Wed evening Jan. 14, 9pm: Well I got my share of rainy Dublin weather today! Mark had to go to Kilbarack to fetch a package, so I decided to come with him, despite the rain, because I had never ridden the DART. But first we went to the post office here in Fairview – not the closest post office, but where I was supposed to have a package waiting for me. I thought it was my much anticipated mattress pad , but it was actually just the a/c adapter for my computer. So after our jaunt in the rain, we went back out and took a bus into town. Mark bought some books for school, and then we walked over to the DART, which is a train that runs up and down the coastline. The town where the package was (who knows why they sent it there instead of one closer) was pretty bleak – it sort of looked like an army barracks or something. But we were only there long enough to get the package and catch the next train out.

Sunday January 18, noon: When we woke up this morning, I was struck by the cloudless, blue sky, but that has quickly turned into wind and rain, much like yesterday. Today I'm determined to go out, though, and run some errands, though it does look pretty nasty out – the kind of weather where an umbrella is completely useless. Mark and I have been off in separate rooms working on our separate projects since yesterday – him on his papers for school, and me on my portfolio. I'm 14 pages in so far, and I can see why I never did it before – it's a load of work! When I was working two (and sometimes three) jobs and having a social life, how was I supposed to find time to spend the hours putting this together? It's nice to finally be doing it, though I wish the designs weren't so old now. But it's inspired me to do new work as soon as this is all put together.

Anyways, I rode my bike through Dublin at night for the first time Friday night when Mark and I went to see Billy Childish & the Musicians of the British Empire, who put on a great show at Whelan's. But man, was the riding intense! First of all, I'm still not used to the whole riding on the left side of the road thing. Secondly, the cars and buses will ride ride up next to you within inches – you have to be nearly fearless. On the plus side, since I've been here, I have never seen a car beep at a biker, not once. Cars and buses are very respectful of bikers. So while they ride right up next to you, it's not in a head-trippy kind of way, just in a trafficy way, if that makes sense. I felt like I was in a video game; it was really exhilarating and fun, but scary at times. I didn't know where we were headed, so I just had to follow Mark and hope for the best! I am loving my new bike (though I need to tape it up – the bright blue colour screams “new bike, please steal”). We hung around Whelan's a little after the show. The crowd seemed to have some decent folks in it – people who I could see us hanging out with – but of course we were both too shy to actually talk to anyone, but that's ok. Then we got back on the bikes and went to get some felafel, and then walked around a little, tried to find an Indie night that Mark had read about, to no avail, and stopped into a club called the Czech Inn, which was entertaining, and then decided to bike home. By then it had rained. With no fenders, I got a bit soaked up the backside on the way home, but not too bad.

Now the sun is out again, and the wind seems to have died down. I should probably seize the moment and get out of here! I'll leave you with the view out of our kitchen window, with Gypsy napping:

Last week really flew by... not really so much in a good way, but it's gone sure enough! I still don't have an Irish cell phone, bank account, PPS number (like a SS#), or internet at home, but we do have Cumin, fake cheese, and a television!!!! Hey, priorities, right? In a few minutes I will try again for the PPS number. After Friday's epic fail, I think I will have everything I need to do it. Then once I have that, I should be able to get all the other things. Once I have all of those, a job should be forthcoming, and then I can join Irish society.

I still feel like I'm walking around a movie set every time I leave the house. I know it's patronizing, but the thicker accents sound fake to me and I find myself wanting to burst out laughing. And things just have such different connotations here. For example, right now in this internet cafe there is a vending machine for a candy called "Minstrels." Uh... that just would not fly back in the States. I mean, remember what happened to the restaurant chain Sambo's? The beer "Galway Hooker" also raised my eyebrow at first (but I have to admit was very tasty).

A little bit worried about the cat. We're still trying to find a readily available diabetic-friendly food that she will eat. Wet foods seem to be generally in gravy or jelly, which are both high in sugar content. Also, while she loves our apartment, her favorite spot seems to be my pillow... whether my head is on it or not. Last night I had to deal with a bad combination of her being pissed off at the food and me taking up the pillow, and her litter box not being to her liking (apparently), so after being beaten, battered, and bitten, I finally kicked her out of the bedroom. Then just as we were leaving the apartment, I went to grab a hoodie from the top of my pile of folded sweaters, only to discover it was soaked in cat pee. So uh... we'll have to deal with that. I can't describe it but if she can't sleep on my pillow, she is like Dr. Jekyll and Ms. Kitty Hyde. Anyways, no one cares about my cat, haha. But it's worrisome to say the least.

Ok, wish me luck with Ireland's beaurocratic red tape department!

belated New Year's Eve Photos!

They handed these out at the pub...

Last moments of 2008

Our friends, Nick and Kristina, displaying the poppers!

Toasts to the New Year!


Then we stuffed our faces at the Chipper

Here is a photo of Mark's back, walking around after I got my immigration card

Apparently they did away with a real tree on O'Connell Street and have this new-fangled thing that lights up and changes colors. Mark hates it, so I took a photo of it


This morning I rode my bike for the first time! The ride terrified and exhilarated me, riding on the left side of the road, with no bike lane, and these little teeny roads with drivers who are not afraid to come within inches of a biker whatsoever. My new bike is wonderful, but the brake levers are placed way far up, making it difficult to reach and get leverage on. Mark is going to put new ones on for me at some point so I can reach them better with my short arms and little hands. We rode out to the post office in Fairview to fetch my last package, which thankfully came!! So I can stop stressing about that now. And it was the lightest of the bunch so it wasn't such a pain to bring back.

Yesterday I had a little adventure -- I took the bus into town and brought my wheel to the shop, which as it turns out, didn't need a tool for the part to be put on, but that was fine -- the dude put the piece on the wheel for me and then I walked around for like 4 hours with this bicycle wheel in my hand! But it was light, and not a huge deal. I was sort of hoping to come upon a store that would have just the thing for my clothes, or else my books, but I really just kind of wandered around aimlessly. I did find a part of town where there was a bunch of thrift shops, but no luck in the furniture area. I also happened upon a bunch of furniture shops, but they were all too fancy. I was supposed to get a SIM card for my phone, but I only wandered into one shop for that and I just wasn't sold on it so I left. I finally got myself good and lost in a sort of slummy part of town, so I had to look at my map to find my way, but I had pointed myself toward the general direction of home, so I wasn't that bad off. First, I came upon this kind of neat sculpture with changing colored lights:



On my way home I bought an American-style coffee maker on sale so we could stop drinking the mud from the french press, and also as a little thank you gift for Mark for assembling my bike. Speaking of which, we ran into the landlord this morning and he said there's a shed being built for our bikes, which is going to be *stellar* so we don't have to keep them in the apartment. And that really means a lot because it opens up the whole entrance way, meaning that there will be plenty of room for a studio for me. I was overjoyed -- I can't even tell you. We had talked about converting our parking space (located under the building) into a bike park, but that was going to be pricey. But now we don't have to! I can't wait to save up and get a desk. And then we can get another little chair for the living room, too. I really do like our apartment a whole lot.

It gets dark here so early! By 4:30 I think it is. So a lot of my photos are at night, like this one, taken I think after my last time at the pub where I get my wifi connection, on my walk home:


Then, here are some random photos. One of the river next to our building.

Mark in our kitchen

Gypsy, on the bed (surprsingly not on her favorite spot: my pillow)

Our author, drinking morning coffee, contemplating the day's activities...

Tuesday Morning, 10:40am. One of my packages still hasn't come, and I can't seem to find the mailing receipt, which means that if it doesn't come, I'm screwed. I'm really annoyed at myself, and I don't even want to look at which box it is. I really hope it isn't the one with my wacom tablet, because that will be a bit of money to replace. I hope it isn't any of them, but it's got to be one, of course.

Yesterday we had to go to immigration so I could register. Mark wanted to leave first thing in the morning, but I really wanted to stick around and see if my package came in the post. It didn't, and so we got a late start. Because of the holiday, the Department hadn't been open since before Christmas, so it was a madhouse when we walked in. I asked the person at the front where to go, and he told me to get a ticket at window 15. It was sort of crazy in there, and I was sort of myopic when I walked in the room, that I immediately thought, “What luck! Window 15 seems like the only one with no line!” So I walked up and got my ticket. But as we walked away, we realized that we had just inadvertently cut about 50 people in line. So with still about two hours wait by our estimation (there was 167 people ahead of me), we sheepishly left in search of internet and food. We went to one of Mark's favorite vegetarian restaurants, Govinda's

But then when we got back, we discovered that there would still be about three hours' wait until my number was called! So we left again, but got a little nervous after a couple of hours. Here are some photos I took while we were out and about:

The River Liffey

Mermaid Sea Horses on Mark's favorite bridge


It turns out there was no need to hurry back – we still waited a couple more hours in the Immigration Department, and I started to get really nervous that the office would close before my number would be called. But finally I did get called, and everything went smoothly – I got my immigration ID free of charge, and it entitles me to work for the next five years. After that, I'm not sure what I've got to do.

By the time all that was done, we were pretty grumpy, so we stopped into a middle eastern market for a couple of food items for the kitchen (mostly spices), and headed for home. I was feeling very sad, to be honest, that another day had passed and I didn't accomplish all the things I wanted to accomplish. It's hard because I have this gigantic to-do list and yet limited resources, and of course I want to do everything at once. But, you know, I can't get a job without being a legal resident, so there's that. Although the kitchen came furnished with plates and silverware and pans, we can't cook decent meals without going out and spending some time and money getting food and other things like cutting boards, spices, oils, condiments, etc – things you have in your pantry that you don't think about until your pantry is literally bare! I still have a list of about 20 items that I need to buy, but we've made some very nice meals yet.

Today I'm going to go out by myself while Mark works on schoolwork here at home. He has been wonderful about going around with me, setting up the house, and all of that, but he has two papers to complete by the end of the month and he needs to get cracking. Though as I am typing this, he is assembling my bike. I am trying to maintain a very positive attitude, but I have to admit that each day to do hit a wall of frustration, not knowing where I'm going, where things are, what stores have what, what buses go where, not being able to call up any number of people and say, “What are you doing? Let's get lunch / dinner / drinks / karaoke or whatever.” And so that's hard. I know it will be lonely for a while, and knowing that makes it a little harder, actually. I think about how just days ago I was with all my friends laughing and carrying on, and sometimes I think, “Oh shit.” But I know that I will have new friends here, and that my old friends will always be there, and we'll keep in touch (much better once I have internet at home), and life just has to go this way. And as for family, I still can't even think about it without breaking into tears. I hope that gets much, much easier. And I hope my sister is working on her vacation to London as we speak so I can meet her there. ;)

There's a new IKEA in Dublin, but it isn't clear to me how to get there. I could go to the bus info center and ask how to get there, but I'm wary of carrying the things I actually want to get there. So instead I may just try to shop around some other stores for something to hold my clothes today. If I find something, great, and if I don't, then I'll have managed to get a look around the city on my own. The weather here is consistently cold, not so far from how it is at home, but much more consistent, so we don't get those freaky 60 degree days out of the blue. It's in the high 30s to low 40s pretty much every day. It has not rained during the day since I've been here, but it's mostly overcast every day.

I have still to take photos of our place, but here's a shot of the main road just before your turn down our street...

Photos from Galway

Sweets from a bakery


Boat

Kristina

Mark yanking our chain


More boats



Stopping in for a pint


Streets of Galway