Mon 12 Nov 07 -- its ferkin chankin here folks.... bloomin -8C and snowin.

just bn in a bar with the frnch Foreign Legion.. mad as hatters - anyhow, bit too drunk for any sense but stayin' the Old Riga Hopestell with a bunch of Romanians...... LOL, no ferkin Locals here to do any w$%k so the Bulgarians and Romanians are doin all th econstruction...... crazy world.

Tue 13 Nov 07 -- Spent the mornin' tryin to work out how to get a bus or train to some other parts of the country... i'll tell you this, they ain't a helpful freindly bunch out here... be sure to know your precise destination as well as how to pronounce it in perfect dialect, regardless of accent..... 2-point-somthing-odd million people speak this language so why can't you????..... LOL. Once you have a tickt proceed to the unmarked & identical looking platform stairwells that lead you to the train that is probably not yours... when in doubt it always gives an excuse to try and chat to the nice young laydeezz...., once on board and seated on th epark bench, hold tight, the dorrbell ound means take-off at a rip roaring 40KPH max..... te trains are amazing relics from old Moskovia.... toilets never had paper in them since i was born, free chewing-gum and if your lucky the dude sitting next to you will share his home-brew Wodka... just what you need in -6C.

Wed 14 Nov 07 -- That Train i got on cost about 4 quid and took me 3.5 hours and about 200Km's to a place called Rezekne... what a difference to the Capital City, eople here are actually pretty freindly and try to talk - in fact most of te younger folks speak pretty good english, so no idea why they don't in Riga.... LOL... we're only about 50Km from Russia here and although its all the same to me, apparently they chat mostly in Russian not Latvian.... top hotel charges about 1 quid for beer and 2 quid for whisky... well i say top.... but you'll generally know what that means..... kinda Former Soviet Military Prison kinda top-class.... only kidding... anyway, can easily keep drinkin tilll 06:00 so my liver is filing for divorce and the bog is suing for domestic abuse....

Thur 15 Nov 07-- had a look around Rezekne today, not much here but its got a nice feel about it. Went 10 pin bowling and played a lot of pool on th epath to recovery from last nights excess. MOre of the same tonight i guess......... somebody said something about 'Topless' in th ebar... bit cold for that methinks but i'll go see what te wooly jumpers look like

Fri 16 Nov 07 -- missed breakfast - wonder why?........ so some Solanka (is that right?.... its really nice thoo' ) soup around md-day before catching the 1447 train back to RIga and now checked back into the Old Town Hostel. Made a call to a bloke, who runs "Riga Out There" excursions, I met him earlier in th eweek and he asked if i fancied a trip to bobsledding in Sigulda tomo........ so i'm looking forward to that now -- www.rigaoutthere.com Off for something to eat now... take it easy.

Sat 17 Nov 07 -- holy icy rattlin bones around a thin fibreglass shell batman - bleedin heck it hurts in there..... bobsled yesterday wiz mental scariest rollercoaster ever times three...... 100KMH down a World Championship course - took all of 45 seconds man.... then onto a shootin gallery to play with some proper hardware dude - eat lead punk - Glock, Pump Action Shotgun, SPAS, AK47... I was in a group of 13 and won the golden bullet woo hoo . Then onto pub to watch the tally's get a lucky goal through some dodgy defendin' in the 1st 2 mins....bollox, pub had about 8 tv's showin 3 games at a time - pretty confusin when you look away and ten hear cheers and look up to see somethin daft like a shy and then realise the cheerin' was for the ruskies drawin level wi israel..... Thought we might just do it at the end but not to be...... barstewards, ferkin ref cheated uz....... went and got lallooed anyhows, ended up in a club that had live rock band called the hobos... they were pretty