Where are you Molly Malone?

Wonderful day again!  This morning started with complimentary breakfast in our hotel then off to jail!

Several people recommended the Kilmainham Gaol. The jail housed and executed the leaders of the Easter 1916 revolt. Really a great tour of a jail that was restored by a restoration group in the 1960s including some who we're imprisoned there themselves. 

After that we grabbed the hop on hop off bus to take a tour and jumped off at Trinity College. Didn't go in today but it's still on the list. We ate a lovely three course meal at Farm, which was good but not quite up to our discerning Bay Area palates. But it was a lovely leisurely dining afternoon. 

Next on to the search for Molly Malone, or at least her statue. We found it on the map, we found those streets in real life but no Molly. Cut to us circling the block twice and finally realizing that there is a sign marking where she should be but isn't. She's away being cleaned. So while disappointed we were glad to realize that it was not that we can't read maps. 

We also found O'Neills pub one of the oldest still operating public house. Please ignore the "incorrect" spelling we're all family!  Shockingly I was not the only one of us to find our last name on a building. 

Back now at the hotel resting before venturing back out to pubs tonight. I'm looking for some live music I think!

Tomorrow we catch a train to Limerick and start the next chapter of our trip. So happy to realize that today is only our second day!

Tea for two!

Had a lovely afternoon strolling Dublin. We walked from our hotel at the west end of the city along the Liffey river. We wandered through some of the neighborhoods along the way.

We stopped for dinner at a lovely tea shop called The Queen of Tarts where we had tea, delicious food and a strawberry rhubarb crumble per our waitress's recommendation. It was tucked away on a walking street and we sat outside and enjoyed this amazing weather!  It's the perfect kind if warm that is warm enough to sit still but not too hot to move around.

We walked off our dinner on the way back to our room. Plan for the night is to keep each other awake for a bit longer and watch the World Cup game as we plan our day tomorrow. 

Off again

Sitting at the airport waiting for my flight and getting more excited by the minute!

One of my best friends and I are off to Ireland, first stop Dublin. As an Irish lass by heritage it is amazing as I look around the gate at how many people look just like my family. Slightly unnerving actually. 

Also, my people have a lot of babies. I knew this but really. 

See you on the other side of the pond!

You might be totally soulless if ...

this slideshow does not make you least smile.

Mild existential crisis thanks to Pandora

You know how when you're in a movie and the previews can really give you a tone of the movie you're about to watch.  This is what Pandora did to me today. 

Today at work I was listening to my Joni Mitchell station on Pandora, don't judge me, sometimes you're just in a folk music kind of space.  So with Pandora, every hour or so there's an ad, and today all the ads are about freezing my eggs so that I can make sure I'm still able to have kids later!

What?! 

Either they think I’m a young, single, sad woman who needs this service now, or they’re torturing older women from the true era of Joni Mitchell and teasing them for not being able to have children now.  Either way there is a lot of stereotyping and assumption going on and I’m offended for the person that the marketing thinks I am...

Also, now I'm mad because I'm clearly susceptible to marketing and am concerned that I do in fact need to freeze my eggs now.

F**k you Pandora

Smile, It's Thursday

Crazy Pills

Do you ever have one of those days, or weeks, where it seems that everywhere you look, something crazy is happening? I do.  

I don't know if it's that I go through phases where I'm more aware of the crazy or there are actual upticks but either way there are certain days where I feel like I'm making the same face as Will Ferrell above and can't stop (also there are not enough moments for Zoolander references in my opinion).

As an example, one morning this week, as I walked in to my office there was a trash can on fire. Not like a urban camping, to keep warm, kind of trash fire.  A normal, on the side of the street, in the financial district, trash can that was just randomly on fire.  I appeared to be the only one acknowledging this oddity.  Was it really happening?  I hadn't had my coffee yet, so sometimes I question myself, but no, it was definitely on fire.   However, like a poor samaritan, I continued on my way, only to clumsily stumble into an argument between two homeless people.  I thought it was a standard "my corner" type of thing but then the dog of one of them jumped in and bit, I think, the other one, while the dog's owner went into a rant about how the other guy was no good and everyone knew it. 

Typically I can assume that there is a mental illness factor in these type of scenarios but I am actually fairly familiar (from my regular walk to work) with the man with the dog, and he seems rather well balanced, considering.  So again because it's before coffee, it takes several seconds too long for me to realize what's happening and when I do I'm standing nearly in the middle of it, confused and oddly detached.

I know cities are not strangers to craziness and mine is no exception but I appear to be in a phase of either heightened awareness or the city itself is getting punchy with the coming of spring and the sun.  Either way it may be time to lay low...