Hello!

Sorry for the hiatus everyone! What with the holidays and then pretty much nothing happening after the holidays (or so it's seemed) I haven't had the time or the motivation to post much. But I've decided that these next few weeks shall be activity time, so here's a big meaty post.

Last Friday was Defur's birthday and over the weekend the group of us made the grand tour of McHugh's, White's (this bar is older than the United States!!), the Roost and back to downstair's McHugh's (fancy Radio K! [fwi: links to a myspace]). It was all really fun :D

Today was decidedly quieter, as one of my friend's and I went for a super long walk/photography excursion...which I just spent way to much time making a map of it on GoogleMaps! It really was a nice walk and I got some awesome photographs.

Lovely surprise house on Greygates Ave

Whoa cool graffiti colors

Old Martello Tower

Dart pedestrian overpass, even more great colors!

See??

Semi-abadoned fishing spot

We decided that this is a
moor-your-secret-smuggling-boat-in-the-dead-of-night rope.

Hungry birds on the Merrion Rd strand

Overall it was about 4 miles and quite a nice walk. Tomorrow I get my loan refund available (yay!), so I'll be making a big grocery shopping expedition (don't worry Mom I haven't been starving, just eating a lot of soup haha). Then on Thursday I'll be seeing Andrew Maxwell, he of my visit Ireland side-bar video fame!! Although this video almost makes me cry laughing.

A Wee Revelation

So on getting off the bus back to Dublin this Sunday night (went to Coleraine/P'Stewart with the beau, which was wonderful) I had a bit of a revelation. I'm going to be here for at least a full more 11 months. Strange that that hadn't sunk in yet, but apparently it hadn't. I realized that this room at UCD, in Belfield, a Dublin village, in the Republic of Ireland is actually going to be my home for the next year. Whoa. How awesome is that? It's not like before when I was abroad in Belfast, because I always had the knowledge that I'd be going to back to Austin and Bryn Mawr in a matter of a few months. It's a whole different ball game now. So I decided, right there on the street in front of the Busaras, that I'm going to get to know this place. I'm going to try to make this city mine and get out there and see what I can see. Slightly weird I hadn't made that decision before, but now I've made it conscious.

So I went into town today. Visited the George's St Arcade, the Cultivate shop, an Oxfam Ireland shop, and Hackett's Garden Centre. Verdicts? I loved George's St. Arcade, it had a fabulous mix of high/low fashion, little veggie organic cafes, bizarre knick-knack shops and a secondhand book stall! Cultivate was cool, I bought some organic pasta, tahini and a little bottle of Dr. Bronner's tea tree soap (I've wanted to try that stuff for ages). I'll certainly be going back there. This Oxfam shop wasn't as great as the one in the Student's Union at Queen's in Belfast, because the clothes were kinda lame; but I was able to find a pretty scarf for only €4. And Hackett's is a lovely teeny tiny garden centre with walls of seeds and bulbs. That earthy growing smell was too much to resist, so I got a smallish lavender for my room and a rosemary plant for cooking!

Moral of my story? I'm feeling adventurous, promising and determined ... woot :D

My First Trip Into Dublin

This is slightly out of chronological order from the last post, but I made a video from my first trip into downtown on Saturday the 6th. It was a nice foray, definitely a museum kind of day because of the weather. So I went to St. Stephen's Green, had an awesome little lunch in a cafe, visited both the National Museum of Ireland (Archeology & Ethnography site .... of course) and the National Gallery of Ireland. Then I walked up O'Connell St to the Hugh Lane Dublin City Gallery (a contemporary art museum) but... it had just closed. For another time eh?

Highlight of the trip would definitely have to be the 3 MUMMIFIED Irish Kings on display in the National Museum. I had no idea bog preservation was that awesome, you could still tell that one of the kings had had red hair! Oh or maybe the sad person who's job it was to wear the leprechaun suit plus giant papier mache head. That dude was still there four hours after I'd first seen him while walking towards the river. Talk about schadenfreude, just seeing him made me glad I was sitting on a smelly bus out of the rain.

On my first night out in Dublin, or "Whoooo COPPERS!"

So night before last I had my Irish initiation to a 'country' bar. It was called Copper Face Jacks (more affectionately known as Coppers) and this link's comment section says it all and more. PLUS it was the night after the All-Ireland Hurling Championship (the Super Bowl of hurling in Ireland if you will) so the place was awash with Counties Kilkenny and Waterford fans. The DJ had an almost wedding dance style of mixing, playing a few rap tunes, then a Jackson 5 and Blues Brothers, then a Cotton Eyed Joe-style "Everybody knows the step but Katie!" song. Essentially it was a dance your heart out, laugh at the creepy dudes and sing along at the top of your lungs party, and it was frickin' awesome. Oh and don't worry, I picked the steps up just fine :)

Fourth Night Here

Went to the beach today! .......well, ok it was the Merrion Strand (pokey beach town with a pokey beach), but still it had a surprisingly nice effect. It's amazing what an afternoon on the beach can do for your disposition. Particularly if that beach has happy dogs and giggling toddlers who like singing the chorus of "A sailor went to ......" "SEA SEA SEA!!" It's not that fancy, and there really wasn't that much beach to speak of, but it's a great spot to watch everyone having their post-Sunday lunch family walk.

In about 10 minutes I'm going out for the first time downtown! The two girls across the hall just moved in and invited me to join them, which made my lonely heart leap like the 7 lords (....a leapin'!). I'll give my verdict of the pub soon.