So Here We Are
That’s probably the best way for me to start this off today. Here we are again, all the running around is over with and we’re back where we started. But are we really? Okay, the question really should be am I really? I don’t think that I am. Fourteen total hours on an airplane gives you a lot of time to do some soul-searching. I think I realized through all of this and this trip that we somehow got blessed with means that it is time to try to turn the page. I could say it’s time to try to be something else for things to change, but in a way, that’s not really the answer. Yes, things have to change, but in a way they have to go back as well.
The four days in Dublin I spent without using my braces were a milestone for me. Do I get around well? No, not really, but it’s not terrible either. My legs were sore and tired and my feet did hurt some, but it was nothing I couldn’t live with. And I guess that is the key to the whole thing now that I look back on it. I can LIVE with it. Part of me has been so caught up in what happened to me three years ago that it was becoming too much of what I am and was starting to identify me too much. I don’t want to just be identified in that way. I have a lot more to offer, and while I may not be able to do everything that I used to, I can still do many things. I already did the dying part and got beyond it. Now it’s time to start living again. So the braces are going away to the back of the closet, hopefully never to return, but we’ll see how it goes. I move slower without them, and a little more carefully, and rely on the cane a bit more, but I feel like I accomplished something by letting them go.
The trip to Dublin let me see that I wasn’t just depriving myself of opportunities, but I was doing it to Michelle as well, and that really wasn’t fair. She should be able to enjoy everything that life has to offer. Goodness she went through enough where she deserves that much. The trip showed that I can do some of the things, maybe at a much slower pace, but I still can do them. I have been too afraid for the last few years to try things I think more out of a fear of failure than anything else. I would get discouraged at small setbacks, and still do to some respect, and that is something I need to keep working on. One of many things actually.
I don’t think I will ever get beyond the frustration I still feel at the whole illness thing. Part of me still cannot handle the fact that there are months of my life that i do not remember at all and what I do remember was really just some alternate reality/dream/afterlife type of experience. I need to know more about that and I am not quite sure how to go about it but I will somehow and someway. For now I think I need to focus on the “now.” I have a beautiful wife and a great son and a lot of life left to live with them. So now I have to get myself in shape physically, mentally and emotionally. So that means diet and exercise to try to get myself back to where I need to be. It also means spending more time giving of myself to my family and friends, which I know I do not do enough of already and had kind of shied away from for the last few years. And it’s time for me to move on emotionally. I know I will still have doubts, and maybe I’ll have to deal with some depression now and then, but I think all of that is changing for the better now and I think once I get my health back to where it can be I will feel better about myself overall.
I’ll still write about everything I feel now and then. I have to; it’s really my only outlet for it, my only way to figure it all out. But I want that to be less of what I do and have my writing define me in other ways. And so since I am changing, naturally the blog has to change some too. I’ll be writing more about other things now. I want to do some writing about baseball now and then, which is a big passion of mine. I also love music (listening to it, not playing it) so we’ll do some stuff with that too. Movies are a big thing for me. I watch a lot of them so we’ll talk more about them. Books, let’s not forget about those. I love to read and we’ll be talking about stuff like that as well. Lest we not forget the creative writing either. I haven’t done much of lately since I was in my little funk, but I have been having some ideas come to and I am writing them down (I have notepads all over the house now), so I hope to do more of that as well. I’ll also be writing some more things about what’s happening in the world and bringing up some questions so we can all join in. I’ll let you know up front, I don’t talk politics with anyone. We get enough of that in our everyday lives, and everyone has their own view, which is the way it should be, so there’s no need for me to profess about mine. I’ll keep doing the questions every now and then, and I do still intend to ask questions to people on Twitter. I think that is a fun experiment and I do have more to say about that for another blog. The whole Twitter thing fascinates me.
So we have a lot of things to look forward to, and I guess that’s the other key too. Let’s LIVE and LOOK FORWARD and keep doing things that way. And so here we are, and here we’ll be. See you tomorrow for a fresh start.
Filed under: Change, Ireland | Leave a Comment
Tags: baseball, books, change, Dublin, movies, music, questions of the day, Twitter, writing
So the trip is over and done. We had a rather uneventful return after we spent the last morning in Dublin walking around and getting some Irish wool for some friends. We then had a quick lunch at the hotel and waited for our car. And waited. And waited some more. We then asked the front desk if we could call the car service about it on their phone and they told us the driver had shown up at 1:30 AM instead of 1:30 PM. They told him there was no way anyone would be leaving for the airport at that time since there are no flights then anyway, but I guess the driver decided to never come back. Thankfully, the hotel staff called a cab for us and we had no problem getting to the airport or through customs. We had plenty of time to kill before the flight and just relaxed. The flight itself was nothing special either, although the jackass sitting in front Michelle kept leaning his seat back into her for the whole flight. The fact that she didn’t get up and punch him showed remarkable restraint. Everything was back to American normal when we got to JFK. We had to wait to get to the gate for over an hour because of ground traffic. We got our luggage, got through customs, got our car and we’re home by about 11 PM. We picked up Sean the next day (thank you Hauser family for having him for the week!) and everything is back to normal now.
My impression on Ireland: I want to go back, of course. We did a lot of running around in the time that we had because everything was scheduled out in a short time, so I would like to go back to see more than just Dublin. Dublin was a great city. I liked the fact that we could walk or hop on the bus everywhere we went. Granted, it is not a big city like New York, but that is also part of its charm. Traffic is just traffic there. As one cab driver explained to us while we were there, people are just nicer and more laid back there. And they really are, or at least seemed to be to us while we there. I am willing to admit that most of the people we were dealing with while we were there were in the tourism and service industries, so they are supposed to be nice. In a lot of places though, that is not always the case. I have been to many places where not everyone is so friendly, but I have to admit that we did not come across one person who was even a little bit annoyed or terse. It was not like they even seemed to be going out of their way to be nice – they just were. It sure would be great if more people were like that everywhere.
Even the people who seemed to be rushing around – people on their way to work, students heading to class at Trinity College, busy waiters and waitresses – it didn’t seem to matter who they were or what they were doing, but everyone seemed to be in a good mood. I am sure, just like any other place, people have bad days, horrible days, but no one showed it. I’m not saying it was a perfect town and I am sure there are spots in the city where it’s not great to go or you can find yourself in trouble – that’s true anywhere you go today. We did run into quite a few people begging for money and saw some homeless people on the street. That’s true of New York every day and an unfortunate effect of the economy and the world we live in today. Ireland has been pretty devastated by the downturn in the economy. Of course, where we were was pretty high on the tourism list and Grafton Street is chock-full of stores that most people can’t afford to shop in, but the streets were full of people milling about, maybe not shopping, but there were lots of people there.
Now, a couple of observations. A lot of the people we came across like to curse. It’s not necessarily a bad thing, just something I don’t personally do very much. It could just be that were more prudish here in America (and I think we are, on many levels, but that’s for another day) but it is just part of the way they speak apparently. Michelle took particular delight in the fact that many people like to use the word”fuck” in every sentence. I think it’s just that I personally don’t use that word, so it kind of surprised me to hear it so much, but I guess you would get used to it over time.
People have long talked down about food and cooking in Ireland and the UK, but I didn’t have issue with any of it. I thought everything was fresh and tasted great and was not bland at all (if you want to see some recipes of what we ate, you can check my cooking blog for what we had over the course of the time we were there). Many places we went said they got their vegetables and fruit in daily, baked their own bread every day and there were fresh flowers every day everywhere we looked.
They love their music and they love to party. Arthur’s Day was crazy, even at midnight on a Thursday.Even while we were walking on the streets towards Grafton Street there were many street performers playing music. There were record stores all over the place as well, something that you rarely see over here anymore. And of course there were the parties and the beer. People just generally seemed to be having a relaxing good time. It may just have been because of the time we were there, I’m not sure. We’ll have to go back to find out for sure.
I would love to see more of the country, however. I would like to get outside the city and see some of the smaller towns, enjoy the atmosphere and see some of the history that the country has to offer. I think seeing more of the rural side of the country would make for a very well-rounded trip. Maybe next time we can spend a week over there and see more of everything. I would certainly go back again though.
Those are some of my general observations about the trip. Next time, I’ll get more specific about how I think the trip affected me and how I plan to go forward with me and this blog. I think it will all be pretty interesting. Check back and see. Until then, don’t forget to do something creative today!
Filed under: Ireland | Leave a Comment
Tags: Dublin, Guinness, the Irish people
After spending the entire day at the Guinness Storehouse, we were feeling pretty good since we had a lot of Guinness at this point. We had about 90 minutes at the hotel before we were supposed to head out to Whelan’s Pub for the shows that night. They had not announced what headliners would be playing where at any of the venues and even the people at Guinness weren’t sure who was going to be playing where. All they could tell us was that one of the headline acts would be at our location and that they were recording it for television.
We rested at the hotel for a bit before heading over. Michelle took a nap but I couldn’t sleep. I was kind of excited about going to show and feeling a little nervous too. I had done a lot of walking the last two days without my braces and was a little concerned about walking to the pub and then spending hours on my feet at the pub for the shows. I lay on the bed for the 90 minutes, thinking about how great of a day it had all been so far and how wonderful the entire trip had been to this point. Three years ago, I never would have imagined that I would be in Dublin doing all this. even after doing all of it, it doesn’t seem real.
They told us to get to Whelan’s at 5 PM. We got direction from the hotel on how to get there and saw it was pretty much a straight shot walk down to the pub, so we walked it. It was a little longer than we thought, but the walk wasn’t bad at all. When we came upon a big crowd, we knew we were in the right place. We crossed the street to the pub and there was just a swarm of people all waiting outside. We even considered not going because we thought it would just be too much to get in there. We had already had a great trip, if we missed this, oh well. Michelle walked inside the pub and asked someone about the whole thing, explaining we had these bracelets from Guinness to let us in. They told us to go around to the side of the building and we could get in that way.
We walked around to the side, flashed or silver wrist bracelets that said we were VIP’s, and after a few minutes of waiting, they let us come in. Thankfully, we were early enough where we were the first people in there so we were able to pick a place to sit. We chose a couple of seats close to the right side of the stage, figuring it was a good spot. We had a bit of a wait before the show was going to start, so we had a couple of drinks and sat and relaxed. As people began to file in, I began to think that maybe we were just too old to be doing this. Everyone who was coming in looked to be at least 20 years younger than us and it just made me feel a little out-of-place, but Michelle put me at ease and said to stop worrying about it and just enjoy it.
Finally, a little after 7 PM, the first act went on. He was singer by the name of Jake Bugg. He had a bit of a folksy, Bob Dylan type of way about him and you could tell his music was definitely influenced by the Beatles. He played with just a simple trio and played about 5 or 6 songs. he was good. I liked his style of music and the way he played. It was about 15 minutes or so before the second act went on. it was a band called Leaders of Men. Taking their name from a Joy Division song, I think they had the potential to be a good rock bad, but it just wasn’t there the night we saw them. The sound system was not right for their whole performance, they had way too much feedback and we’re just too loud for both of us. It seemed like a lot of noise and not a lot of music to me. People in the crowd seemed to know them and like them, so they enjoyed it, but it just wasn’t for me.
There was another break in the action this time and a TV camera crew swung over behind us and said he was going to be filming there. We offered to move out of his way, but he was very nice and said he would shoot around us. The next act that came on we thought was the headliner. It was Amy McDonald, a Scottish singer. I had heard her name before did not know any of her music. She apparently has a big hit song called “This is the Life” that was number 1 in several countries and she has performed on American television before. I have to say she was really good. She played a great guitar, had an awesome voice, and the crowd loved her and every song she sang. We loved her performance and would have been very happy if the night ended right there.
It actually did almost end right there. Michelle and I worth both feeling tired and hungry and weren’t sure we wanted to sit through another act. We thought Amy McDonald was going to ve the headline act, but then they started setting up for another band. We decided we would stay to see who it was. If we didn’t like them, we would be out of there. Boy, were we glad we decided to stay. We were lucky enough to be sitting where we were and when they announced Mumford & Sons, the place went nuts. Michelle and I just looked at each other and she had a big smile on her face. She really likes Mumford & Sons and couldn’t believe we were seeing them and sitting about 8 feet from the stage.
As much as we liked the band, the audience absolutely worshipped them. They knew every word to every song they sang and many times even sang louder than the band did. It’s hard to explain what it was like. It sent chills down my spine when we were there and still does when I think about. Here we were in this room that held not more than 150 people seeing a band like this who were so loved by their fans. Even the band seemed a little in awe at times and couldn’t believe everyone was singing back to them like this. If you’re not familiar with the band, they are interesting mix of rock and folk. It’s a quartet of a banjo player, an upright bass, a keyboardist and a guitarist. The lead singer, Marcus Mumford, also plays a bass drum with his foot while he sings and plays guitar.
Needless to say, the show was pretty wild. I think they played 6 or 7 songs; it’s hard to remember because I was so caught up in the whole thing. When they played “Little Lion Man,” people went crazy singing along. Michelle has spent the last few weeks trying to imitate the way the band and all the Irish people around us and the way they said “fucked” when they sang the song (I’ll write more about this tomorrow when I talk about my impressions of the whole trip). Of course, they came out and sang “The Cave” as an encore and it was just amazing. I don’t know any other way to put it. It was just so damn good, there is no other way to say it.
When the show was over, we made our way through the crowds inside and out. It was after midnight and people were still partying in the streets even though it was a Thursday evening. We made our way back to the hotel in something of a daze, still in shock about how great the show was. We actually ordered room service when we got back while we packed to leave the next day and just sat up and talked about the whole day and how much fun it was. We finally fell asleep at around 2 AM or so, exhausted from the day. Needless to say, we slept in a bit the next morning before we would have to leave.
That’s all about that night. Tomorrow I’ll write a little about our trip home and then about my impressions of the trip as a whole and how I felt about the people, the culture, the city and more. Check back if you want to see it. I’ll leave you with a few pictures we took from the show that night. You can see more on my Facebook page if you want to see them. Until next time, have a great night and see you tomorrow!
Filed under: Ireland | Leave a Comment
Tags: Amy McDonald, Dublin, Guinness, Jake Bugg, Leaders of Men, Mumford & Sons, Whelan's Pub
We had gotten all of our arrangements finalized with Guinness and the contest people the day before. Guinness would have a whole day’s itinerary for us when we arrived there and I asked us what time we would like to arrive. Michelle and I both agreed it might be good to get there earlier so then we might have some time later in the day to fit something else in (little did we know…) so we suggested 10 AM. Guinness said great, we’ll see you at 10 in the morning.
We had a comfortable night’s sleep and got up and had a much smaller breakfast than the day before. I stayed with yogurt, fresh fruit and a croissant while Michelle had some cereal. We walked over to the bus stop to wait for the tour bus, which has a stop at the storehouse. The weather seemed pretty good this day, although it was a little breezy. I wasn’t wearing my braces again today as my legs were still healing, and I knew we were in for another long day of walking, but I wanted to try it anyway. My legs were sore from the walking, but other than that I felt pretty good so far.
The bus arrived at the Storehouse (which is huge by the way) and we walked in and up to the information desk. We told them we were here and were contest winners and the gentleman at the desk made a call and said someone would be right down. There was already a line for people to get into the storehouse for the tour. Since it was Arthur’s Day, they were expecting quite a crowd. After waiting for a minute or two, we were greeted by someone who brought us in upstairs and into the storehouse where we had to wait for someone else. Again, we waited for a couple of minutes before someone walked us over and greeted us. They said congratulations to us for winning and since we had said we were going to be there at 10 AM they were adding something special on to our day. We would get to sit in on the daily sampling of yesterday’s batch with some of the select employees who do this as part of their job. We were to meet the master brewer, Fergal Murray, who would take us over to where it takes place. It seemed pretty exciting to us.
Fergal came over a moment later and introduced himself to us. He said he had been working for Guinness for 28 years. He apologized for being a few minutes late but he was doing an interview with the BBC and had to take care of it. They brought us upstairs, where we were issued VIP passes and vests and we had to sign some paperwork. We were then joined by a public relations person for Guinness and a photographer from the BBC who would be following us around for this portion of the tour. Fergal then led us out of the building and across the street to the other part of the factory. We found out the entire complex encompasses a staggering 55 acres of land in Dublin and they are building new, more modern facilities as we were there. We did see some the old original buildings from the 1700’s that are no longer in use but are too old to be torn down. This included the old flaking silo where barley was stored and flaked as it was at that time unprocessed when they received it. It was a long walk over to the other side of the complex where the other offices were located and we had to traverse some old cobblestone steps so I was treading very lightly.
We finally reached the offices where the sampling would take place. We were seated at a table with 7 or 8 other people, all who are employees of Guinness in one department or another who gather every morning for the sampling. Everyone id give 6 half pints of Guinness from the batch processed of the previous day. They are also given a ratings sheet where they are asked to rate each sample to see how it is for quality, aroma, bitterness and several other criteria. The expectation is that every sample will be between a 7 and 8 out of scale of 1 through 9. If the samples are deemed to be bad, then they will not process and ship that batch. We were told that occasionally they will sneak in a bad sample on purpose to make sure everyone is paying attention and rating properly. They asked us to taste a control sample and then taste the other 6 samples and rate each one. They then went around the room and asked for our opinion on each sample. I felt all of the samples tasted very fresh, a couple were a little more bitter than others, and one actually tasted more carbonated than the rest of them. We all went through each sample, which added up to about 2 whole pints of Guinness I imagine over the course of about an hour.
We were then asked if we had any questions they could answer. I asked we had long heard that Guinness in the U.S. tasted different from that in Ireland and if this was true, why is it? Fergal answered that there shouldn’t be any difference at all where the taste is concerned. The problem lies in several areas. One, the optimum time for a batch to reach the U.S. is 10 days, which isn’t always possible under perfect conditions. Two, many bartenders in the U.S. do not know the proper technique of pouring a Guinness and if it is not poured correctly, it will taste different. Third, and this I was not aware of, but the pubs in Ireland use certain pint glasses only for Guinness and they are washed separately with special detergent designed for Guinness glasses and this can help with the way it tastes. Many bars in America use glasses that are washed in a dishwasher, which glasses for Guinness shouldn’t be in. It was a very interesting experience. Even the employees present that this was unusual because no one, not even most people who work there, get to do what we did and it was nice for them to have outsiders sit in to see what they thought of the process and the beer.
We both felt pretty honored to get to experience that. After the sampling was done, Fergal took us back across the street to the Storehouse where he said goodbye to us and thanked us for coming. He had more interviews to do, this time with American television. I was grateful that he took so much of his time to spend with us doing this. We were then met by someone else from the staff who gave us the rest of our agenda for the day. For now, we could tour the Storehouse at our leisure, go over to the gift shop and then they gave us some vouchers for lunch. After lunch they had sett up for us the connoisseur’s experience at the “secret” bar in the Storehouse for some special instruction and tasting. When that was done, we could be done for the day at the Storehouse. They also gave us two passes and bracelets for entry to Whelan’s Pub that night for the Arthur’s Day show. At that time, they did not even know who would be there to perform that night.
We stopped over at the gift shop and bought some souvenirs and they slowly toured the Storehouse. They take you through the entire history of the brewery and the process they use to make Guinness. We saw the lease Arthur Guinness signed for the property – a 9,000 year lease at 65 pounds a year. We learned that Guinness buys 2/3 of all the barley grown in Ireland in a year. Of course, they had a free pint sample for you on your way up the Storehouse (the design of the storehouse is like a big pint glass, it gets wider as you go towards the top) and on the top-level is the Gravity bar, where you could get another free pint of Guinness. So we had another 2 pints before lunch, bringing our total to 5 or 6. When we went to lunch I had another pint at the bar where we had lunch on the fifth floor.
We the walked over to the “secret bar” where there were about a dozen other guests at the bar. The bar was lit underneath and we were there for a lesson on how to pour a Guinness draft and how to properly drink it and the three other types of Guinness they make – Guinness Stout, Guinness Black Lager and Guinness Foreign Extra. I had never had the Foreign Extra before, and they told me it is hard to find in the United States sometimes, but you can get it. Of course, we got full samples of all 4 versions, so add 4 more Guinness to list, bringing me up to 10 or 11, I kind of lost count. Either way, it went up one more when they told us we could each have one more of any type we choose (I went with the Foreign Extra). It was interesting to learn that there are actual ways each beer should be drunk in order to get the proper flavor from it and it was fun to learn to pour one the right way (it should take exactly 119 seconds to pour, by the way).
After all of that, we were done with Guinness for the day. With left there with the experience of a lifetime, something most people never get to do. We took the bus back to the hotel and had about two hours to rest up before the rest of the evening, and we needed the rest! My legs were tired, but hanging tough. I was glad to get back to the hotel to rest for a bit and we napped before we started our second leg of the day’s adventure.
I think that is enough writing for one night. I’ll cover the adventure at Whelan’s Pub tomorrow as I begin to wrap up our little adventure. I hope you all are enjoying the ride. It was so much up to this point it’s hard for me to put into words and it just got better from here. Check back tomorrow to see how the evening’s fun went and enjoy some of the pictures from the Storehouse. To see more, you can always check my Facebook page for all of the pictures from our trip. Until tomorrow, enjoy the rest of your night!
Filed under: Ireland | Leave a Comment
Tags: Dublin, Fergal Murray, Guinness, Guinness Storehouse, master brewer, storehouse
We purposely woke up early on day 2 in Dublin for several reasons. First, we wanted to have breakfast. Breakfast was included in our package at the hotel, so we wanted to check it out. Second, we wanted to get an early start and do some sightseeing. Neither of us seemed to have much of a problem dealing with any jet lag or anything, although that could be because we napped the afternoon before. We both got up at around 7:30 AM and we ready to start the day. Okay so we were getting ready, but as I was getting dressed, I noticed that my legs did not look so good. They were very red and raw from the chafing that happened yesterday from walking in the rain. It hurt just to my pants on, so I knew wearing the braces would make for a miserable day. I decided to forgo the braces for the first part of the day and see how I would do. I let Michelle know about it and she agreed that it would be a good idea, but we would just have to take things very slow. it was going to be a lot of walking and this would certainly be a challenge for me, but I wanted to give it a try.
We got dressed and went down to breakfast. We were seated in the dining room and relaxed a bit before the waitress came over and asked if we would like coffee or tea to start our day. Michelle ordered tea, I went for coffee. Then they asked us if we would like some toast as well. We said sure, not thinking much of it, although it seemed a little odd to us, but what the heck, I like toast. We then took a look at the menu and both decided we were going to give the full Irish breakfast a try. Now, I had a vague idea of what this was before I ordered it, so I knew there was going to be a lot of meat on the plate. traditionally, the Irish would a very large breakfast to help sustain them through a heavy day of work on the farm in a cold winter. Well, that certainly would be true with what we got. I’ll go into more detail tomorrow on my cooking blog if you want more details about the breakfast, but it is safe to say that I might never eat a breakfast that large again, and probably a few things on the breakfast either, but it was a good experience.
We left breakfast feeling very, very full and we had plenty of energy to help get us through the rest of the day. We walked over to the Tourist Center and a few blocks from the hotel and got a couple of two-day passes on the tourist bus for us. These buses were great. They stopped at 24 different tourists spots and you could get on and off all day for two days The buses ran until about 8 PM. The nice thing about Dublin is, although it is a city, if we got stuck somewhere, we could walk back to the hotel. Nothing was really that far away from where we were located. It was still raining a bit when we left for the morning and this was a Wednesday morning, so everyone was going to work or school. The streets were quite busy with people moving about. They have a great commuting system in the city with lots of buses running constantly to bring people back and forth to where they need to go.
Once we were on the tour bus, we rode around for a few minutes until we found the first spot we wanted to stop at, which was Dublin Castle. We had high hopes that it would be more than it was, but we quickly found out that most of the actual castle isn’t there anymore and what is has been converted to be used as office space. It was disappointing, since we were hoping to see an actual castle in the city, but it was not to be. Luckily, Christ Cathedral and St. Patrick’s Cathedral were both within close walking distance of where we were so we were able to walk over and see them.
Christ Cathedral was originally built in the 11th century and it was quite a marvel to see. The grounds of the church were quite nice even in the misty rain. We only ventured as far in the church as the entrance see they wanted 8 Euro a piece to tour the church. I can understand that they need to raise money to keep up the grounds and the church running, but we didn’t really want to pay to see it, so we moved on to St. Patrick’s. Here are a couple of pictures of Christ’s Cathedral:
St. Patrick’s was a few blocks away. A lot of this walk was uphill, and I was moving slowly. One thing that you need to keep in mind is that a lot of the places we were walking were old cobblestone streets that were also a little slippery from the rain. They also don’t have the same disability features like ramps in many places there, so everything was stairs to be walked as well. I moved very slowly and cautiously, but so far, so good.
It was a very nice church with beautiful gardens. The gardens were quite extensive, with many flowers blooming nicely and people sitting and relaxing, enjoying the solitude and quiet. We took a nice, leisurely walk around the gardens, with a pigeon following us most of the way. We saw the area where the well is located that St. Patrick purportedly used to baptize people. They also have plaques along the garden wall honoring some of the famous Irish writers. We didn’t go in the church either here, as it was the same and they wanted Euros to tour the church. Just as we were reaching the front door, a tour bus was stopping there, so we decided to hop on and head back towards Trinity College. Here are some pictures of St. Patrick’s grounds above.
Trinity College was a few minutes away, so we relaxed on the bus for a bit. By this time, the sun had come out a little and the weather brightened a bit, which was great for us. My legs were feeling a little tired, but for the most part I felt like I was doing okay. When we got to Trinity College, we walked through the gates and onto the campus, which was buzzing with students. The college has about 16,000 students, so it’s a decent sized school and the campus itself is very large. We wanted to go see the Book of Kells, a 9th century Gospel written by Celtic monks with very ornate drawings. It is quite a sight to behold and is the main attraction at the college. What we thought was better, however, is the library itself. The library at Trinity College is a copyright library, meaning it is entitled to hold any book of material that is published in Ireland. They have an immense collection of books going hundreds and hundreds of years that you can walk through. As soon as you enter the room, you can smell all the old books. They do have some items on display, but most of the library is sectioned off by velvet ropes so you can see the books, but you can’t touch them. Called the Long Room, it houses the books as well as marble busts of famous writers adorning the room. It’s amazing to see. Unfortunately, you are not allowed to take pictures anywhere in the library so we couldn’t get shots of anything, which is too bad, because you have to see it. I’ll always remember it.
By this time of day, it was about 3 PM and we were wearing down a bit from all the walking. We had skipped lunch because breakfast was so large, so we went back to the hotel to rest up a bit and figured we would venture out that night and maybe pick up some souvenirs for people along the way. We rested for a couple of hours and then got up and went back out for dinner. We decided to eat at the Hairy Lemon, a pub nearby, mainly because we liked the name of it. I’ll write more about it in my cooking blog, but it was quite a nice meal in a quaint little place. After dinner we walked out to Grafton Street, which is the big shopping area in Dublin. Just like areas of Manhattan, this is a pedestrian street so there are no cars allowed there. Not only is the street filled with shops and shoppers, but there were lots of street entertainers there as well. We walked up and down the entire length of the street, which is quite a ways, going into various shops to look around and check things out. There were lots of high-end shops that seem to cater to the tourist industry, but there were also some neat little shops down some of the side streets that we saw. There was a lot of jewelry, lots of clothing and lots of trinkets available. We were able to get some things for people, but mostly we just had fun and enjoyed each other’s company. We even walked down to St. Stephen’s Green, which is the big mall in Dublin that looks like a glass dome. By about 9 PM or so we were tired and had gotten everything we wanted to get, so we went back to the hotel, had an Irish coffee nightcap, and went to bed. Here are a couple of pictures from Grafton Street above.
I know it may not sound like the most exciting day, but we had a lot of fun and I feel like I accomplished something. When we fell asleep that night, I was exhausted and my legs hurt, but I felt good. I had walked miles, literally miles, without my braces for the first time in three years. It was a big deal for me. I was a little worried about what the next day would bring because I knew we would be spending the day at Guinness on our feet so it was a lot to ask, but for the first time in a while I felt pretty good about myself. It’s hard to explain, but I feel like I was starting to turn a corner that day, that maybe I was finally going to be able to move past this barrier, whether it was invisible or symbolic in those braces.
Okay, that’s enough writing for tonight. Tomorrow I’ll write some more about our trip and cover the great time we had that last full day in Dublin. When I am done describing the trip, I’ll talk some more about what my impressions of Ireland and the people and how this trip may have helped me turn a corner. So until tomorrow, enjoy your evening and try to do something creative today (or tomorrow, I know it’s kind of late tonight)!
Filed under: Ireland, Uncategorized | Leave a Comment
Tags: Book of Kells, Christ's Cathedral, Dublin, Dublin Castle, full irish breakfast, Grafton Street, Ireland, St. Patrick's Cathedral, the Hairy Lemon, The Long Room, Trinity College
Okay, I am back, or at least I am trying to be back. We returned from our trip to Dublin about 10 days ago and I have taken a bit to try to get things back together. I have a little break in my workload and everyone here at home is trying to back into a routine and rhythm, and that includes me. Before I get back to what I want this blog to be, I want to take a few days at write about our experiences in Dublin. Not just our experiences as tourists, which was great and I have some fun things to tell, but also about how I think it has helped to change me and my approach and outlook on things.
I think I had hit a funk before we left. I was doing a lot of work, Sean had started up with school and had more responsibilities to take care of, and it just seemed like there was a lot going on in our lives before we left. For some reason, I think I had lost some interest in writing for fun, which happens everyone once in a while. It’s hard to think of myself as a professional writer, but in reality it is what I get paid for even if it is not the great American novel or writing for a newspaper. I still get to write every day and I write about a pretty wide variety of topics, so I have had the chance to learn about things I knew nothing about before ( I am a blast at parties now, since I can talk about just about anything now. I know just enough about a bunch of things to make it seem like I know a lot :)). Anyway, I think that has had some effect on my desire to blog. I spend all day writing, and the motivation to do it, even for something I enjoy, just wasn’t there. This trips seemed to come along at the most opportune time. We needed to get away and I needed to get away from writing and come out of my shell a little bit.
It’s a hard thing for me. I don’t really think of myself as handicapped, but there are times when I realize that I am, whether I like it or not. I can get around, but not always easily. I still have unresolved issues with my legs and feet, but I have learned to accept that that is what it is. I have the same issues with breathing, though that is not often an issue either. Either way, some of the physical limitations I have seem to have had made me into something of a hermit at times. I work from home and do a lot from home and don’t often leave home on my own. I need to try to get over that, and I think this trip helped me see that I can get around better than I thought.
So let’s start with the trip and see what happened. Michelle and I were both concerned about how my legs would be on a nearly 7 hour flight to Dublin. We were concerned enough to contact the airline and arrange for wheelchair service to help me get around the airports and make things easier. It was a big help since we were able to get through security at JFK easier to get to the gates. Once we got to the gates, we did have a slight delay waiting for the plane to leave, but other than that, we boarded and took our seats and waited. It’s the first plane I had been on since 2008, a year before I got sick. Aer Lingus was great. They were very helpful in having the wheelchair for us and I think it was a pretty good flight to Dublin. We left JFK at around 10 PM New York Time so we would arrive in Dublin so we would arrive there at around 10:30 AM with the time difference.
It was a good flight. I watched “Cabin in the Woods,” which is quite a strange movie if you have never seen it. Give it a watch if you get the chance. We also seemed to get a lot of food on this flight. They gave us dinner, a snack and breakfast on the way there. The food wasn’t too bad. The problem would be by the time we landed in Dublin, I had had my braces on my legs for about 20 straight hours at this point and they were starting to hurt. The braces provide my lower legs with some extra support and strength for my feet. They can get quite uncomfortable after a long stretch of time and they were by this point. I was looking forward to getting them off.
We found our driver and he took us to our hotel. It was raining quite heavily in Dublin and, according to the driver, had been for a few days now. We got to the hotel, the Brooks Hotel, which was very nice and elegant. Unfortunately, we were early . They do not have check-in until 2 PM and we got there at 11 AM. They graciously took our luggage and asked if we could come back at about 1:30 or so and a room would be ready. We didn’t really have much of a choice and agreed to do it. That left us walking around the city of Dublin for a couple of hours without really knowing where we were going. We did have a map and tried to scope a few places out. We stopped at a coffee shop for an espresso and a hot chocolate for Michelle, which she said was among the best she had ever had:
We looked around a little bit more after our beverages, but the rain was so heavy, we really just needed a place to duck into. We finally decided on the Dublin Wax Museum. It sounded interesting and we figured this would give us an hour or so to walk around and see what was there. It wasn’t too far from the hotel either.
The Wax Museum is situated behind the Bank of Dublin and is housed in an old bank itself. This gives it a dim, creepy feel to it. One of the cool aspects is that the exhibits are all housed in old bank vaults that still have the vault doors on them. I though this was a great feature. many of figures are of people from Irish history. There are sections covering different eras in Irish history, a room about Irish writers, and then there are some horror aspects, an entertainer’s area and a kid’s area. There are a lot of fun and interesting figures there. not all of them seem particular lifelike, but this one of Queen Victoria seemed kind of creepy and lifelike when you got close to it:
We had a nice time in the museum, and there are other pictures you can check out on my Facebook if you want to see them. We then stopped for a nice, quiet lunch at Peter’s Pub. I just wrote about it on my cooking blog if you want to see what it was like and what we had, but it was very enjoyable. We then finally got back to the hotel and were able to get a room.
We got upstairs to our room, and it was quite comfortable. One thing we found out right away was that just inside the door to our room was a slot for your room key. The key also activated the electricity in the room, which I think is a great idea. This way you can never forget to turn the lights off when you leave and save some energy. We unpacked and flopped on the bed. By this time we had been both awake for about 26 hours straight other than a brief nap on the plane, so we were exhausted and soaked from the rain. Michelle’s sneakers were ruined (we ended up leaving them in Dublin) and I needed to get my braces off. I knew there was a problem. I removed the braces and saw that water had gotten between the braces and the skin on my legs, chafing my legs pretty badly all afternoon long. When I took my braces off, I had pretty severe cuts on both my legs in front and back and it hurt a lot. It felt a lot like a bad sunburn but they were cut up pretty good.
We both slept for hours. Not just an hour or two, but several hours, right through dinner. We woke up about 8 PM and decided we should just go downstairs to the bar downstairs, grab a snack and relax since it was still raining and my legs didn’t look so hot. I didn’t put the braces back on since it hurt too much. I can get around without them ( never wore them when i was just in the house all day anyway), but it would be a challenge. Thankfully we weren’t going very far, just downstairs. I moved slowly with my cane and away we went.
We went downstairs to the Jasmine Bar and each had a drink. It was my first Guinness of the trip. I had expected a taste difference in the Guinness, as everyone always talked about, but I didn’t taste one (there will be more on this in a later post). Michelle and I then decided that we were hungry but not very hungry (lunch was quite large and filling) so we just ordered some dessert and Irish coffee. We opted for the homemade lemon tart with homemade raspberry sorbet. It was wonderful!:
The real treat was the Irish coffee. I love it and make it often myself and was curious as to how it would be made here. I would later find that different bartenders make it slightly differently. I’ll have more about it on my cooking blog tomorrow, but here is what it looked like on that first night:
It was great to just sit and relax and enjoy each other’s company. It’s not something we do enough of, as I am sure many other couples experience when you have kids, work and other responsibilities that keep you from spending time with each other. That was another reason this trip came at a good time for us. By 11:00 PM, we were ready for bed and went back upstairs to gear up for the next day, where we had a lot of plans.
I’ll write more about our trip over the next few days to cover the whole trip, the experiences we had, our take on the Irish culture and how the trip as a whole has effected me. For this blog for the next week that is how things will be. After that, I plan to have a little different take on the blog itself. I want to write more about things that I like, such as movies and baseball, but I will also take on some other interesting topics and ideas that I may see or come across in the news or other media. I also want to just use ideas that I may have or you may have to write about different topics. I am still going to have times where I ask a question of the day, but it won’t be every day. I also will still interact with some celebrities on Twitter and see if I can get their take on different topics. And I am also going to write on here, and that is both writing like this and fiction writing, hopefully more than I have done in the past. Time never seems to stretch far enough to do all that we want, but I am going to try to make time to do it, one way or another.
Things are changing, and I think it is all going to be for the good. Check back tomorrow for more on our trip and see what’s changed. Until then, don’t forget to do something creative today!
Filed under: Change, Family, Ireland | Leave a Comment
Tags: Aer Lingus, Brooks Hotel, Dublin, Dublin Wax Museum, Guinness, Ireland, Peter's Pub
I’m Not Dead & Going to Dublin
I just wanted to make a quick post here since I seem to have been ignoring this blog lately. I still want to work on it, I just need to find the time to do it and get back into the swing of things. I am hoping my trip to Dublin this week will re-invigorate me and get me back on track with some of my thoughts and doing things. I am planning for big changes this fall, focusing more on my family, my health and my writing. I think things will be very different when I get back On the 29th of September. Hopefully I am right! I promise to be here with more questions, stories and I am thinking of changing the path and direction I want to go with this blog. It will still include my writing and questions, but I think I want to try a few other things as well. i’ll keep you all posted. Thanks for sticking with me and standing by me friends. I’ll be back when we are back from Dublin! Here’s to a great trip and a new start!
Filed under: Family | Leave a Comment
Tags: change, Going to Dublin
100 Things to Bitch About | Maxim.
via 100 Things to Bitch About | Maxim.
Between work and my new medication, I haven’t had a lot of time or energy to do any work on my blog here, but I am hoping to get back to it once my body adjusts to the new drugs. In the meantime, enjoy this list from Maxim Magazine of 100 things to complain in today’s world. It’s funny, and a lot of them are true! I hope to get time to do some work on here tomorrow!
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Tags: 100 things to bitch about, Maxim, Maxim Magazine
Frankly My Dear, I Don’t Give A…
I really don’t about a lot of things. New medicine for me means the return of side effects until my body gets used to the new dosage. This means some days I am extremely tired, some days I am nauseous for hours, some days I am lightheaded and have to sit constantly. There are lots of other side effects that go along with taking Lyrica, thankfully only a few of them have had an effect on me, which also has an effect on how much I actually get done on any given day. In the past, it has taken me about 2 weeks or so to get accustomed, so hopefully that will happen again and I can back on a more normal schedule. I’ll write some more about what’s been occuring with me and my ongoing medical saga soon.
Back to the last question from Tuesday, which was:
What is your favorite movie line or quote?
I do have a few that I actually like. It’s funny how we can feel that our lives are impacted by certain movies. Some films seem to come along at a particular time in our lives and just fit perfectly with what we are feeling are need just then. And then we hear it – just the line we needed to hear from the character or to the character we most relate to. It can feel like they are talking right to us and we always remember it. However, there are also those lines and catch phrases that seem to become part of our culture almost immediately. The American Film Institute compiled a list a while back of what they think are the top 100 most famous quotes from movies. If you want to check it out for yourself, you can look here. As for me, there are a few quotes that really stand out for me. Being a baseball buff, the speech from James Earl Jones’ character in “Field of Dreams” perfectly describes how baseball can make you feel. I am also a big Humphrey Bogart fan and “The Maltese Falcon” is one of my favorite movies. At the end of the movie is my favorite line, when someone asks him about the falcon and he replies that it is “the stuff that dreams are made of,” a loose interpretation of a line from Shakespeare’s “The Tempest.” I just love the way the line is delivered and the context of it. Another of my favorite movies, “The Godfather” produces a lot of great lines. For that matter, so does “The Godfather II” which I think may even be better than “The Godfather.” Michael Corleone (Al Pacino) says in “The Godfather II”: “Keep your friends close and your enemies closer,” something that has become part of our vernacular and is used often. Those are just a couple of my personal favorites.
Thanks to everyone who took the time to answer and a special thanks to David Wells, who answered me on Twitter, sort of (you can check the comments from my last blog post to see his answer). Now let’s move on to today’s question. I have had a lot of relatives getting married this year, so I thought this might be a good question to ask:
What do you remember most about your wedding day?
Wedding days can be kind of a blur for the bride and groom, but there are always a few things that stand out in your memory about that day. Even if you didn’t have an elaborate wedding, I am sure there is something you have never forgotten about it, so what is it? Think about it and let me know. You can answer on here, or on Facebook or on Twitter. I’ll ask some people on Twitter as well and see how they answer. I’ll post my answer tomorrow.
I did manage to post the next installment of “Below the Surface” yesterday if you want to check it out. Thanks to those who have read it and sent me feedback; it’s greatly appreciated. Hopefully I will be able to finish that one soon so I can start on another one. If you ever have anything you would like to contribute, such as a question, poem, story, photo or whatever, just drop me a comment or a note and let me know. Any and all participation is highly encouraged and appreciated. Until next time then, enjoy your day and don’t forget to do something creative today!
Filed under: Movies, Questions | Leave a Comment
Tags: famous movie lines, famous quotes from movies, favorite movie quote, question of the day, wedding day memories
A big flash of the fluorescent light overhead jolted Steven back to the present. He stared at the access point again, hoping for some kind of answer to either what happened back then or what was happening now. The door offered him nothing, just the coldness and silence of the cement crusting the inside of the door. Steven shook it off, picked up the air conditioner and made his way up the basement stairs and back to the main part of the house.
He closed the basement door with his foot and heard it creak shut. He struggled with the weight of the machine in his hands as he made his way up the staircase to the second floor, stopping once to re-position his hands while leaning on the banister. He finally made it to the top of the steps, sweat beading on his forehead as he turned to go down the hall towards the master bedroom. As he twisted the doorknob to open the door, he could swear he heard the basement door creak open and closed as he went in. He rested the conditioner on his bed as he stopped and listened again, walking lightly to the doorway so he could hear better. Nothing. He turned back into the room, picked up the air conditioner and grunted as he worked it towards the window. It took a little work, but he was able to stabilize it in the window frame and closed the window on to the top of the unit to secure it in place. As he positioned the side panels of the air conditioner to seal it off, he could see out into the entire backyard. He could swear he saw someone looking back up at him and then quickly dart into the garden on the path when he looked back. He didn’t get a good enough look to see who it was, but it was definitely someone.
Steven raced out of the bedroom and down the steps, taking two and three at a time until he reached the bottom and stumbled, rapping his knee on the banister. He kept going at full speed as he slid across the kitchen floor, this time whacking his elbow on the corner of the stove. Steven could feel a chunk of skin fly off his elbow as he hit. He briefly grabbed at his elbow and then kept moving out the back door and across the lawn to the garden path. He reached the path, breathing heavily, and slowed down, trying to move quietly and rapidly looking around for something, anything. He kept moving down the path, but he saw nothing and heard nothing, just the sound of the wind rustling the leaves. He came upon the barren patch of earth again and saw that it looked exactly as it had before. Steven looked around for clues of anyone being there, but all he could make out were footprints in the earth, probably from himself, Oscar and the other workers. He walked further down the path to a small clearing near the edge of the woods where Oscar had set up a compost pile. There was nothing here. Steven took a few steps and peered out into the woods, but he couldn’t see anything through the dense brush. There was no way someone could have worked through there easily and quickly. As Steven turned to go back up the path towards the house his stubbed his foot on a tree root near the compost pile and fell. “This just keeps getting better,” he thought to himself as he pushed himself up, feeling his knee ache and his elbow throb. He stopped as his arms had extended themselves to brace him before he stood. Something had caught his attention. There in the soft earth just short of the compost pile, unmistakably, was one very small footprint.
Steven quickly rose and hurried down the path towards the house, looking all around him as he went. He didn’t take time to pause at the scorched spot this time and went straight towards the house towards the basement access door. He was so unsure about everything at this point, what had been real, what was real and what wasn’t. He slowed down as he reached the door and just took a moment to stare at it. He then moved closer and examined it. Although it was rusted and worn and caked with dirt and cement, and if you didn’t know to look for it you miss it, but there, without a doubt, near the handle was a small, rusted rut in the metal. The scratch was real and it was still there.
Filed under: Fiction | Leave a Comment
Tags: below the surface, fiction, horror fiction
The Office of Iguana Flats 