An Addition to the Family

Um so I bought a few books for the flat library this year, but this one is by far the most important. I'm a little surprised we didn't have it. It's called The History of Love, by Nicole Krauss.

If I were ever to get a literary tattoo, I would definitely consider something from this book. Anyway, I think I'll keep it under my pillow until the end of the year. We have good conversations.

Yours,

Seeing Red: A Gingermentary

Just life at the flat. (Totally ad-libbed, by the way. Can you tell? Of course you can't. We're professionals.)




Yours,

Catch-Up

Much has happened in the past month. To start, a new semester has begun. I'm taking two classes at Uni.-- Introduction to the Study of Religion, and Twentieth Century Literature: Forms in Transition. Both have proven thus far to be incredibly interesting. There's a lot of reading involved, but hey, I'm an English major. It's what I does.

We also began our flat-wide class: Public History. I'm quite excited for this one. We get to interview people involved with the Nottingham program, because apparently little to no information exists on that front. So I suppose you could say we're all doing our sesquicentennial duty. Huzzah!

Secondly, I underwent a mild freak-out session in which I thought I had failed a class last semester. On February 7th, I checked my grades online and discovered that I had received a 41% in philosophy. (Remember, these are British standards. For British freshmen, this does not constitute a fail. Their first year at University doesn't hurt them.) I needed a 42% in order for the credits to transfer back to Luther. So after a week of frantic emails and intense waves of depression, I learned that the grade was incorrect: they had forgotten to factor in my essay score. I got an A on the exam and a B in the class.

Thirdly, I got a job. At this place. Making these:

Can you taste the awesome?

I start on Wednesday. I have absolutely no idea what to expect. Which is why I'm gonna wear my skinny tie:

This guy knows how it's done.

Fourthly, we visited Coventry and Stratford upon Avon as a group this past weekend. We went to Coventry Cathedral (which was bombed during WWII). We also saw an amazing production of King Lear in Stratford. Twas quite a day, to be sure.

Fifthly, I made awesome french toast.

And that's a rap.

Yours,

Tale of Travels (pt. 3)

SPEAKING of the Oscars: the award for worst blogger ever goes to... Aaron! For his incredible ability to not update for months on end! Congratulations, sir.

Seriously though, there's no excuse for this. (Actually there is, but we'll discuss that later.) It's preposterous--outrageous! We should have this gentleman tarred and feathered for his nefarious deeds!

Double seriously though, there's no time for that. We have to get through the whole of Ireland, we have to move on to bigger and semi-better things! Okay let's go! (!!!!)

Kilkenny
So we arrive in Dublin and immediately take a bus to Kilkenny. It was a terrifying ride, comparable to the Knight Bus, with lots of snow and darkness. After about three hours, the Girlfriend and I made it to the city centre. But then we got lost. And by "lost", I mean walk from one side of the town to the other, ask at least three people for directions, finally call our hostel host and have them come pick us up, totally bloody lost. It's fine, though. I had a delightful conversation with some drunk guy's sister via his cell phone, which he shoved in my face and demanded that I answer.

Finally, we got to our "hostel"--the only one open for Christmas. It was a rather sketchy affair. The place itself was a cottage, housing at the time two other (very friendly) couples. The woman asked us to pay in cash, which wasn't a problem, but the term "shady dealer" still came to mind. At any rate, it was an alltogether relxaing stay. Nothing in town was open for the holidays, except for a few grocery stores which we frequented. Also, there wasn't any heat in the cottage. (Why would there be?)

Classy dragon paintings in our (red!) room

One of the cozy beds

Kitchen area

Living room and fireplace

Girlfriend being silly, as always

Icing snowman, included in our Christmas feast

Downtown at night 

Church we went to for Christmas Eve mass

Yep, Kilkenny was pretty fun. We celebrated Christmas and Allyson's birthday with a bottle of wine and a brick of marzipan. (OMGMARZIPAN) The following day, we tried to shove off to Cork. But buses didn't run on the day after Christmas. SO we ended up staying at a B&B, without the second B. (They didn't serve breakfast on the day after Christmas.) Note to self: don't do anything in Ireland on the day after Christmas. You don't have a choice.

Cork

We got to Cork via Bus Eireann: truly the best way to travel in Ireland. Cork was exciting, I guess. It's mostly a shopping town, but we had fun looking in some of the quirkier places. We also walked along the river. Oh, and the BruBar Hostel offered free breakfast and internet access. 'Gotta appreciate the finer things, yo.

View from a bridge in Cork

City Centre area and shoppes

I think if I were to do this trip again, I would've skipped the more touristy places (i.e. Cork, Limmerick, Sligo) and stayed in some of the smaller towns. It was perfectly fine, though. I've always wanted to visit Ireland and it was definitely worth it to just walk around all over. Also I probably would've visited during non-holiday times. Not much was open!

Limerick

Ah, Limerick: the poet's city. I enjoyed staying here. For the most part, the Girlfriend and I walked around, visited closed museums, and toured the gardens. And we stayed in a hotel that was cheaper than a hostel! Yay for being cheap!

St. John's Cathedral: Closed.

Tallest spire in Ireland, though...

 Limerick outside a pub we went to

Okay, I have to pause here briefly. We found a quaint little pub that apparently held poetry readings every Wednesday. What luck! We were in town on Wednesday! It was called the White House, and it was a pretty popular place. Allyson and I showed up fashionably late and barely found a seat. I guess the whole poetry reading thing was too daunting or something--we arrived just in time for a few classic country songs by an alarmingly colloquial cover band, complete with southern accents. So that was enjoyable. We enjoyed a beverage (a.k.a. a Guinness, which is much better in Ireland, by the way), until we were promptly approached by a nine-fingered drunk. He told us about how he lost his finger and his brother in Chicago. He then asked Allyson to cover her ears while he told me about the local brothels. (Did you know, they're called "Bunny Farms"?) After a fantastically inarticulate conversation, he bought us drinks. We obliged, and then laughed all the way back to the hotel.

View of Limerick from the river

Wow. I don't have many photos in these places. Am I biased? Maybe. Onward, to Doolin!

Doolin
Doolin was by far the our favourite place to stay. It's a small, rural place on the West Coast. Near Galway, Doolin offers all the comforts of traditional Ireland: amazing music, awesome scenery, gigantic cows, and oh, the Cliffs of Moher. We stayed here for New Years and met some very friendly people. We hiked to the Cliffs, hung out at pubs, or just rested in bed back at the rainbow hostel, which coincidentally had heated floors. HEATED, I SAY!

Main road through Doolin. 

Girlfriend admiring rolling landscape

Band at McDermott's pub

More of the festive McDermott's

Cliffs of Moher (click to enlarge)

Me smiling--it turns out we got in free because we visited on New Year's Day

Mysterious fog 

Just being epic, no big deal

Needless to say, Allyson and I are yearning to come back here. Sometimes I wet myself just thinking about it.

Sligo

Uh-huh, so January 2-4 constitutes our stay in Sligo county (think way north of Ireland). I'm probably exagerating, but Sligo was the creepiest part of our vacation. Granted, we stayed at a nice hostel. But it was situated in the industrial district, and we were the ONLY GUESTS. Not even the manager stayed on premises, simply because the freaking place was deserted. Friggin. And the doors didn't lock!

Despite my misgivings, however, we survived. Again, we walked around and admired all the closed places. Mostly we just hung out in bookstores. I don't even have any pictures from Sligo! Oh well. Just imagine a somewhat large town along a river. With a mall and a church. And a creepy hostel.

Dublin

Our last stop took place in the grand city of Dublin. We stayed for five days and had a blast. I think we were a little tired of traveling at this point to fully appreciate Dublin, )it had been almost a month by now) but we did our best. Here're some pictures!

View of the river and accompanying seagulls

Jameson distillery! Oh, so yummy.

Allyson was chosen to do a tasting...

Yep. She's in her element 

Monument in City Centre

Trinity College entrance: Book of Kells ahoy!

Trinity College quad

Trinity College Arts Building

The Samuel Becket bridge...

...where we waited for Godot. He never showed up.

Awwww

"There's no ship as can match the Interceptor for speed."

St. Patrick's cathedral

St. Patrick cathedral spire

Memorial for Irish writers and Nobel Prize winners (Yeats, Shaw, and Beckett)

 Park dedicated to Irish writers

In conclusion, Dublin was pretty cool. It was a little expensive for our tastes, (groceries were €20 for a day!) but it was quite fun. We walked around the Temple Bar, went to the Writer's Museum and Art Gallery, and played cards. By the end of our five days we were all traveled-out. On January 9th we took a flight back to Nottingham. It was about time for a flat reunion.

So to recap, we did this:

(in about three weeks)

Yay! Wasn't that fun? Will you forgive me for not writing now?

NO!?

I suppose I had better catch you up on other things. But this post needs to end. Goodbye and thanks for watching!

Yours,