Passed Out

Horrible quality photo, but I had to share. This woman was passed out cold on a bench at a popular square in Stockholm. I didn't want to take a photo using the flash for fear of disturbing her rest! You can't tell from the photo, but she seems to be a normal-looking woman. She even has a small shopping bag!

Crazy Country Roads

I forgot to mention yesterday, while I was on my drive in the country I encountered a beast of the small and crazy kind... I was on one of those great narrow winding Irish roads and I saw something in the street in the distance. At first I thought it was a rabbit, but as I approached I saw it was a little dog. I slowed down to a snail's pace since there as no one behind me and nearly stopped to see if the little guy was okay, because he was really in the middle of the road. Well, the little devil started baring his teeth and fiercely barking at me! So I started trying to move the car on past the crazy thing and he ran TOWARD the car!! I heard a THUMP and screeched to a halt thinking I had killed the poor thing, but immediately heard more barking. Not yelping; more crazy barking. Then I couldn't see him at all and was afraid to move, but cars were approaching from behind me so I had to creep to a very slow start and move on. As I made my way further down the road, I checked my rear view mirror and didn't see a dead dog, so I felt okay about it but still a bit creeped out with my heart racing. What a weirdo!!! I feel sure that even though I didn't kill him, he must have died by the end of the day hanging out in the street like that. Dumb dog.

Sunday Cloudy Sunday

Today I woke up feeling like a new woman! After a week of feeling so badly, I was relieved to feel almost completely normal this morning. I had a car for the weekend and was dog-sitting, so I decided to stop by a friend's "boot sale" - which is like a garage sale in a parking lot - on the way back to Dublin. The boot sale was in Greystones and was very close to the seafront. After a gorgeous few days it had been raining early this morning, but it cleared enough for a nice visit and general observation of the sale. On the way back to the car, I caught this great photo of a sailboat on the sea. You can just feel the chilly mist, can't you?

Powerscourt Gardens

Today I got out finally, after a week of doing nothing. I went to Powerscourt Gardens in Wicklow. Great day for a stroll. Blue sky, sunshine, mild temperature. Perfect!

Stockholm Shots

My Trip to Stockholm

So… Stockholm – GREAT city. First, my room at the Crystal Plaza Hotel was small, but very clean and nicely located in the city centre. I got a great free breakfast buffet both mornings and a discounted dinner at the Thai restaurant in the hotel. The people of Stockholm were very friendly and helpful, and all of the people I encountered spoke English and spoke it quite well. Public transportation was fairly easy to figure out, and when I couldn’t figure it out I had the friendly people at the Pressbyran stores to help me find my way. The Pressbyran shops are where you buy tickets for the Tunnelbana, the buses and the trams. I never tried a tram, but I traveled by bus and T-bana frequently.

The first day I ate a reindeer and horseradish wrap on the way to the hotel from the central station, then checked in and took a LONG T-bana ride to a bus for the Drottningholm Palace. It was gorgeous, and the gardens were quite nice. I got tons of pictures and had perfect weather. Afterward, I took the long ride back and did the travel book’s recommended walk around the city centre. I saw Sergels Torg, where there was an international market going on, with lots of booths with food and products from around the world. It was crowded and buzzing with people. I had a delightful time wandering around and taking it all in. The rest of the walk took me around to the major sights of the city, including other squares, buildings, and churches, and even to the sight where the prime minister Olof Palme was assassinated in 1986. My walk ended around dusk, and I was exhausted after walking several miles. I hate to admit where I ate dinner. ONLY because it was conveniently located on the way back to the hotel, I indulged in the golden arches – that’s right, McDonald’s. After some greasy deliciousness, I headed back to the hotel and crashed.

Day two began with another suggested walk from the travel book, around Sodermalm, an island to the south of Gamla Stan (the Old Town), which is between Sodermalm and the city centre. Sodermalm offered excellent views of Gamla Stan, and was well worth the uphill hike I took to get there. I got a little lost after walking up the winding road with the great view, and headed on over to Gamla Stan, where I wandered the streets for a while and admired the old beautiful buildings. I went into the Storkyrkan Cathedral and looked around, then continued my walk around to the Royal Palace. At almost noon, I stumbled upon a growing crowd, which was gathering to watch the changing of the guards at the palace. Apparently, this is Stockholm’s most popular tourist event. I had no idea until I was standing there waiting for it to happen. It was a big show, let me tell you. It took about 45 minutes, and even after it was over, the band marched around the corner and continued playing to the cheers from the audience. I found the narrowest street in the city, and it was not alone – there were many narrow streets along my walk, and I took photos to remember them all! After eating lunch, I headed off on the Under the Bridges boat tour, which was the most relaxing two hours of my trip. They have a recorded guide on headphones that describes the sights as the boat cruises along on both the Baltic Sea and Lake Malaren. It was wonderful! After the tour, I did a little more wandering on the streets of the city centre, and then headed back to the hotel to plan my last day. I ate dinner at the hotel’s Thai restaurant – Szechwan scampi and fried banana with ice cream for dessert – and after a quick walk around the neighborhood to ease the full belly, I called it a night.

Luckily, the hotel let me check out but leave my suitcase in a baggage room. My last day started with a trip to City Hall, a 1.5 mile walk, and a long hike up the tower, which is 348 feet tall. A lift takes you half the distance to the top, but it’s your own two feet that take you the rest of the way. I waited about half an hour in line to get up there, and it was worth the wait. Breathtaking views of the islands. After I climbed back down the tower, I walked over to the Vasa Museum on Djurgarden. This was not a quick walk – about 2.5 miles. I was so tired when I got there, but the Vasa was bigger and more amazing than you can imagine. The ship, which sank in Stockholm Harbor in 1628 on its maiden voyage, was salvaged beginning in 1956 and this museum is practically built around it! It was fascinating. The photos I got do not do it justice. The size in itself is the wow factor, but the story around it is intriguing as well. I went to the Skansen open-air museum last. It is the world’s first open-air museum, opened in 1891 to show industrialized Stockholm and the rest of the world the Sweden of the past. Authentic buildings from all over Sweden were moved into this museum. I stopped for authentic Swedish meatballs for lunch and to rest a while, then I strolled up to see the elks, reindeer, bears, foxes, wolves, owls and a number of other creatures in the Scandinavian Animals section of the museum. It was great fun, but I was extremely exhausted by the time I was leaving there. Luckily I found a bus to get back to the city centre. I picked up my bag from the hotel and got on the bus for the airport. I coughed the entire hour and a half ride to the airport, and spent the three-hour wait for the plane medicating as much as possible for the flight. I finally made it home at close to 1 AM last night. I am fully ill at this point, and quite relieved not to be flying again until next month. Welcome Amoxicillin!

Bad Shower Week

On Monday I decided to color my hair to get rid of the grays that were starting to show. I gotta be young in my travel photos! So I got up early and put the color on. I ironed while I waited the 40 minutes or so for it to set and got ready for... the SHOWER. A shower, a HOT shower that is, is a critical part of the hair coloring process. It is the only way to get the color out before it burns your hair. Unfortunately and somewhat predictably, I had no hot water. I tried as hard as I could to stand the freezing cold to scalding hot cycle that is the procedure when the water won't work. Turn it all the way up to 9, wait for it to get warm, get under it until it's scalding, turn it down to 4, wait for it to cool back down enough to get under, stay under it until the water gets too freezing cold again and repeat. Unfortunately, the bearable periods of warmth were about 5 seconds long. Not nearly long enough to rinse out the color in a reasonable amount of time. Thus, I was forced to wrap myself in a towel and run downstairs to the kitchen sink to rinse. I couldn't quite stretch my body to adequately position my head under the water, so I cleared the counter and lay down with my head in the sink. More than once I filled my ears quite well with the warm water. But hey, at least I was rinsing the color out, right? I had a celebratory feeling of success until I realized I still had to condition my hair, so I squeezed out my hair as much as possible, still dripping as I ran back up the stairs to fetch the conditioner I'd forgotten in my panicked haste to get the color out. Then I applied the conditioner and let it sit a minute or two and ran back downstairs to rinse again, reassuming my extremely uncomfortable position on the kitchen counter. I'm thinking €200 for professional hair coloring doesn't sound so bad at this point!
I called my landlord and told him to fix it. "Today," I said, with obvious hostility. He stopped by later and removed the filter from the power shower. Not that it mattered, because of course when he showed up the darn shower worked perfectly. So he thinks I'm a stupid person who can't operate a shower. However, he told me he hoped that the filter removal would fix the problem and asked me to call him if I had more problems.
Tuesday came and I enjoyed a hot shower with no problems. Feeling like a million bucks, I wondered if maybe the problem was solved. Until Wednesday morning, when the shower was freezing cold AGAIN. I took a bath, because for some insane reason the bath tap is sourced from a different tank than the shower. Hot bath, soapy hair all day, another call to the landlord. Not surprisingly, he came back over and it worked fine for him again. This time he literally played with the dials a couple of times and told me it was sensitive and I shouldn't mess too much with the settings. Which, by the way, I only do because I don't like freezing cold showers. I'd leave it on the same setting all the time if only it would WORK!!!
This morning I had a nice hot shower again, but it's only a matter of time... probably tomorrow morning at 3:30 when I have to take a shower before I leave for Stockholm it will be like ice water again. I'll let you know when I get back.

Vienna Beauty

A taste of Vienna

Beautiful Vienna

I'm back from the insanely gorgeous Vienna, Austria. I couldn't believe how pretty the city is. I had a great time, despite fighting a cold and some bizarre knee issues (only at night while trying to sleep). My hotel was small but nice and superbly located. I found it easy to get anywhere from there, mostly on foot, but a U-bahn stop was very closeby and convenient. I only got lost once and it was because I was "off the map." Even then I found my way fairly quickly.
There were many highlights during the trip - too many to name them all! I enjoyed all the churches and museums, the food was terrific and the locals were all very nice. The first day was super hot, the second day was a bit milder, and the third day was almost cold - definitely windy - but absolutely beautiful.
I went to art museums, mostly, but also took the time for two other somewhat peculiar museums: the criminal museum and the clock museum. The 'Kriminalmuseum' was pretty far away from the main part of the city, but it was a beautiful morning on Saturday when I set out on my journey. I took the U-bahn and walked about a half a mile or so to get there. It was as if I had stepped into the twilight zone. The museum is in an old house with winding hallways and stairs, which is creepy in itself. The displays were all described in German, so I was given a photocopied handout sheet that gave me the VERY abridged version of each exhibit. There were about 20 rooms, and each had very disturbing objects and photos on display. In some cases, they had the actual weapons used in murders and the skulls of some of the criminals and victims. Yuck! Also, I was the only person in there, so it was EXTRA creepy. The clock museum had about a million old clocks and watches in it, and although I did enjoy it, I could have saved the admission price for something better. For example, the Bratwurst I ate immediately after the clock museum was far better and only cost €3!
I saved a visit to the Hundertwasserhaus apartments for last, and they were truly amazing. It looked like a combination of Beetlejuice and Dr. Seuss - totally bizarre. I wish I lived there!
All in all, it was a wonderful trip. I am going to rest as much as possible over the next four days... Friday I'm off to Stockholm!

Sunday is Movie Day!

After some delicious eggs benedict at a restaurant not far from my apartment, today I saw a movie called 32A with a couple of friends. It's an Irish movie about 4 teenaged girlfriends. It was very cute. It won some Irish film awards. I feel I am more educated now about being an Irish kid in the 70s. It doesn't seem too much different from the 70s in America except they listened to cooler music.

After the movie, we went shopping at Penney's and Tesco. We went out of the mall using the wrong exit and ended up climbing down a steep hill with all our shopping bags to get back to the LUAS. It was a fun little adventure. I was happy to have not been caught in the rain - third Sunday in a row!

I have been experimenting with more baking this weekend. The chocolate cake I made last weekend turned out far better than what I ended up with last night. I tried to make a 'Neiman Marcus cake' (whatever that is) and the ingredients were cake mix, butter, cream cheese, eggs and icing sugar (two different layers). The recipe reminded me of ooey gooey bars but what I ended up with was cake and cream cheese mush. I halved the recipe and put it in a round cake tin, so I'm hoping that was the problem. It's pretty weird. So tonight I have to bake again for this guy's birthday tomorrow at work, and I have no idea what to bake yet. I'm thinking since I have enough leftover ingredients for the Neiman Marcus cake I may just try that again. If it doesn't work right then I can at least say I tried.

That was my weekend.

La Clique

Last night I saw "La Clique," which was sort of a variety show that kicked off the Dublin Fringe Festival. We saw contortionists, a juggler, a woman with four hula hoops who could whip them off the floor with one foot and hula them all the way up to her neck, a guy who danced from the ceiling from straps over a bathtub (that one is really hard to properly explain)and many other acts that were jaw-dropping - Just amazing! It was sort of like a circus, but without the animals. Check out the link: http://dublinfringefest.ticketsolve.com/events/events_for_show/300085
Here are some photos:

Rainbow at Work

Man On Wire

See this movie. It is a documentary about Philippe Petit, a Frenchman who walked a high wire between the World Trade Center towers in 1974. You can read about some of his other wire-walking adventures here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philippe_Petit
The movie was amazing and truly inspirational. Please check it out.