Today I tried opening a bank account - to my surprise, I have to book an 'appointment' with the banking professionals before I can open one. Of course, they are fully booked until two weeks later. How come they cannot process something as simple as opening a bank account in a short period of time? What is even funnier is that they booked me in for an hour timeslot on the 23rd. AN HOUR? It takes an hour to open an account?

I find that the culture here is very different - not sure if it's the whole European mentality, but it is certainly true here. They waste a vast amount of resources on silly little things. For example, I was walking to the tube station yesterday when I walked past the construction that is happening around the area. These construction area are boarded up with signs indicating which company is responsible for the development and so on. What made me laugh was the fact that six men were dedicated to 'repainting' the board blue. The board was originally blue, but overtime it got splattered with mud and grimes. They are repainting the board that is used to board up the construction site. I found it sorta amusing, as something like that in North America would be frown upon or actually laughed at.

Work is moving slowly. I met with this girl today at work who did some development work earlier, and in about an hour I improved the throughput of the results by 32%. Impressive huh? That's what a Waterloo education does to you, and I'm damn proud of that. :)

Where should I go this coming weekend? Even with the lack of funds, I think I need to take a break from the city and perhaps head somewhere in the UK. E-mail me with suggestions as to where I should be visiting! :)