Wow, I almost missed it. Thank you blog sidebar-counter!

It’s really hard to believe that we’ve been in Dublin for a year already. The time is just flying by us, and it’s hard to keep up. The company has been a great place to work thus far, with all kinds of perks. We’ve been to some pretty incredible company-thrown parties, as well as some pretty awesome private parties. We’ve hung out with Howard Lederer, and Chris Ferguson. And we’ve made a lot of friends who’ve kept the fun agenda busy! We’ve seen some concert acts including a huge show by U2 just recently.

Regretably, we haven’t actually done that much in the way of travelling. Something that will have to be rectified soon. That said, we’ve been to Salzburg, Linz, and Vienna in Austria, Budapest in Hungary, Brighton in England, as well as numerous Irish towns, castles, and coasts.

It’s been immensely rewarding thus far, and there’s still a lot of room to do tons more. So here’s to one year in Dublin, and hopefully the next year will be as fun as the last!

Morgan

I was hangin’ out in the Airfield break room last week and one of the gals asked whether anyone was going to “Bloom” on the weekend. And I was all, “What’s that?” Well, it turned out there was a garden expo in Dublin’s Phoenix Park during the bank holiday weekend.

Sure enough I ended up getting myself a ticket for Thursday, which as Met Eireann promised, was sunny and warm. Really warm, actually. It’s fairly humid in this neck of the woods, and when the clouds shirk their duty of shielding the emerald isle it can heat up a little. I was pretty pooped by the end of the day in fact, not having had the usual run of several months up to what I would classify as a nice July day at home.

Anyway, they had a shuttle bus running to the park from Heuston station, so I took public transit… I also took Morgan’s beautiful camera & lenses of course! I spent the better part of the day running around the fair getting blurry shots of pretty plants and landscape designs.

Part of the expo featured spaces where entrants could create landscapes to advertise their designs. There were a few that I found particularly nifty, such as Anthony Ryan’s “Metamorphosis” garden with its sheltered space and pretty water feature, and this water garden with stepping stones – I just wanted to climb into that hammock!

Two fellows giving a talk about the vegetable garden display they’d set up had a story to tell passersby. It seems the deer that reside in the park had broken in and had a snack, but they only preferred two varieties of lettuce/kale and left the rest. Whew!

I took some time to wander through the artisan food and craft sections. Yays! I actually went around several times.

There was gorgeous pottery – blue and green – they totally nailed the glaze, and cleverly stuck with it over a whole line of different pieces. I discovered some ladies from the weavers’ guild who were spinning raw wool and weaving dyed yarn – I’m always so impressed by human inventions. Especially the old ones – I can’t get over the clever devices people can make!

The food tent was also highly rewarding. I found a lady who makes her own cheeses from sheep, cow, and goat milk. Mmm! Actually, I had previously discovered her downtown in January or so, and I was very glad to find her again. There was an apple juice operation in one corner – I brought a bottle home for Morgan and he agrees the Jonagold apple juice is tasty and not over-sweet. Thumbs up! I also stocked up on summer honey from Andrew McGuinness of Meadowsweet Apiaries. I cracked open a jar when I got home and it’s very nice indeed. Very pale and extremely sweet – I’d say it’s got lots of clover besides a bunch of other things I can’t place. I’m very fond of finding honey from small/local producers. I do miss Patty Milligan’s “Lola Canola” summer honey from Bon Accord, Alberta, but I think of her (I met her when she had about 40-or-so hives) whenever I try a new honey. In fact there are beekeepers who tend ~5 hives on the Airfield property, but I haven’t tracked them down yet. I hear they were selling their wares on sheep shearing day at Airfield, which was the Sunday that weekend, but instead of documenting the “Woolapolooza”, I enjoyed some most excellent hiking around Sally Gap, so I’m still waiting to see how über-local honey might taste.

And just like that, it turns into a food post! That’s okay, there’s really nothing finer! I’d better tack this up on the blog before I get distracted and go eat a pot of honey. But yeah, Bloom was good – would you believe they threw it all together in two days? Me neither! All in all, a very fine day out.

On the Sunday of our trip to Budapest, we did indeed ride on a boat, upstream along the beautiful Danube. It was a glorious day, and everyone and his dog was out in canoes, kayaks, and motorboats. We saw people tubing and paragliding. And the town where we went was called Szentendre, after St. Andrew. It’s just north of Budapest. There we found tasty barbecued meats at a Serbian restaurant, which boasted an excellent guitarist. One thing that’s really struck me around Budapest is the amount of live music in restaurants and on the street. Much of it is of fair quality too. A ton of artists, actors, writers, and musicians reportedly live in Szentendre. And more and more tourists are showing up. I believe it’s because of the hot chocholate (forró csokoládé in Hungarian) at a little café down the street, south from the dock, across from a family of knife-makers. Here ended my search for “real” hot chocolate, that is, melted drinking chocolate in a cup to which you then add milk and whipped cream as you wish. I would gladly row 10 miles up the river for it. (Okay, 10 km in something streamlined maybe.) I think there’s also a marzipan museum and a confectionery museum, as well as a wine museum there. We took the train back into town after being waylaid at the station and serenaded by a little old fellow and his perhaps-once-tuneful violin.

Mmm, Szentendre drinking chocolate!

The next day we trundled across the bridge to the Gellért Baths to soak our cares away in the mineral-rich waters. A great way to spend a Monday if you ask me. At the lockers, there’s a cute little key attendant who locks up for you and then lets you back in when you’re done. (It’s appropriate to tip a few hundred forint.) It was nice – quite clean, not too salty, not super hot. That said, many people I know would be looking for a lot warmer pools than I found there. They also had extra things like facials and massages, and I think maybe I should have gone for one – I’ve been missing massage since class ended!

Magically healed in the fountains of life and youth and so on, we decided to do a little more walking. We climbed up to see some statues on the hill beside the Gellért, including the liberty monument, which looks to me like a lady trying to paraglide with a leaf, and St. Gellért, who, according to legend, was pushed off the hill in a barrel and died. There was also a very cool, cavernous little church, carved and dug into the side of the hill.

That evening, it was time for possibly the biggest helpings of food yet at a nearby restaurant appropriately named Fatál. Yes, it’s Hungarian for wooden plate (on which some of the menu is served), but I prefer to take it literally and without the accent. Morgan and I indulged in roast duck and wiener schnitzel of significant area. (The schnitzel was totally hanging off the edge of its fatál.) With various flavours of beer of course. And not a vegetable in sight, unless you count potatoes. Please don’t tell our moms.

After supper the guys, apparently not completely owned by the hugeness of the food, went to check out a local casino. I went home to pass out. They came back with stories of poker hands and people that tried their darndest to usher them into strip joints. Rumour has it that if you accept the invitation of such an establishment, the bill will be much more than you bargained for…

On the morning of our final day, we checked Gerbeaud off our list. It is a fancy-pants café-confectionery with tasty cakes including Morgan’s Gerbeaud torte and my alma torte. You can tell how respectable it is by the way they bring thimbles of complimentary water to your table without your having to ask. I must say though, that their version of forró csokoládé is entirely trumped by Szentendre.

Back to the Oktogon (octagonal intersection and subway stop below) and Andrássy út we went, to see the House of Terror. The building that now houses a museum was formerly chosen as headquarters for both Nazi and Communist terror organizations, and many people were tortured and interrogated inside it. It’s very well set up to tell the stories of Hungary’s double occupation (and very short-lived rebellion) through pretty much endless amounts of media. There must be several days’ worth of video alone, as well as printed material and some of the technology and other artifacts of the day. There were beautiful statues and tributes but also reconstructed prison cells, some of which I really would not have enjoyed. It can be a profound experience if you allow it, and we left reminded of sobering stories made up of many lives.

We took our last ride on the underground and strolled our last Hungarian streets, ate our last honey-cakes and said our last thank you’s to our generous hosts. We used our last few hundred forint to buy a bottle of water for the plane and we were off home again. There or thereabouts ended a lovely extended weekend away. I would highly recommend Budapest and wouldn’t mind going again myself, though we have the rest of Europe to get through. I hear Croatia is quite lovely.

Mixed and ready to drink!

Gerbeaud's Alma Torte

Diane

This past weekend was pretty fun, and now I’m fairly well set up as far as my new household (I have a household!), I can’t pretend I have much excuse for not blogging occasionally.

It was a pleasant weekend all through. We started off on Friday having some supper with our neighbours from upstairs. It was nice to get the skinny on their favourite places to eat and share stories from home and about our experiences in Ireland so far. I’m really glad to have these folks around. So far, they’ve helped us figure out how to work the boiler and the washer/dryer, and provided pleasant company too!

Saturday was a games party at Darse & Xan’s. It was a lot of good old fashioned fun, with all kinds of tasty snacks besides. There was Ra, Medici, Carcasonne, Blokus, and RoboRally (I love to be the “TrundleBot” – I’m so gleeful it exists!), culminating in Taboo and Apples to Apples that were good for the whole group to play together. Oh yes, and we got to see for ourselves that Darts and Xan aren’t kidding about the size of their spiders.

Sunday was glorious – the weather was lovely and warm, and it held the whole day. Morgan and I took ourselves over to Dun Loaghaire harbour. My intention was to enjoy the sights and sounds of the Festival of World Cultures whilst finding the farmers’ market, but neither Morgan nor I anticipated how many folks would be taking advantage of a sunny summer day. Everyone and his dog was out, riding the midway attractions or buying things from stalls or watching the many musical acts on the outdoor stages (or watching the ticketed shows – it sounds as though there was a pretty decent line-up in general). To me, it most closely resembled the Children’s Festival, which graces my hometown of St. Albert every spring.

We found the People’s Park and the farmer’s market and something to munch as we trundled though the crowds. (I told you I love to trundle!) We moseyed (dare I say it) down to the shore taking pictures and kept going down the east pier, the weather inviting us to linger there awhile. There was someone making a perspective painting – if you stood at a particular point of the decorated sidewalk it seemed as though you were standing in a glacial crevasse.

Not only was it perfect weather for festivals and street paintings, it was also a very good day for a hundred sea-bathing junkies to participate in the Annual Harbour Swim. It looked a little chilly with everyone in normal bathing suits, but I must admit I was impressed. I mean, not that bog snorkeling isn’t cool too.

Diane

I had a chance to go out to Vancouver to visit my sister a few weeks ago. We rode around the city on the bus and took in the sights… and food that Van had to offer. The weather was fine, with not too many rainy periods and even a few hours of blue sky!Carrie has gotten lucky with a really nice little townhouse with good landlords and roommates who call her to find out where she is if she isn’t home on time, which is really nice of them. I also got to meet Trio, who is a very pretty grey striped cat.

We spent the mornings sleeping or reading and making porridge for breakfast – I discovered that the girls have quite a large collection of books that appeal to me between them, which they very kindly shared.

We did the most important things first – a walk on the beach and a trip to the cupcake store downtown by the harbour where they have the international fireworks competitions. Those little cupcakes are expensive, but very fun with all the different flavours they have. Carrie was also adamant that she wanted to take me to try some fancy hot chocolate at a place which is conveniently located right beside the cupcake shop. Care had some creamy milk chocolate, and I had dark “mexican” hot chocolate with some spicy cayenne or other pepper in it – very tasty!

Carrie took me to the site where she was a movie extra for a few days – she was ten feet from Keanu Reeves and some other girl. It was a pretty non-descript lot – I wonder how it was chosen.

On Friday night we all went down to Granville Island to watch some Theatresports. The improv was some of the best I’ve seen in a long time. The actors were experienced and totally on fire, and we all appreciated a chance to laugh. My favorite skit was built around a squeaky spot that one of the actors had found in the floor of the stage. It reminded me how much fun I have at improv nights – I’ll have to try and make it out again soon! Afterward, we went to a tapas place by the entrance to Granville Island called The Cat’s Meow for their sweet potato fries. I had some crab cakes that were really good too.

The next day Care and I went back again for the market. I really love it there, even though it’s crowded beyond my liking. I like to see vendors selling directly to their customers, and there are so many fresh and exciting products to be had. Carrie and I munched on some turkey sausage and rosemary bread with herbed butter and strolled from shop to shop. We visited a dive shop, a stationary store, a store that sold natural dyeing supplies…

I felt I had to show Carrie a restaurant that Morgan and I had found in the summer called Memphis Blues. There’s a couple of them in Vancouver, but the only one I’ve been to is on East Broadway. The “Memphis Feast” only comes to about $30 or $35 and you get a year’s supply of meat with bbq sauce and cornbread. Morgan’s skillet cornbread is much better, I think, but I love the pulled pork. Two times I’ve been, and two times I’ve left with a considerably large doggie bag. Ah, meat.

Carrie’s roomy lent us her car, a cute little Honda called “Josh”, to do a grocery shop on Sunday morning, and I got some split green peas and sausage so we could boil up a mess o’ comfort food. You could stand a spoon up in it – a real big spoon!

Well, there was even more to do – we tried on potential bridesmaids’ dresses and found a style Carrie liked and played with hairstyles for me. It’s been a while since I had my hair in curlers. We made some tasty cookies and Care opened birthday presents from home. Carrie’s roommate drove us out to Deep Cove and we walked around on the dock and ate some sushi in a warm little place nearby. Mmm, west coast sushi!

Eventually, it was time for Carrie to get to rehearsal and me to head back to the airport. Unfortunately, I never made it to a runthrough of Wedding of the Year, but I did have plenty of time to admire the artwork displayed in the Van International. The stone carving is lovely, and the whalebone work is actually pretty imaginative. I couldn’t do it, that’s for sure.

Anyway, it’s business as usual for me again, but I have enjoyed my excursions to the coast the last little while. That makes 3 Vancouver trips for me in the last 12 months.

I was looking at some of the stats we’ve got on this blog, and I saw that someone had found it by searching for “Diane and Morgan”. I was a bit curious how deep in the search results that was so I tried it myself. I was rewarded with a huge number of hits with quite a variety of interesting people named “Diane Morgan”, or similar. Here’s a sampling of these sites:

• Diane Morgan is a cook with a long line of cookbooks.
• Diane Morgan is a comedian from Bolton, England.
• Diane Morgan is the author of a book on dogs
• Diane Morgan is a Lecturer at the University of Leeds
• Diane Morgan is an artist.
• Diane Morgan paints custom mailboxes.
• Diane Morgan is a County Controller for Montgomery County in Pennsylvania.

That’s a few. If you find any fun ones, post a comment!