On a date – listen to romantic music

So says a new French study anyway.  They reveal that listening to romantic music is more likely to result in a successful date.

http://pom.sagepub.com/content/38/3/303.abstract

An experiment was carried out where 18—20-year-old single female participants were exposed to romantic lyrics or to neutral ones while waiting for the experiment to start. Five minutes later, the participant interacted with a young male confederate in a marketing survey. During a break, the male confederate asked the participant for her phone number. It was found that women previously exposed to romantic lyrics complied with the request more readily than women exposed to the neutral ones.

Maratona dles Dolomites 2010

The Maratona was the focus of the year for me and my first European sportive (or Granfondo as they’re known in Italy) and it certainly didn’t disappoint.

We spent the first week driving down, spending a few days in Grenoble before moving onto Trento in Northern Italy. The place we stayed at in Trento was amazing. It was a converted farm house on the side of the hill, with vineyards surrounding it. A truely idyllic spot for a week of cycling.

So we’d typically spend the morning riding around the local mountains before the sun got too warm, before settling in for a nice bit of lunch, and of course the ubiquitous Peroni and relaxing for the day.

Before we got too accustomed to this fantastic way of life however we departed for Corvara, the start point for the Maratona.  It was fantastic driving down Passo Pordoi (3rd climb of the ride) on the way to our appartment.  The hill was full of cyclists finding their legs.  Some looked distinctly more uncomfortable than others but it was a fantastic sight.  As we got into Corvara we had the pleasure of pulling up at some traffic lights next to the legend that is Mario Cipollini, who was in town for the event.

The morning of the event saw us getting up around 5am to load up with food before rolling down to the start point.  Despite seeing so many cyclists around the town each day it was still a surprise to see so many waiting in the dusk for the start.  We thought we were early but were still 20 or 30 lines back.  It was an interesting atmosphere, with the tv helicopters zipping about overhead, Europop being blared from the speakers, and cyclists from all sorts of nationalities nervously shuffling about whilst admiring the bling on display.

6.30am came and everyone started to get going.  The ride out of Corvara up towards the first climb up the Campolongo was pretty hectic with so many people of varying abilities jostling for position.  If the ascent was interesting, the descent was a real eye opener, with people taking crazy lines down the other side of the climb.

After a few climbs things began to thin about a bit and the ride became much nicer as people got into a rhythm.  I think most people were trying to keep plenty in their legs for the Giau loomed around the 80km point.

It’s reputation as the hardest climb of the ride certainly didn’t disappoint.  In terms of gradient and length it wasn’t that different to the climb to Villard Notre Dame the week before, but with 80km already in the legs over 5 climbs, and the mid-day sun beating down it was tough.  Really, really tough.  I suppose if you weren’t in the middle of it you could find humour in the grimaces of pain etched onto the faces of everyone as they ground their way up the climb.  It seemed to go on forever and was by far the hardest hour I think I’ve spent on a bike.

Eventually the summit was reached however, and the rest of the ride from there was relatively plain sailing.  Just one more climb to do, albeit an 11km one, and it was into the home straight and the end of the Maratona dles Dolomites.

For my first European sportive my time wasn’t as good as I had hoped, but many lessons were learnt on how to survive on slopes such as these.  It certainly gave me a taste for more and I’ll hopefully do a couple next year.  The organisation was fantastic, the weather perfect and a fitting end to a memorable 10 days of cycling.

Tags: cycling, maratona

Do you look good on the dance floor?

Girls, curse the clever things, apparently can detect how suitable we are by the way we dance. Not in the sense that men who dance like dads at weddings aren’t good mate material, but in the way we move and the testosterone this unconsciously signals to the ladies on the dance floor.

That is the findings of a study done by Peter Lovatt, a researcher from Hertfordshire University, anyway.

He went to the local nightclub and filmed various people dancing. He then showed silhouettes of these men to women and asked them to rate them in order of attractedness. The men that got the girls going were giving it large on the dance floor with big movements.

So let that be a lesson to any guys heading out on the town tonight.  If you want to get lucky, you have to give it a go on the dance floor.

Tags: Add new tag, Dance, Nightclub, Testosterone

Where do you sit in the cinema?

Apparently if you’re right handed you tend to sit to the right of the screen as this allows the right hemisphere of your brain to process the visual stimulus of the film.

I’m right handed but more often than not sit on the left hand side of the cinema.

How about you? Where do you sit in the cinema?

Do you want to make good predictions?

Then the latest research suggests you shouldn’t think about it. Ap Dijksterhuis and his colleagues have just shown that people with expertise in football are better at predicting match outcomes when they spend time not consciously thinking about their predictions.

You can read more about the experiment here

Tags: Football, predictions, Research

Why national anthems require no cheerleader

I’ve never been a fan of this modern trend of anthems being sung by an official singer at sporting events. They always seem to sound so much better when the crowd belt it out in unison. As if to emphasise this point compare this shambles performed at the recent France v South Africa game with the rousing rendition of the Welsh anthem from a few years ago.

No real comparison is there? Maybe one day the people that organise these events will see sense and return things to how they should be.

Tags: anthem, rugby, singing, South Africa

A happier house hunting experience

Posted by adi on Apr 4, 2009 in Play

I blogged recently about the shoddy time I had looking for a place to buy in London. After a bit of thinking I’m contemplating buying a place back on the Island as an affordable investment property, continuing to rent in London (in a nicer place) and seeing how things look in a few years.

Anyway, with this plan in mind I had a look around a new place on trip down to see a friend for his birthday. The experience was a world apart from my last estate agent one. They called up a few hours before the appointment to make sure we were still on for the viewing. The girl then turned up on time and spent close to an hour showing me around the place and fielding various questions.

As a result it seems likely that I may go down this route and invest on the Island. Some lessons to be learnt there for Haart estate agents.

Tags: Estate agent, house, Property

The most incompetent estate agents in the world?

Posted by adi on Mar 28, 2009 in Play

I’ve been looking into buying a place here in London recently, with the prices falling and the interest rates making saving practically pointless and all, it seems like a good time.  So I’ve been doing some searching on the various property websites out there, found a few that look ok, nice enough areas, within budget and so on.  One in particular I clicked on the ‘contact estate agent’ tab, filled in my details and checked to arrange a viewing.

I had left both email and mobile number so figured that the agent would then be in touch to arrange a time.  A few days passed and no sign of the estate agents.  It got towards a week of silence so I decided to call them up.  Got through to a girl at their office and she wasn’t aware of any web based contact (groan), but she’d get an agent to call me to fix something up.  A few more days of silence so I called again, same thing, but at least this time someone called back within the hour and we arranged a viewing.

We’re in a seriously depressed market right now, if the media are to be believed there aren’t many buyers out there so I’d have guessed estate agents would be falling over themselves to ’service’ potential buyers like myself, so the difficulty I had getting a viewing was not a good sign, but alas I had one, so that was something.

Unfortunately a booked viewing was not the same as an actual viewing.  Yesterday was the day of this much anticipated viewing, so I cycled down to the place in plenty of time and got there a comfortable 10/15 minutes ahead of time.  It wasn’t the nicest of days to be hanging about but patiently I did so.  2 o’clock came and went with no sign of anyone from the estate agent.  At quarter past I rung them up to see what was going on.  They had no record of the viewing but would get one of the sales staff to call me to sort things out.

Some twenty minutes passed and still nothing, so I called for a second time, and this time the girl on the phone promised that she would come out herself, give her 10 minutes and she’ll be there.  I waited at the property until 10 to 3, around half an hour after this phone call, before deciding to call it quits and give up on this property.

It turned out that the pictures on the website had glossed over certain things that put me off the property in question, but even if they hadn’t, the antics of the estate agents certainly would have done.

Step forward Haart Estate Agents, you were absolutely bloody awful.

Tags: Estate agent, haart, London, Property, Real Estate

Hell does not begin to sum it up

Posted by adi on Feb 1, 2009 in Play

Well today was the Hell of Ashdown ride.  Suffice to say, whatever could go wrong did go wrong.  The train to the start was delayed by around 40 minutes (on a 30 minute journey!) because some loony locked himself in the toilet and was threatening to kill himself.

Finally rolled off at 10,10am, a full 50 minutes after my scheduled start time.  The next few hours were pretty good.  It was cold but the sun was shining and the riding was good.  Completed ‘The Wall’ to the top of Ashdown Forest and felt good.  The wind up there was horrendous but was nothing compared to what greeted us in the valley.

The forecast had been for snow today for most of the week but this morning it was scheduled to hit us in the evening.  Did it buggery.  It was a full on blizzard for the next hour or so of riding.  Couple the snow with the howling wind and it was in your face, horizontal style snow.  Absolute murder.  My fingers and toes were as good as gone as I lost all feeling in them pretty quickly and it was a miserable experience.

Thankfully for the last ten miles or so the sun came out, and with my legs feeling ok I was able to complete those at a decent pace to complete the course in 4hr 41mins.  A bit slower than I was hoping for (sub 4hr 30min) but given the horrendous conditions I was pretty pleased.

The organisation for the event was superb and the poor souls stood marshelling the course in the snow deserve an enormous amount of credit.  And the cooked food upon our return was very welcome indeed.

To cap things off the train home was late arriving, then delayed by twenty minutes getting back to Waterloo.  So all told an eventful day and, whilst I doubt I would have agreed when the snow was falling, an enjoyable one.

Tags: cycling, hell of ashdown, snow

Beware the ice

Posted by adi on Jan 24, 2009 in Play

Went out for the weekly club ride this morning and the roads were pretty treachorous, with ice littering many of the side roads we usually go down.  Nevertheless it wasn’t long until some of our number took a tumble, with the rider in front of me going down, causing me to get my cumuppence too.

Thankfully no lasting damage was done, just a few bumps and bruises down my right hand side, although the rear brake was a bit wonky, meaning most of the ride home was done with it stuck on.

Not sure for how much longer the ice will be on our roads but do take care if you’re out and about as it can be rather treachorous.

Tags: crash, cycling, ice