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I was going write a bit about how I got ride of my facething account. However, doing that, in a way, gives more power (through recognition) to the thing I was leaving and goes against the reasons I left.

The end of it is I no longer have the account. I am not trying to drop off the grid, or avoid anyone, or seek attention (well, maybe I am seeking a little attention) I was simply tired of the network and how lazy it was making me when it came to keeping up with friends.

Lazy? You ask. Well yes, lazy; and let me tell you why

Have you ever dropped in to see how a friend has been? Perhaps after you haven't seen them for a while. There usually a few minutes of general banter, then you tell some stories of where you're life is right now and then all things inevitably lead to nostalgic renditions of that ride home from school one day or that buck and doe where Joe stepped through the table and things are happy and grand and everyone laughs and such and such.

I like those conversations (I liked them enough to make a road trip out of it visiting buddies who lived on my route home) but occasionally I find those conversations inhibited, or sometimes replaced, by a few clicks of the mouse.

So let me ask you this: have you ever "dropped in on a friend" through facecrap, riffled through their photo's, wall posts, videos or notes? Perhaps not all of those at once but I can bet you've done it at least once (a day). Now, have you ever met up with that person a few days, or weeks later and got to talking, remembering and sharing about stories old and new only to discover that you already new the story, but didn't know why?

This is usually the point where a light comes on and your fingers snap and you say, without really knowing you're saying it: oh yeah, I think I saw that on myface.

It is at this point my cheeks would feel a bit warm and likely turn a deep red, but I don't know how you would react. I felt so guilty, like a voyeur, peeping tom a creep with a laptop and I had spied on this persons life.

did you hear that John and Helen broke up? that sue and tom got together? that Steve's cat had kittens?

Aside from the creeping around, which I didn't feel good about, I felt the communication was cold and impersonal. On a few occasions I'd find myself substituting a quick email to someone on their birthday for a "wall post".

(whoops, and I haven't even wished matty a happy birthday yet)

But no more! I have a birthday list started, and I hope to stay on top of it.

(Damn, I didn't wish Bizz a happy birthday either)

As long as I keep my trusty journal near me (or Laura Van Geel) I'll never miss another friends birthday (Andrew Thuss) again.

So I've left the social network known as Facebook. I will have to turn old school and write emails to people, text them my plans or even, heaven forbid, give them a ring. I hope you all remember my birthday, it's June 24th.

I'll leave you with a quote from a blog that I found a few months ago that got me thinking about this latest, and (hopefully) final goodbye to the social network that has swept our lives away. Take care, and I hope to see you all soon in real life.

--b

"Facebook is like a creepy and pointless videogame where people collect every person they've ever met, then waste their time spying on all the dumb bullshit they do all day. I don't care if some moron I went to high school with bought a new iPod, I don't want to play the vampire biting game, and I don't want people I don't care about to know what I'm up to if they're not going to bother asking me with words." Joe Mathlete

the leanne and the steve

and so it begins. IreTrip '08.

We've one Fiesta, three suit cases, two siblings and an extra body.

We're set to venture about the island for the next ten days, but my day, my morning, started like most others.

Buzz. Buzz. Buzz. wack. snooze.

(ten mins)

Buzz. Buzz. Buzz. wack. snooze.

(ten mins)

Buzz. Buzz. Buzz. wack.

Then I sat on the edge of my bed thanking the snooze lord for setting my alarm thirty minutes ahead of my schedule for the day.

Luckily I had mustered up the intension to pack the night before. Unluckily I had ignored that intension and was now scurrying around my room tossing things into a bag.

three shirts. three socks. the pants i have on, the shorts laying right there. camera, computer, wallet, passport.

good. done. sorted. i'm out the door.

back in the door again. toothbrush, deoderant, umberella.

let's try this again.

back in the door. give Jade (matty's replacement in the house) the rent money.

right so. here we go.

good bye cork, see you in a week.

i learned

I learned that a short while ago I was reading and that I felt as though reading wasn't what I wanted to do right then.

Maybe it was I was bored with my book, maybe it was that I was all read out or maybe it was that I couldn't find my book anywhere despite having not looked at all.

Tomorrow I am going to Galway for three days. I have three days off in a row because there are new staff members coming on board and they need hours to learn how to take my job away from me.

also, i am not bitter. not at all.

In fact I'm not even bitter at all, it's just that sometimes bitter is funnier; although i am sure that what is written above isn't funny at all.

i should stop trying to be funny.

never the less i am going to Galway and visiting a friend. I am staying at her house because she has two empty bedrooms and because she lives in Galway. You might remember Janine from a past post but not really because I didn't name her by name. She was the entity in charge of making all the food for the day. She made a great mom away from home.

she also made a good kosher meal.

I don't really know what I am going to do while in Galway, but I'll tell you a bit about it when I get back.

Also what I'll tell you about is how I am slowly loosing a great deal of friends. Two people left a week ago and another a few days after that. Matty fly's out in a month and his parents are here visiting for a week which means I'm not going to see him. Chris is in France for a series of odd reasons and Connor my American bartending pal had his last work night tonight and will be on the eight o'clock bus to Dublin in ... two hours. Even my auzzie-roommate whom i don't want be around isn't around.

I need to learn how to find more friends, and fast.

Chinese Food

The thing about the thing is that recently I haven't been writing very much, about anything. And the thing about that is that I am really sorry.

Really.

I don't think i can apologize enough to make up for not having written anything in the past very long time. In fact, I am sure that if i was to apologize another time I would look a bit pathetic and desperate for your forgiveness; lord knows I don't want that.

So, I am sorry for looking pathetic and desperate.

So this one time, last night, we ordered Chinese. Matty picked it up on our walk back from the car which we had rented to drive around West Cork in yesterday. I know what you might be thinking and I assure you that the story that needs to be told involves the Chinese food and not the road trip and i'll do my best to make you understand that.

So on our road trip yesterday we sort of just drove around. Chris had a valid license so was the only one who could drive and therefore drove us all around all day. All of us included Matty, Jordan (new roommate from Brantford, Ontario) and myself. The four of us just drove around.

In saying that we had rented a car and just drove around I mean exactly that. You may think that

hey, you went to the trouble of taking a taxi out to the airport, filling out all the paper work with the lady at the desk only to find out that your license expired two months ago and you could no longer rent vehicles, let along drive them (only to know that the whole time you were hoping with all your heart to yourself the whole time the lady is filling out the paper work that she doesn't turn over the card and in the 100% chance that she will to look for the expiry date she will, somehow, have forgetton how to read dates written in numbers) and then have Chis step forward and put his license down and hope that she not realize that he wasn't over 25 and having gone through all that trouble perhaps you might have had a plan laid out for the day, a map with you or, at least, a lunch packed.

of course if you thought that you would be of perfectly sound mind and without the comprehension of the conversation that took place the night before.

IT went something like this:

chris: do you want another pint?
Bird: you know what, i'd like to rent a car tomorrow
Chris: me too.
Jordan: I'll have another pint
Matt: .... (he wasn't out because he was in bed because he was resting up to call in sick to work for his 11:30 shift at 10:30 because I was going to ask him to come along at 10:25. It was because he wasn't out that he had nothing to say.)

Now that you have a little idea of what our plans where you might have an idea how the day went; and if you picked "perfect" you would be absolutely right. With no plans made there were no plans to screw up. We saw more than what we set out to see (as we had set out to see nothing) and we had a better day than we would have watching the crap American television that Ireland gets for day time viewing (may I also note that we all get crap American television no matter where we are watching during the day, thus it is better to get out of the house and rent a car no matter where you are).

That night we got Chinese food from the place across the road from our house which I had never eaten at before. They give their food out in plastic reusable tubberware and not in those earth-hating styro-foam containers.

Now that, my friends, is news worthy material.

Ireland

I got to Ireland two days ago to visit --b. I was up at 6am to catch my flight, arrived at the Dublin airport at 10am, got to the town centre around 1130 and took the bus to Cork and arrived at 5pm. It was a long day of travelling and it was finally good to put down my bags and to see my brother who I haven’t seen for over 10 months. As soon as I got here, we went out for a cheap pint. Apparently this one pub has happy hour all afternoon so we went there to chat and meet up with one of --b’s roommates Matty who he has known since university.
It’s really nice to be a little bit settled again and to see a familiar face again. Sean and I were travelling a lot and I find that moving around so much is sometimes hard on the system so it’s nice to relax a little bit in a house and catch up on my sleep. Also, because I toured around Ireland last year (I rented a car with 3 other Canadian girls—craziest thing i’ve ever done) I don’t feel pressured at all to tour around this time because I’ve seen everything I want to see in Ireland and so I can just relax and check out all the pubs and all different kinds of beer.

Canada Day

a big old happy canada day everybody! i've been at work quite a bit lately, not mention getting ready for the arrival of my second guest. of course, few of you know that i, rather matty and i have had a first guest so perhaps i should explain that.

bid dan came to visit. there are more stories, that will be told in a day or so (and for salutmaman time that means perhaps a week, but likely longer) and you will enjoy them very much. he was with us for about five days i think.

moving onwards today is the day that mandy will be arriving in cork. Currently she is en route from Dublin where she landed earlier this morning and is likely to get in around half four. She msg'd me and said perhaps two-thirty but, if she's anything like the common sparro-

african or european?
shut up you. what does it even matter?
well, i'm not sure really. but i feel you should be specific about references you leave. do you think anyone really got that one from 1993 you left in the last post?

right so. if she's anything like the common sparrow she'd never be able to carry her luggage that far and in the time needed to make the ten o'clock bus to Cork. The one at noon would work much better with her schedule.

you mean to tell me she's going to carry her luggage with her talons all the way fr-
don't you have a "best of monty python" to be filming?
was that today?

happy canada day everyone!

the wonderful

so as much as buying un-gum made for a bad day, the rest of sweden had nothing to do with the negative. that particular day cannot be reprsented by the post i left on it, in fact that story is the only bad thing that happened and in all seriousness (oh my goodness, you know i am being serious now since i've made a point of saying it) it really wasn't all that negative anyways.

i imagine i intended it to be a humorous anticdote, which you likely understood and didn't need me to spell it out for you.

hmmm. I do believe that that is the case and next time I will give you, the reader, more credit and not have to walk you through my thoughts.

with that thought cleared up, lets move on to another one: the graduation.

i don't know about you, but i've been to a graduation or two. Four actually, and that's just the one's for myself where I somehow managed to convince the powers that be that I deserved credit from them for having attended.

The first was preschool where I majored in finger painting in all prime colours. I never used this degree in elementary school, but it did give me a chance to explore my creative side. I don't remember much of the ceremony and i think it was because my buddy ryan had slipped something into my bottle.

The second was from grade eight. I was awarded the "Most Christian-Like Student" award, or rather would have had someone remembered that it was an award and given it to me. I was given a nice envelope though, and in it was a nice certificate which looked nice on my wall.

The third was high school and the forth was university. Both big, welcome surprises.

The point is that the four ceremonies were very similar and traditional and exactly what you'd expect, or at least exactly what I would have expected a graduation to be because what happens at them is pretty much what happens at all grads everywhere. Parents come, teachers talk, awards are given, ties are worn, hats are tossed and photos are taken.

Standard, right?

So Victoria, our Swedish friend, has this little brother. His name is Christian and he is in a heavy metal band (which we went to see and who were rather good). The reason myself, matty, nolan, sara and chris packed up our bags and flew to Sweden for 5 days was because we were invited to the graduation.

Wow, I thought. "A graduation, how cool. I love those things", I said out loud to Matty, "all those people wearing nice clothes and giving speeches and throwing hats. But I don't have a tie to wear or an award to give. I suppose I could bring my award from elementary school and give it to her brother, but I don't think i'd have enough room in my carry-on for it."

"You're pretty dumb, and I don't think he'd get the joke" replied Matty "and I don't think you have to worry about the tie-to-wear bit because i asked Vic the very same thing and she told me not to worry about it because it's not that sort of ceremony."

He was right. Instead of square topped hats they had sailor caps and instead of speeches they had a parade. Instead of certificates they had a giant photo of themself as a baby and instead of parents taking photo's they had parents and family and friends and grandmothers and tourists taking photo's. On their sailor cap was written their name and year of graduation.

The parade wound it's way through the city centre and ended up in a park. As the graduates walked on by they were singing and jumping and bombarded by well wishers with hugs and kisses and gifts of roses and stuffed bears and tiny champagne bottles that hung round their necks on blue and yellow lanyards.

When the parade had disappeared round the corner momma and papa brodenson, victoria's parents, took off down the street parallel to the route, and not alone either. every other parent that had been near us was bustling along to get to the best spot to see their graduate again.

the parade gathered at it's end in a park where bustling parents and family and friends and tourists searched through the sea of Swedes for the big baby picture that their graduate was carrying. Christian was with the rest of his band sharing a laugh with his friends Sir Eric, second guitar in the band, and Spider Pig, a fellow Swedish graduate. I knew these where their names because this is what was stitched into their Sailor Cap along with 2008, the year of their graduation.

We went back to the Brodenson household afterward and ate sandwhich cake and juggled for the little cousins.

Christian enjoyed his "most Christian like student" award I gave him or rather he would have had I have given it to him not to mention had thought of it when I was in Sweden and not just now seated at my computer.

watching all the people

i want to go see jay-z
great i will go with you
really?
no. not really. i'm from the country, and i like it that way.
hmm. too bad. it's going to be awesome. it's going to be sold out
really. how are you going to get tickets? hey, do you want to camp out over night?
no.
i thought you wanted to go?
i do, but i'm not stupid. besides, you're the one that doesn't want to go.
i'm not stupid either. and it's not about the show, i just want an adventure.
you can go on your own and have your adventure.
that won't be fun.
neither will camping out over night. i wouldn't camp out overnight if i was ... camping.
nice one. oh, and ron white called. he wants his joke back.
tracy byrd called, he wants his song back.

the next morning came around and my alarm clock went off. why i ever let him talk me into waking up at eight to go wait in like for his tickets is beyond me. at least i had, or he had i can't remember, roped sarah into waiting with me. however, one look at my phone confirmed my suspicion that it was eight am and that i wasn't going anywhere until sarah told me she was already there.

the call came soon after. where are you in bed where are you in line you langer, get up.

she was waving me in as i scanned the crowd. not in the way mom gets your attention during the christmas rush at the mall food court, but in a way that said she was where she was and i needed to get there immediately. i called matty.

right on dude, is the line long.
not bad. but dude, it'll be you and most of mrs murphy's ninth grade class.
young crowd, eh.
yeah man. ha, no. i'm just taking the piss.

we bought the tickets, sarah told me the ticket girl was hiting on me and i told her that if it wasn't for her company, sarah's that is, that i would have had a date later that day.

langer.

so we sat for an hour just beside the master ticket because we were too tired to go anywhere else and watched all the people, living happily. we talked about life, relationships, love and travel. we made plans to do this when i returned from italy, and to do it once a week. i said it wouldn't happen because her beloved chris would soon be there and we were likely to never see her or him ever again. i'm not that kind of girl, ... and i believe her.

last night

my italian roommate, who had a party last night for his graduation, has photoshop on his computer and he's been nice enough to let me mop the floor and use his computer all afternoon. i am sure that if he was consious he would be apreciative of the floor having been mopped and my usage of the computer, however until he is revived i'll have to assume he would.

i'll bet he's dreaming of a way to get into our french roommates room without using the key that was lost last night at the party she wasn't at. here's hoping the landlord that doesn't know the italian graduate is living here doesn't mind giving us a new key for the room. although i'm sure he's dreaming of the pink dress he wore last night.

matty and i met our first neighbour last night, although the meeting would have been more enjoyable had it not been five in the morning, he not had his phone in his hand threatening to call the garda or had he have been sober.

there's an older man at the door, says an italian boy. he wants to know who's in charge. matt and i exchange looks and decide that it would be better for allan to deal with this one.

go wake up allan, says i. he'd know what to do. the italian boy stares blankly back with the expression of someone with enough apathy to leave out the back door, regardless of the dificulties that he might face, yet with enough empathy to continue staring at me until i decided that waking allan up, after him having been passed out for several hours, would not make for a well recieved conversation with the man at the door. fine, says i. i'll go talk with him.

i rounded the corner seperating the kitchen from the entrance and found several other italians speaking with the irish man whom at this time was holding his sober quite well. or prehaps, in hindsight, appeared more sober in his present company. somehow i convinced him not to call the guards and instead to tell me that he had a 14 year old daughter asleep inside and he had lived there for six years and some other things that i missed because i was holding back a question about him being as drunk as he was at five in the morning when he had a 14 year old daughter asleep inside. i was in the wrong, and so was the rest of the party i had with me, so we parted ways, him and i, likely never to ever speak again.

not a good first impression, perhaps i'll run into him again and have a better experience to tell about.

i did end with an appology to him and the house emptied quickly after he left. they all left for another house party a little ways away that didn't have daughters asleep next door. matty and i put the house back together and settled down to watch some march madness while we reminised about life at 141 and the craic we had. somethings never change.

spelling bee

i had the biggest headache yesterday. it was one that lasted the entire day. what a heck of a way to spend my last day off of work.

no, not that i'll never have another day off work - it's that today, rather tonight, is my "last" shirt at the shel. my "last" because i quit on the 14th, but i was kept on because i am just so darn good.

also, there was no one else.

but what the heck, right? what's another few hours, few friends, few euro's gonna hurt? i even have a few more happy customer stories except by happy i mean cutting off and by stories i mean encounters because what happened wasn't a story because stuff just ... well, happened with no outcome that means anything in any context.

first, two american girls sat, drank and wrote on their arms. i think they were twenty-one but i didn't check so who knows. turns out the one was keeping track of how much she had drank with ticks on her arm. that way when i wake up in the morning i'll know exactly the why of how i feel.

you have a serious problem that i can't even begin to discuss with you because we haven't the time nor do i have the interest i said to myself because i had had enough of speaking with her.

second, some langer went up to two women seated near the door which was handy for him becuase had they not been there he would have walked up to no on because there wasn't a hope in hell of him making it any further. i wouldn't have stopped him, his centre of balance would have. he then came up to me and had the adasity audacity to ask for a drink and the gull to have a confused look on his face when i told him the answer. he got over the rejection rather quickly and returned to the women at the table. i joined them quickly for a short while because that was all it took to convince him that following me and my beconing beckoning index finger out the door was a better idea than ... doing whatever it was he didn't know he was doing.

come here.
confused look.
no, no. come here.
confused follow
[outside the pub]
you should head home
confused look back into pub and one confident step towards the door again
no, no. don't go back in there.
look of understanding and step in the right direction

third, there is no third. i wish there was, but there isn't. perhaps next time i'll have a third and make the post complete. perhaps tonight during my 8-c i'll have a third. perhaps, for now, i've exhausted new words i can mispell.

monday morning i fly out to venice, italy. i'll be there for a week, maybe ... maybe longer, who knows. matty's not coming with me because he spent all his money on Jay-z tickets.

oh, and sorry about that last post. i had that headache i talked about and after an hour at the computer i could no longer think. i meant for it to be a series of more childhood memories, but i've now lost the direction the rest of the stories would have taken. hopefully they'll come back to me, but until then you'll just have to wait. in the future i'll try and make the posts more relevant to travelling too - unless they are making sense to people and you feel as though they are part of the greater context of the life of brad. please, let me know so i know how to write to your reading desires.

cheers,

--bbb

I'll be at my local too

matty and the girls where out doing their thing. the girls, having skipped work, were at the brog (shoe) because it wasn't the shel because the shel was too close to work. matty was too close to work because he didn't want to miss some of his training. langer.

i had met up with brian at the shel and we left from there in a car of steven's because he was heading to a different part of town, but mostly because that's just the sort of thing you do for friends on paddy's day, which is to say everyday of the year. upon getting to the KLM we met terry and the regulars and the pool table named john. we made a point of making plans to go back to a pub near the shel because that's just the sort of thing that happens when you make plans three weeks prior; things change. this also meant that when the girls and matty took a notion to walk our way we'd likely pass them on the road.

a few phone calls, text's and several hours later we still hadn't left the KLM for the pub near the shel at which the girls and matty had been waiting for ... well, several hours. the phone call came in and i answered it and gave it to brian.
'i'm not talking to her'
'wat d'you mean?' asked a bewildered brian 'who's this?' he asked the phone. his face changed from one of a person in control and having a good time to that of a young child who had just been picked up by his father aftering pooping his pants. with eye's wider than most people would have thought possible he passed the phone to the only person who could protect him at all: his mother. who, need i remind you, has been in the pub since noon, which it is now several hours plus a few after.

mama brian delt with the situation the only way she new how which meant not dealing with the situation at all but pretending that she was speaking to a friend of hers whom she could hardly hear through the cell phone's reception which, ironically, was exactly what she thought was happening. brian turned the phone rightside up for her and moments later terry took the phone and gave directions.

the girls and matty turned up some time later and stayed for a bit, but my time has run out and i'll have to complete this again some other time.


[i hope you had a wonderful paddy's day! i posted some pictures on my flicker page, feel free to check them out.]

brother bear

it was a week or two ago. we were all on a patio. it was the day i reached a check point. the clay oven was burning rather quickly through the supply of wood on hand and it soon became apparent that more wood be needed if we wear to bee kept warm.

later i would have a dream about tearing down the shel, scavenging the place for bits of wood the owner, gilivan, wouldn't miss. roy was there, and a regular named a-min-d and a few of the other staff as well. soon the whole floor was ripped up the the bar was floating on the few remaining joist. with that job done i went back to the fire, which meant waking in a room full of smoky clothes.

roy's appartment is having work done, shelves removed and toilets added, and it was producing a great deal of, what turned out to be, unburnable bits of wood that, also, turned out to be too big for the clay fire. matty and i went to investigate the situtation and learned a long time after the facts described above. we had been gone a while and finn et al had some bits of stone to get rid of. they climbed on her brothers roof, just off the patio, and tossed pebbles. finn's brother had a few pebbles too, and tossed them her way. [get off d x'ng ruf] came the txt. the three of us, roy, matty and myself, returned bearing gifts of gold trim, wayne scotting and vanities, which needed to be made smaller.

luckly matty and i are ninja's.

my turn came after matt's and just before the arrival of a big angry brother ^[1]. i propped my bit of wood against the wall and would have split it in two, honest, had i not have been distracted.

before me was a bear wearing people clothes standing in the landing in front of me, guarding the only exit. it was speaking but i couldn't hear it over the sound of me pooping my pants for the second time ^[poop]. the bear, brother o'finn, inquired into the delivery of his text earlier.

Brother O'Finn told us he had to work in the morning, which was now an hour ago, and that he would appreciate if we would keep our noise to a non-existance in a tone that suggested his patience for shenanigans ^[2] had expired sometime around the mid 90's.

matty decided to leave when roy convinced himself that since Brother was up already we might as well continue on the same route to destruction we were on. i agreed because my smell was starting to discust myself.

but i don't mind because it gives me character.

point and check

today my sweater the sweater smells of camp fires and longs nights on porches with memebers of staff and their roommates and matty and big angry brothers of staff who are unimpressed with the levels of noises at four in the morning when they have to work at six. but i don't mind, because it and me gives it character.

wednesday i was a bit bummed and i had nothing to do other than walk to work. my walk to work is a quiet twelve and a half or thirteen minute walk, depending on lights and determination, from my house. i bob my head from side to side, counting the steps and looking at the series of clocks along the way providing check points for my journy. none of them say the correct time, nor do they keep the same time, nor am i sure that all of them are clocks; most importantly, though, is that very rarely are any of them people with which i can chat. thus, a quiet walk.

i was bummed because i was bummed and i was quiet because the clocks weren't talking. but today the ones that weren't clocks were people and they did talk. i ran into milo, whom you haven't met but may hear about him again; and i ran into my bc friend who gave me a hug and a promise of a story that gave here licence to be loud in the plaza we were standing in involving rips and embearassment and hours and halfs that elapsed before strangers told her of it;
and i ran into mitch and his partner (a girl) who were on their way back from the grocery store. i spoke at length with each of them and never once said i had to walk away and get to work, except to ang who invited me along with her roommate to salsa lessons, and to milo who was out with fifteen of his closest friends, and to mitch who had walked across the road with me but not his partner because traffic was being traffic and we were paying less attention.

my clocks that where people checked my points and adjusted my direction and while i didn't know the time i now knew where i was going. at work i was no longer bummed and felt less like a slug and more like a feather.

[you haven't met mitch either but you might hear more of him later too. he started as the new ahmed last week because the old ahmed left for dublin. mitch and his partner are kiwi's.]

cove, cobh, kov

we went to cobh two days ago. we would have been matty as well, however he got caught up with an issue at the house and had to wait for the landlord to show up. i gave him a call and he said he'd be here as soon as he could. i sure hope he gets this room to stop spinning.

i had been up for a few hours already and had packed a lunch. turns out it was better for him not to come because i ate the whole thing. however, had he of found the floor he likely wouldn't have been eating all the much.

with tickets bought and seats on the train chosen we sat patiently and talked of all the wonderful things we'd see today. the titanic monument, the catherdal, the baptism (that one we hadn't planned on and obviously didn't talk about before we left) and the lusitania exhibit. perhaps a pub or two along the way as well. we small talked for a good long while, and for a good long while we didn't realize that the train hadn't gone anywhere. then people sitting farther ahead of us dismounted and went about their way back to the station which was confusing because they would have a hard time getting to cobh (cove) if they stayed at the station.

turned out that we were going to be the ones in trouble beause the train was taking the day off and giving the bus company all the buisness. instead of a nice comfy train ride the whole group, four more than bus capasity, packed together and rode the road to queenstown (cobh).

we walked to the cathedral, stayed only a moment because the next service wasn't until seven, it was noon thirty at the time, which was also the kick off time for the baptism i meantioned earlier. we went to a museum which was also taking an undefined holiday, giving all it's buisness to the cathedral which was hosting the private party. so we went to the bench park and watched the ocean for a while and ate sandwhiches and oranges and talked about grass stains.

we went to another museum and learned about the titanic, emigration, lusitanian and something else that didn't make the cut for the days memory bank. we sat in the cafe and talked about overloading information and tried to guess what time it was. sarah always won.

the bus train came back for us, which was nice because cobh was cold and done with us. we tried to go to african lion safari's little brother but the train driver was confused with the hours. we saw some trees instead. they were big and green and brown and read and asked me to climb them. i politely refused for a while, but at last succum to their hospitality. i climbed and climbed and loved it very much.

i slepted like a baby that night.

locked in

st valentines day i spent at work. which is fine because my mother/valentine is a world away. matty had a night on the town with our two new travel buddies, sarah and nolan. they went out to dinner someplace and and drinks at other places and came to visit me at the end of it all.

roy and i had an entertaining night. i wished all the regulars (men, mind you) a happy valintines day which, for the most part, they shrugged away any concern they might have had which was minimal to begin with. earlier that day at lunch i had wished the same to steve who said he'd give me a kiss later.

he didn't.

as the trio waited around for me to clean up slash decided between cards (matty has learned how to play euchre which really means he tries to play poker with every hand) and going out to a late bar. i suggested we stay at this late bar, not this in the sense that i was about to suggest a particular one but this as in immediately located under out feet. fifteen minutes later, when i had explained the concept of a lock-in* to the girls, i had finished cleaning and we sat down for a good three hours of deep conversation and eighties music. roy, myself, the trio and a new character, kevin (whom i have yet to talk about but might at some other occasion) liberated several pints from the taps and spent a wonderful valentines with the closest thing to a family i have this side of the atlantic because, as well all know, this day is all about family.

unfortunately, i had missed two calls from my valentine because the eighties were too loud and my phone was vibrating in a jacket too far away from me to be warn. she left some nice message though.

nolan spent most of the next day in a coma.

*lock-in: the bartenders kick everyone out save for their friends and the best regulars and the small party of people say "locked in" the pub until the large or at least medium sized morning hours.

advent

A few days ago, five really, i went to hang out with this guy. a bunch of other people came too, which was pretty cool because it'd been a while since i'd been to a spot with a mass amounts of people that i didn't have to serve drink* to. the guy talked for a while, then spent a bit of time letting other people talk, then some others sang. this all stopped to allow everyone to go for a quick jog around the building. when the got back to their seats they all had spots on their foreheads. weird, but i didn't want to be left out so i joined in.

at the end of it all i felt like i should give up chocolate or something. but since i don't eat chocolate to begin with i decided on television. i told matty about this experience and he decided to watch more television and more trashy television. also, he would try and get me to watch it too. now, when i sit in the kitchen studying french and reading my one book a week (at the end of it all i felt like i should not only give up something, but add something too) he makes enormous sounds from his spot dans la canapé that might be laughter if i didn't know he was watching simple life:interns which isn't so much funny as embarrassing to humans everywhere.

*in ireland the word drink can be both singular and plural. i suppose it is because they use the word so often that it saves a mass amount of time if they drop the last letter.

and the world spins madly on

nolan arrived a week ago and has a job and a house and a group of pubs we can all call home. she met a friend in dublin (sarah maloney) who turned out to be a friend of a girl matty and know from school. it also turned out she was in the same residence building as mandy when she was a first year don "are-eh".

small world.

last night we had our staff christmas party and everyone took the opportunity to wish to everyone many more times than was necessary a happy christmas. we had dinner at captian america's and they all commented how "american" it was which got me thinking how flashy everyone must think america is. i also noticed how the restaurant resembled a kelsie's or boston pizza's on steriods. then i realised that it really was a kelsie's or boston pizza's except that it had captian ameria comic books on all the walls, not sports parifanalia or old wooden cart wheels.

small world.

i finished jPod the other day. i'm going to read on the road now. jPod is written by a west coast canadian and it was great to read a story that used names of cities i new of and associated with home even though i have never been to any of them. on the road is written by an american who was born in montreal and is his story of traveling across america. at least i think it is. is it ironic that i travel to another continent and read authors from home?


and the small world spins madly on.

miss you all.

--(bb)b

(st)itching to tell a story

life, in general, is good. i've gone so far as to get a fiddle teachers number; all i've to do now is call it. i'm excited. there doesn't seem to be too much committement needed because she's always moving too. i'll keep you posted what comes of it.

my glasses have decided that they'd rather been a pain in my life than do anything constructive. they live the remaining days of their life either tucked away in a pocket or, in the rare occasion that i wear a touque to support the arms behind my ears, on my head. i think i'll have to break down and ses a doctor since the mailing system won't get a script to me until well after i had ground my glasses into a thick pulp and made a few new friends who would later turn out to be lamp posts.

"but they were such good listeners" i would later say
"your not talking to anyone but yourself" would come the reply from no one because matty would still be in spain.

with those glasses in my pocket i spent my post-spectacle-shopping day pulling pints, avoiding the regulars and chatting with an american couple who kept me entertained all night. susan, another of the barstaff, made fun of me last night for being "prejudice" because i only talked to the foreigners. i didn't know where to begin telling her what was wrong with what she said ... so i agreed.

the american couple said good evening at the appropriate time (something other patrons might want to learn) and we closed up shop. the final task of closing up shop involves arming the alarm and making a mad dash to the door. on the way there are lights to turn out and massive handless doors to trapease through. the act of closing the very last door usually isn't followed by a gasp from susan, nor a sudden realization that i left something behind, nor the onset of a pain that can only come from having a massive handless door close firmly on my middle and other-ring finger.

so in the end i was able to spend some nice quality time with the night watchman at the cork emergency waiting room with the doc prepped the O.R. for a silly canadian boy who had less than agile hands. two hours and three stitches later i am on my way home.

i'll have to set up a video conference with mom when it comes time to remove the stitches as it will cost me 50 quid to visit a doctor.

sacred steps

we didn't actually have tea at the Frank's house, because it is a museum and they don't serve tea at museums.

finding it was a challenge. the kiwi's, as it turned out, don't do "getting lost" as well as matty and i. none of the streets were written in english and therefore were unpronounceable, meaning nothing to the lot of us. as tourist we were forever looking for that street that has a Vij in it or started with an L ... having evolved from the realization that following our favourite street, the one that ended straat, did us as much good as following Rue Street in Montreal.

then the house found us the day started looking good.

we spent several minutes in the antiroom reading an outline of the family, familiarizing ourselves a bit with the history and waiting for the tour guide to round the group up. fifteen minutes later we realized there was no tour guide, just a group of people who can't read the sign that says: please proceed on your self-guided tour.

What i was impressed with most was how sacred the place was to everyone there. Quotes from the diary of anne frank guided me through the house. Through them she stressed the danger her family was in, how trapped she felt within the walls and how important it was for all of them to remain absolutely silent during the day; the workers in the warehouse below were not aware of the family hiding and may have given them up to the Germans. No toliets or steps, no laughing or crying, no talking or chewing moving at all.

The house had three floors to be toured, a fourth, the attic, was sealed off. Save for a few whispers between tourists, the place was silent. As groups moved about it was clear just how difficult it must have been for this family. Above me i heard the every floorboard creak under every heel that passed. Everyone moved with such care, with a common understanding that something out of our grasp had happened here. Occasionally a blasphemous flash would disrupt the out focus and furrowed brows would assault the perpetrator. Very people took more than one photo, it just didn't feel right.

It was incredible to have walked through the place that once served as a safehouse for so many people.

ol'vanny

we visited the van gough museum, but they didn't have starry night. i was all excited to see it because, really, it was the only one i knew of his without being prompted. of course once walking past a few of his others i started to remember them as well, but i was still a wee bit disappointed.

i took the audio tour which turned out to be for people who couldn't read the plaques that hung next to each painting. i suppose it was also for art fanatics who enjoyed being lead around by a breathy female. it's been a while since i've heard my celebrity narrator, yet this was a welcome change; as well, i could watch the painting reveal it's self, if you will, as my female friend described it to me.

part of the tour took us through some of van gough's doodles. it was neat to see how his works progressed; what made it, what didn't and what changed.

the girls came with us, however we learned early on that museums weren't really their thing and pretty soon they had run ahead, finished the tour and were taking elevator rides. we hadn't thought to bring any toys with us to keep them occupied while we went about our day. i suppose those are the things you learn as you travel.

we finished off the tour, as one always does, with a trip to the souvenir shop (which, as i am sure you all know, is french for cheep-trinket). i picked out three postcards of mini van gough paintings. that i am sure ol'vanny would have been very proud to see his work trivialized, but i cared only until i saw that prints of the real thing were going for thousands of euro.

the lovely young woman who worked the check out was doodling on a bit of paper. cleverly i remarked that perhaps someday they'd be hanging somewhere with people doting over them. she smiled, thanked me and checked me out.

i walked away with a big stupid grin on my face which quickly turned my face red as i caught eyes with the group of three tourists who had watched the whole thing. all matty could do to hold back his laughter was smile and stifle his chuckle through his nose. the kiwi's pointed and i turned pink.

damn this cleverness

i collected my bag at the coat check and we went on our way. we were due at anne frank's house for tea at four.