building. Next few days was in Boston. Another lovely city, lots of cool buildings here. Definitely worth a visit. I then headed on upto Maine where I met Nik from these forums. Ended up staying with him for 5 days. End of my trip I was pretty broke so I crashed on his fold out sofa and we got drunk with his friends most nights. Fun Fun.[/hide] Well I think that's pretty much it. Sorry for keeping you so long. Feel free to send some abusive pms if I bored you out of your skulls or if you were on 56k. :) Also please ask some questions if you like and I will try my best to answer them. One last thing - Yes I think it was worth it. You should do it if you are thinking about it.

But this whole thread is about picking players from all over the world and bringing them together, choosing them because of their unique skills or the way they performed in the least couple of years. It's all about individuality and not teamwork. Everyone knows that a typical dream team would probably fail miserably as a real team in the real world. I understand what you are saying and respect Rosenborg for what they have achieved and am not doubting they can compete against the best teams in Europe, but you surely understand the meaning of a dream team thread.

Most of the teams in the CL could beat those top teams on a good day. It doesn't mean they would have the world's dream team. Dream team is more picking the best players individually in their positions and not looking at how they would gel together if they were an actual team. Do you really think each of those Rosenborg players could individually compete with the typical top players?

Possibky use the ""hide=" tabs like what happens in the movies threads. But wouldn't it be quite long to make a complete walkthrough? Don't they appear on other, better video games sites?

You know I did think that too....

It was a toss-up between the other top strikers in the world and Ibrahimovic. A lot of the others are even more overrated than him I think. Heck I was thinking of putting Larsson up there :wink:

Love this show. Have only seen up to the end of season 3 past 1. Not managed to see any since I've been away for 6 months.

................................................. . Torres Ibramhimovic . . . . Ronaldinho . .Ronaldo Messi . . Essien . . . .Lahm Ramos . . Cannavaro Ferdinand . . . Buffon . ................................................. A quick list. Could change about constantly. Not sure on the positions though. Torres - As much as I dislike him as he's a Liverpool player, I can't help but admire him as a footballer. His work rate in the final stages of the Euro Championships sealed it for me. Ronaldinho - Still one of the best footballers in the world, but has had a difficult time lately. If I wanted the ball to anyone on my dream time it would be him. Defence - Not sure sure about this yet. Might change it slightly yet.

The best football players already have a congested season nowadays even without the olympics. Most teams want their best players rested during the close season rather than send them away to play in a tournament that isn't taken too seriously in the football world. Plus in the olympics there is an under-23 rule, with only a few players over that allowed in the team. (And don't get me even started on the possibility of their being a British team at 2012.) It's kind of like tennis I suppose. The best players don't think too much of it.

Bloc Party - Flux

I was going to answer half seriously on this thread, until I read the words 'in the olympics'. There's your problem.

Once you get into watching curling, it's great. A lot better than more popular sports I think.

soccer... oh wait. Extreme Ironing.

Caught the Greyhound from Los Angeles (Hollywood) and have just arrived in San Francisco. Spending 4 days here before heading to Vegas

If you win the contest, you will be able to customize your current generic rank. So instead of it saying "Chicken Feather" etc., it will be able to say whatever you want (within limits). I think he means, will the winning entry's list be used, replacing the current rank list? These ranks have been used since near the start of tipit.

I heard about this just before booking lots of greyhound trips across america. Maybe I'll fly them instead.