Returning to the previous flashback

It's getting hard to keep track of days. It was Wednesday night that we ate in Bushmills. The Inn there was very pretty and friendly.

I should stop again to comment on how positively nice the people here. There's nothing forced about it. Between that and the fact that they speak English, it makes the underlying works of a trip like this much easier than most. The food had been pretty good so far too. I can't say every meal has been wonderful, but overall it's been fine.

So eventually we arrived Wednesday night at our B&B, which, in the middle of the night, felt completely out in the middle of nowhere, to a kind of spooky effect. Of course, inside there was nothing spooky about it, even though our room was named after a famous rope bridge that spans a local chasm. The owner was clearly anxious to get to bed, though he was perfectly friendly (of course).

In the morning I got up and walked outside, and of course it looked quite a bit different. Almost breathtakingly beautiful, and speaking of breathtaking, just amazing air. It's always worth taking a moment to sample the air wherever you are. Air should not be taken for granted, and some of it is better than others, and this was one of the good ones. Clean, with a bit of sea smell, and perhaps a touch of some sort of animal manure, but not to the point where it was more than a hint. It was a wonderful thing to get up to.

The breakfast at the Causeway Inn was pretty great. I didn't know B&Bs had menus. I had a pancake topped with bacon and a poached egg.

So what's the perfect way to follow up a breakfast? A visit to the Bushmills Distillery, of course. It was relatively unbusy, because it was before the busses started to show up from Dublin full of day trippers. They weren't distilling anything, but we had a guided tour around from a very well-rehearsed young man, who as an aside advised me to drink as much Guinness as I could while I was here because it wasn't the same anywhere else. We also learned about the very important distinction between Irish and Scotch whiskies, and among the Bushmills varieties. The coolest thing to see was the bottling plant, where you could see bottles get rinsed, filled, labeled, have their caps screwed on, put into cases, an palletized.

And then of course there was the tasting. We were under the impression that you got like a thimbleful, but nope- full portions. Unaware of this, I ordered a tasting and was given enough whisky to allow me to comfortable nap for the remainder of the day, probably a bad idea while I was driving.

From there we went to Giant's Causeway, which I already wrote about, and then on to Derry, following the scenic coastal route. Scenic yes, and uncomfortably narrow at times. Amazing that I didn't hit anything. I can't emphasize enough the danger here. There are plenty of things for which my instincts or training and practice aren't exactly right, but there are very few where everything I know is the exact opposite of what I should be doing. I can get on okay, but I know that if I get in a panic situation there's a decent chance that I'll do something terribly wrong.

Long day's drive from Derry to Galway on Friday. Keep your fingers crossed (or course my posting this on Friday implies that it wasn't disastrous).

Getting out of Dodge-Londondodge

It's Friday morning and I am writing now because I'm just a little freaked out.

We stayed Thursday in the clumsily-named Derry-Londonderry, which is either part of Great Britain, part of Ireland, or both, as the hyphen would suggest. What it doesn't suggest is a system in equilibrium. One of the more recent landmarks is the Peace Bridge, a truly pretty pedestrian bridge that crosses the River Foyle (though honestly, I like the sound of River Liffey, which is in Dublin, so I've been calling all the rivers that). Once across the river, you're in a big empty area, which is perhaps filled with merrymakers on a warm summer day, but this was a cool cloudy day, and it was deserted. They do have a lot of graffiti here, some of it partisan and some of it pleading for tolerance.

Then I walked back. We ate dinner in the hotel restaurant and went to bed. I slept badly.

Derry is a walled city. In fact, it refers to itself as The Walled City, so I decided to take a morning stroll around the wall (you can walk all around the city up there). I've been in lots of medieval towns and been up on the walls in a couple. The warfare aspect of them just always seemed very distant. You're up on a hill and you're defending your hill from the assholes in the walled city on the next hill. Although the wall was built, I think, in the 17th century, it continued to hold a place in the culture of the city all the way through The Troubles, so all the historical markers are relatively recent.

Pretty cheery stuff, eh?

The city is not very big, though it sprawls a bit once you get outside the walls. It seems kind of poor, especially compared to Dublin, which bustled from very early in the morning until late at night. Here nothing was open, everything looked kind of shabby. One of the big downtown stores is a burnt out shell, who knows why. No energy at all, at 8:30 on a weekday morning. The only place I saw people were at the bus terminal.

None of these things would have bothered me by itself, but the combination made me incredibly anxious.

So what do you thik could possibly calm me down after all this? I went in an supermarket. A Tesco to be specific. I bought a Dairy Milk bar and some peas and some carrot batons, which are what I guess I'd call carrot sticks. And I paid with some of the British money that I got. Gave the cashier and 20 pound note and some coins and she gave me "fuffteen" and 20P back.  And that did make me feel a bit better. I'm ready to leave though.

Yes, the italics are a Calvin and Hobbes reference

At this point, it's hard to know whether to work chronologically or backwards, so my chosen literary device will be the flashback, so I don't have to pick.

The last two days have been packed. Yesterday was, if I must say so myself having planned it, not optimally planned. I got scared off by the stories of having to get to a particular site an hour outside the city by first thing in the morning in order to be sure to get one of the very limited admission tickets. So I signed us up for a tour that would guarantee admission. There was nothing wrong with the tour, but it left us back in Dublin at 5:00 instead of an hour north, which was the direction we wanted to go, at 3:00.

Today, on the other hand, worked pretty much perfectly, including the weather for once. Yesterday it rained on and off the entire time we were at the sites we were visiting. More props to the umbrella.

What we saw was this, a place of mystical significance called Tara (no sign of Scarlett or any of the O'Hara's anywhere).

And this, a spot called New Grange.

New Grange is what they call a "passage tomb," so called because, according to our archaeological guide, because it has a passage in it and they found human (cremated) remains inside. It's hard to describe the scale of this thing, but you can see people on the right which give you an idea. It was built somewhere around 3600 BC, which would mean probably before the Great Pyramids. I can't argue about the passage part, but nobody is really sure if it was actually a tomb. It could have been a mall for all we know.

There are a bunch of these things around Ireland, but this is one of the few where you can go inside. Pretty cool. The passage goes in 19 meters, a fraction of the diameter of the thing, which is almost perfectly round. Nobody knows what's in the rest of it and probably never will. They only found the one passage by accident. There's an opening above the door where, at sunrise on winter solstice, the sun lights the passageway. Another passage tomb nearby is lit on the equinoxes.

The entrance to New Grange is behind this stone.

The three interlocking swirls on the left are unique to this site. It's a logo! Nobody actually knows what any of this stuff means or who these people were, but it's clear that among them were some megalithic age marketing people. Ronnie is quite sure that they're boobs, which considering that the main feature of Tara is a phallus, makes perfect sense.

Today, we were someplace else entirely. 

This is called Giant's Causeway. The mythology behind it is kind of dumb, even for mythology. Something to do with giants fighting about something. Why they needed a causeway and didn't just use boats like everyone else is a mystery for the ages. Maybe it's just another 50,000 phalli. 

For some reason, spell check didn't correct that. Is it really a word? Cool. By the way, that's Ronnie sitting in the middle of the phalli.

Honestly, this whole place is crazy. There's nothing that I've seen like it anywhere. I know that one of the things people have said about it is that they're disappointed that the columns aren't bigger or just that it's overall too small, but those people have to be Americans. No other culture would think that this incredible formation is unimpressive just because if its sheer size. And let me tell you, a lot of the formations here are huge. This has got to be well over 100 feet tall.

And one last thing about it, I know it's cool because I heard a whole bunch of little kids and a whole bunch of teenagers walk up and say, "Wow, this is cool."

So back to yesterday. We found ourselves in Dublin at 5 and needing to drive 150 miles north. We called the B&B where we were staying that evening, and they said they'd be out until 10:30, so we figured we had plenty of time. But getting out of town was really hard. Even if I hadn't been driving on the left it would have been hard, and it hardly mattered because we were barely moving anyway. 

But we made it out, and drove and drove. First city streets and motorways (aka expressways) and then other major roads with occasional roundabouts (roundabouts deserve their own post) and finally country roads. And at around 9 we finally neared the town of Bushmills, where we were going to eat dinner while we waited for our hosts to arrive, and as we approached the town, we were stopped by an extremely friendly policewoman who pointed out that there was a parade in progress and that we could not go any further.

Now you may ask, why would there be a parade going on in Bushmills at 9PM on a Wednesday night, but you would only be showing your ignorance. Bushmills is in Northern Ireland and this is what they call marching season, and there are politically oriented parades all the time. So we had to park the car a half mile from the restaurant and walk, crossing between the bands, to get out dinner. So we ended up not getting there until almost 11. A very long day.

Taking a break now. Time to plan tomorrow's drive.

I survived the first right turn

After a rest from all that walking and standing around, I went for another walk. This one was more directed, because I was going to go rent a car. It was a half hour walk, and I've learned enough in my 29 hours in Ireland to know it's a good idea to carry an umbrella no matter what. As it turned out, had I walked slightly slower I would have really needed it. As it turned out though, the downpour started about 3 minutes after I arrived at the garage.

I got the car and ventured out into the wrong-side world. There's a reason that there are signs that say "Look Right" at the corners and that even the rental car itself has a sticker on the windshield that reminds you to drive on the left. It's simply unnatural to drive on the left. That's why nobody else in the world aside from the British and their acolytes (willing or unwilling) do it. It's against God's plan. That makes it inherently dangerous.

So out of the garage I drive, into the pouring rain. Fortunately, I had to go straight for a few minutes, which was enough for it to let up. I finally reached a turning point, and patiently waited to make a right turn through traffic. Honestly, I think that letting people like me who've never driven like this rent cars is insane. All my instincts are going to be not only incorrect, but the exact opposite of what they need to be.

I did make it back to the hotel unscathed, so that was good. We then walked down to the famed Temple Bar area, where it seems like every rowdy college kid visiting Dublin was milling around. We had no particular interest in joining in, but walked around until it began to rain, at which point we headed back to the hotel. Again, good to bring an umbrella everywhere, so we were fine. I've noticed though that, I guess because of the combination of locals and tourists, that there's no instinct for passing on the sidewalks. The locals want to veer left and the tourists veer right, so there's no flow.

At that point, we were kind of pooped and not wanting to stand and watch more music, so we ate at an actual restaurant, which was very good. Then back and to bed. It was a pretty long day and tomorrow will be even longer. So far, jet lag isn't preventing us from sleeping and being awake at the appropriate times. Hopefully that will continue.

Day 2 was not just a walk in the park.

Before anything else, I need to say that although this is a very nice hotel, its wifi in the room is really lousy. It pops in and out and goes from slow to fast to nonexistent in a matter of minutes. It's fine in the lobby, but not here.

Today I got up a bit early and took a walk around St. Stephen's Green, a park across the street from the hotel. I don't believe Stephen himself had anything to do with the green, in spite of the possessive. I think I'd heard that the Guinness family donated the park to the city and it's a very nice place.

There's a pond somewhere not in the picture that would be pretty with less garbage floating in it, but it doesn't seem to bother the ducks. Which reminds me, they don't have Duck Tours here- they have Viking Tours, with the same kind of vehicle and you have to wear Viking helmets while you ride, and no, I'm not kidding. They all yell something out as they pass the hotel.

Anyway, the park is very nice first thing in the morning. I'm sure it's nice most of the time, but it was very pleasant and quiet when I was there. There are lots of statues and lot of little nooks. Here are my favorite statues.

 

I like the first one, of Robert Emmet, because all it says about itself is that it was donated by the Robert Emmet Statue Committee and then names the committee members. The right one is a Henry Moore and it's of Yeats, or at least that's what it says.

So after than nice little walk, I came back and had my first Full Irish Breakfast. That's a thing, though it means slightly different foods depending on where you are. Mine had eggs, Irish bacon (kind of like thin Canadian bacon, but in strips), sausage, broiled tomato, sauteed mushrooms, potatoes, and black and white pudding, which are kind of like little discs of something grainy- one white, one dark, both tasty. That was a lot of food and I didn't really come close to finishing, but I gave it a good try.

Our first stop this morning was Trinity College, home of the Old Library and the Book of Kells. The Book is much older than the Library, though nobody knows exactly how old. Over 1000 years ago. It's an illuminated manuscript of the four gospels, considered to be among the finest of its sort, and it's very famous and people line up to get a peek.

The problem with this, of course, is that it's a book. It's small and old and in a case so you can't turn the pages. So there's a very nice exhibit before you get to the book itself where you learn about Irish scribes and how books like these were made. Interesting. Then you go into the room with the book, which is a single rectangular case with a crowd around it. People tend to be a bit pushy here, and I mean that literally. There's no hesitation to encroach on your personal space and try to squeeze by. I think that may be a tourist thing more than an Irish thing, but I do know that last night at the pub I was standing getting napkins and one person tried to squeeze by me in front and one tried to simultaneously squeeze by me behind and they were both annoyed that I didn't get out of their ways.

So my rule is if you are standing in a crowd around something in a museum, if at all possible stand behind children or teenagers. Those people have the attention span of a flea, so while a 45 year-old might linger for a few minutes, the kids will be out of there in 30 seconds tops. The book is very cool. I like illuminated manuscripts, and this is a good one.

From there, we went into a long room called, sorry, the Long Room. 

Pretty long, isn't it? It's an old library of textbooks, according to the guide. He was describing all the bay and shelf labels, which are necessary to locate any book because the books are sorted by size, not by topic. Also, the lower level, built in 1712, is almost 200 years older than the upper level. He said that the students are allowed to request a book and they can have it from 8:30 AM to 4:30 PM and read it in the little nook all the way in the back on the second level. We also asked hm about whether the room is climate controlled, to which he replied by pointing to an open window. He said that they do check regularly.

From there, we went to the National Museum because they had a Vermeer. It was incredibly beautiful, as they all are. What a treat to find one here. By this time it was only early afternoon and I had more adventure in store, but that's enough for now, I'll fill in the rest of the day later.

First dayish

Our flight could not have been less eventful. We got into Dublin at around 8:45, and then did the usual, get bags, get local cash, get a cab, off to the hotel.

The cab driver gave the first hint that this is a different kind of country. Not that people in Amsterdam have what you'd think of as attitude, but they're kind of cool. No sense of cool here. Everyone is just right out there. I mentioned to the cabbie that I was a bit nervous about driving on the left side of the road, and for the entire rest of the trip he was explaining to me how I should handle particular situations. He also pointed out pubs and shopping areas (for the missus- actually he mentioned this even before we got out of the airport). The then mentioned that he had a crick in his neck and that it could be cured by a good grab and twist (he didn't say this, more kind of demonstrated) and that the wife was looking forward to doing so.

We got to our hotel, which couldn't be more convenient and centrally located, and amazingly, our room was actually already available. So up we went, down a surprisingly long hallway, to our very pleasant room. After a nice 3 hour nap, I went out for a walk around to see what's the deal around here.

There's a nice coffee bar just next door, and lots stuff all over- shops and pubs and official buildings and pubs and fancy restaurants and pubs. And pubs. A whole lot of people had to be concerned that they and their friends were not going to be able to get something to drink when the mood struck them, so they clearly made sure that this couldn't possibly happen. I needed to get a plug adapter, because I forgot, Euro or not, Ireland is not totally part of Europe. It's still (somewhat unwillingly) part of the UK and uses those weird UK plugs. So that was my big purchase.

Once Ronnie was up we made what can only be called a pilgrimage to the Guinness Storehouse, probably the best brewery tour where you never get inside the brewery. The brewery is right next door, because Arthur Guinness was stupid and/or clever enough to lease a huge decrepit downtown factory on 100 acres (or hectares, I forget which) for $1 per year for a term of (now hold your jealousy New Yorkers) 999 years. So the beer thing worked out pretty well and they use a different part of the complex for actual storage, so the old storehouse is now a self-guided tour and celebration of that stuff that is Guinness Stout.

It was actually quite a lot of fun- I'd recommend it. They illustrate all the processes and then teach you how to taste it, and then they have several bars where you get to see how a pint should be poured and get to enjoy it. I was really impressed with how they handled a massive number of people without the thing feeling crowded. Only the bar we chose was crowded. But I'd recommend it highly.

We then, and only because the taxi driver suggested it, went shopping. It was pretty pleasant, considering it was showery, as it was on and off all day really. The famed shopping street, Grafton Street, was pretty mall-like, but the department store, Brown Thomas, was very nice. Ronnie bought some pretty jewelry by an up-and-coming Irish designer. Then back to the hotel to rest up a bit and then to dinner.

Even though our systems were used to a completely different time zone, we got ourselves out to dinner, which was mediocre but certainly filling, and then we stayed for a round of Irish music. The music part was fine; it's impressive how a guy with a guitar and another with an accordion can fill a room, but they had dancers with them who performed every other song and they were really fun, especially to be standing right on top of them. You could feel the percussion as their feet hit the floor and it was a good time. The Guinness was pretty good too.

At this point, we were beginning to get tired and headed back to the hotel. For a trip with no expectations, it was off to a very promising start.

Off we go

We're off to Ireland for two weeks. We've been talking about it and kind of planning for a while now, but we're going in with no particular goals or expectations except for a few things we want to do and see.

For what I've heard, Ireland is a good place to have that kind of vacation. Everyone raves about how nice the people are and the beauty of the scenery, and it sounds almost like you can't make a bad choice unless you stay in your hotel room all day. Or turn the wrong way into a roundabout, (Clockwise. Clockwise!). I've actually watched a video on how to do it (it doesn't look that hard).

We're not used to traveling this way, but it seems like a fun thing to do and the timing worked out nice to go to the Galway Races, which are supposed to be great, on Ronnie's birthday.

So we'll keep our eyes and ears open, listen to some music, maybe even join in sometimes, and explore for its own sake. Sounds like a pretty good trip to me

Why I look tired sometimes.

Today I drove down to the Brandywine River Valley to go see an osteopath. I have periodic trouble with my back that requires a spinal adjustment, and this guy is able to fix it in about 15 minutes and it lasts for about a year or so.

That all went as well as having to drive 45 minutes with a backache can go. Then I saw this truck.

And then it happened. Who would think that the back of a truck would set off such a chain of thought? First of all, I always thought the leader in door opening solutions was the arm. And really, who even knew this was a thing? There are leaders and, by implication, followers in door opening solutions? And not just on a national basis. It's on a global basis. Global. All over the world, people are opening doors and these people are leading them in how to solve the problem of opening doors.

I wonder what they consider to be the greatest threat to their dominance in door opening solutions. I suppose there could be an global uprising against doors; that would be bad. I wonder if they are good at all of the different kinds of door opening solutions. Or are they best at the ones that open towards you or the ones that open away from you or the ones that slide into little pockets or revolving doors. I wonder if they have a research team whose goal is to keep them on top of door opening solutions. Maybe the next big thing in door opening is for the door to disappear into the floor, or maybe thinking further down the road, the door simply dematerializes and rematerializes once you've gone through it. And are there main rivals the second leading purveyor of door opening solutions or the leading purveyor of door closing solutions?

Now, some of this may strike you as interesting or funny or good way to pass the time on a 45 minute car ride, but my brain does this all the time whether I want it to or not. And yes, it's sometimes funny, it's sometimes interesting, but it's exhausting. I think that's part of why I enjoy my job, why I might enjoy any job is because it limits the scope of things that I can be thinking about it any particular time. I free associate constantly during class, but that's class. When I'm preparing, I'm outlining, organizing and trying to figure out what will make for a successful lesson. I'm not free associating then, and I'm certainly not thinking about who's going to be the leader in door closing solutions next year.

Vineyard weekend. The long bumpy empty part.

We’re off for a weekend in Martha’s Vineyard. Taking a different route this time. Instead of flying, which was over $900 round trip, we drove up to Quonset, Rhode Island, where we were taking a ferry, known (to themselves anyway) as the Fast Ferry. The ferry was scheduled for 1PM, and as usual, I was stressed out the day before about the prospect of getting through New York at around 9AM. But we left at 7 and hoped for the best.

Almost shockingly, things worked out great for the drive. We hit a bit of traffic here and there, but made it in a shade under 5 hours, which was pretty remarkable. I’ve gotta say, driving up I-95 from the Jersey Turnpike all the way up to Rhode Island is not anybody’s idea of a good time. The George Washington Bridge is an impressive and reasonably nice-looking bridge (would probably be beautiful if it weren’t choked with cars), and it is by far the visual highlight of the whole 250 miles or so.

The whole trip was aided by using EZ-Pass, of course, which has eliminated the need to stop at toll booths. It also yields my favorite useless road signs- in the Express lanes, where people routinely pass through at 60 miles per hour, do you really need signs that says “DO NOT BACK UP”? I think the laws of physics prevent that.

So we got to the ferry terminal, if you can call it that, though it was disappointingly not a quonset hut, about an hour before departure. That’s a long time to wait, and it reminds me of the frequent traveler’s dictum, if you never miss a plane, you’re getting to the airport too early. IOW, if you get to the airport so early that you’re always sitting around for an hour or more, you’re wasting time. Clearly there is an optimal arrival time, if you weigh the relative unpleasantness of sitting at the airport versus missing a plane. But it’s tough to predict how long a 250 mile drive around rush hour passing through New York is going to take. I was okay to wait.

Eventually, the ferry came in. It’s a nice-looking boat, a big catamaran. People started to line up, so we joined in early so as to get the best possible seat, whatever that meant. The boat was pretty nice inside, but as soon as we started moving we started to hit some big swells, making it feel a bit roller coasterish. It didn’t bother me particularly, but a number of people started getting seasick, running to the bar to get barf bags and/or running outside. I didn’t actually see anyone throw up, but many folks were looking with like they just had or were about to.

Fortunately, the ride smoothed out after a while and we cruised over to Oak Bluffs, where the crew instructed us all about where to stand and how to line up and get our bags as we debarked. As one would expect, this elicited chaos, with half the passengers scrambling to get their bags before docking so that they would not have to go in the order that they were assigned. We were among the first to board, so we were among the first to debark too, so we needed no such scramble.

Then a taxi van (all the taxis on the island are passenger vans) to the house, which was open and waiting for us. After a bit of settling in, we went out shopping and bought more groceries than I have ever bought at one time. And then we kind of settled into the house. I say kind of because this is not a house for 2 people. This house was designed specifically to handle a large bunch of people, which is what always buzzed around here during what you might call my parents’ glory day. This was from the mid-80’s to late 90’s, when lots of business associates were also social friends and would tend to gather here, along with our families, culminating with a summer-end weekend party for anywhere from 50 to 180 people (not all staying in the house itself).

That ended when my mom started showing ALS symptoms, and it was a kind of slow decline from there. But I don’t want to dwell on that (right now, anyway, plenty of time for that stuff). The point is that the house felt incredibly empty. I don’t think Ronnie and I had never been there before without some other family members present. It was kind of eerie. The pictures I’m including look like things you’d take of an empty house you were showing for sale, but it was as occupied as it was right then. In retrospect maybe I should have taken one with Ronnie in it for scale, but I think you get the idea.

That ended on Saturday afternoon, which is another story.