March 14 – Wednesday – Slept in all the way to 7:45, easy morning, labeled pictures, went to I-café to update, light lunch, and off to the Kinsale Golf Club for 9 holes. Nice sunny day, temp about 55 or so, the breeze around the golf course was cool but walking up and down the hills worked up a bit of a sweat. I didn’t shoot very good, rental clubs and I haven’t played in months, but I still enjoyed it. After supper we made our way to the Spaniard, Lisa wants to see if she can join in on the Trad Session. On the way I need to hit the ATM, and the stupid machine ate my card! Something about unauthorized use, I’ll have to go to the Bank of Ireland in the morning and get my card back and clear this up.
At the Spaniard we meet two couples from Chicago, and a couple from Cleveland. It must be USA night. Of course, music is a topic of discussion, and we find out that the guy from Cleveland is a singer songwriter who has traveled on the Rock Boat with Gaelic Storm, his name is Jackson Rohm (www.jacksonrohm.com) traveling with his girlfriend Jennifer Ackerman (I think I caught the last name right) and they are headed to Dublin for St Pat’s. He plays around the Midwest, including Chicago and Michigan. I would like to get him to Grand Rapids.
The Chicago group lives near Downer’s Grove where the Ballydoyle is located, although they don’t follow any of the groups we do, they are aware of the pub. They landed in Dublin and are working their way to Shannon.
The session is a fiddler and box player (accordion) and they play jigs and reels throughout the night. There is no bodhran so Lisa doesn’t get a chance to join in. The pub closes up at midnight so we walk down the hill with Jackson and Jen, he is gracious enough to give me a couple of his CDs, and we call it a night.
March 15 – Thursday – Trash day today, I have to get the container out before 10. The Bank of Ireland opens at 10 so after putting the trash container next to the gate, I try to get my debit card back. The attendant at the bank was able to retrieve it, and thought it might have been a “blink in the system”. So after trying the card once more and having her retrieve it again, I call Fifth Third to see if the problem is on their end. Apparently there was a “breech” somewhere, that affected a list of numbers, so a bunch of Fifth Third costumers had their debit cards replaced with new ones. Seeing as I wasn’t home to get any notification I was unaware of this. I have a new card waiting for me at home, but that doesn’t help much now. I will have to make other arrangements to get cash here now.
Victoria had called and would like to show the house again, she pops by at 3:30 and the prospective tenant is a pilot. I found out that the house is protected by some historical order, so it must be quite old. It was part of the St Multose school/church system, the Rectory is just down the road a bit. Maybe I can find out more from Peter, he was the owner before Bruce, and Peter is due back from holiday soon.
Some observations while I’m rambling.
· There are a lot more people in town this week, the tourist season is starting, and the street in front of the house has a lot more gawkers.
· The weather also turned this week, since the rain on Sunday it hasn’t really rained much, just a sprinkle now and then. A lot more sun, and the temps are better, daytime is a light jacket, a little cooler at night.
· We haven’t seen much for a lead up to St Pat’s day here, and we’re not sure what will be happening around town yet.
· If you come here, when you fly over buy the phone card that they sell on the plane, it makes it very cheap to call the states. About 10 cents a minute, my cell phone costs me about $2.50 a minute! Quite a difference!
· Pop is expensive, even in the stores you pay 2-3 euro for a 2 liter bottle, and you pay 2 euro for a 8 ounce bottle in the pubs. Guinness averages 3.60 euro a pint, Murphy the same and Beamish 40 cents cheaper. Smithwicks is 4 euro. Drinking isn’t cheap. Lisa’s wine runs 5 euro for a quarter bottle for a chardonnay.
· Food prices in the grocery store are a little higher than we are used to, but not bad. Our meals at home really save us a lot, and the butchers have high quality cuts of meat. Example, tonight I picked up two pork chops with a Peking coating for 3.15 euro, added potato and veggies and had a great supper.
· If you pay attention, you can eat for a reasonable price. 7-10 euro for a good meal. Otherwise a good meal can run 15-30 euro real quick.
· Coffee is served “black or white”, with or without cream. And most of it is a long pull espresso. Some very good, some not. Most of the cappuccinos that I have had were good.
· “Are you okay?” said quizzically actually means “Can I help you” not “are you nuts or something?” many of the store clerks or hostesses will ask you this.
· People feel quite safe walking around any time of the day or night, but everyone is fanatical about having a burglar alarm. I guess property crime is much more prevalent that assaults.
· The TV and radio here is stuck in the 80’s and 90’s. Most of the shows seem to be old, very few new. That includes the BBC channels as well as the RTE Irish channels. There is some new stuff but not much, a few American shows like Cold Case and Law and Order episodes, and Heroes was just starting Season one, but these are few and far between. There are 6 or 7 soaps, and they play at all hours of the day and night.
· The locals have a strange way of looking at you like they are very skeptical about you or your appearance, a “don’t talk to me” or “what the heck are you up too?” look, but once you say hi, or start talking to them they end up being very friendly.
· An example of the rising house prices – the lady behind the counter at the golf club is from Scotland, she said she purchased her home 11 years ago for 72,000, and was recently offered 570,000. She wouldn’t sell though, because it would be so expensive to get another. Ireland has a lot of millionaires on paper because of the real estate boom.
· You end up with lots of change in your pocket over here, the smallest bill they have is a 5, and the change is made up of 1 and 2 euro coins, 50, 20, 10, 5, 2, and 1 cent pieces.
After supper we make our way to Hamlets, it is a pub attached to the Blue Haven hotel, and would be much more at home in the states than here. All new, lots of chrome, no character to it, even has a champagne room that feels artificial. Michael (from the Spaniard on Monday) was singing, called it the “Folk Sessions”. We like his music and voice, it just doesn’t fit with the atmosphere, so we make our way back to the An Seanachai to listen to Liam O’ to finish off the night. Home about midnight.
March 16 – Friday – Victoria mentioned that the house was set up for broadband and that she had a extra broadband box that I could try, so I picked it up at her office and took it home. Unfortunately it won’t connect, it doesn’t pick up the DSL signal, so I don’t really think it’s turned on. The weather is overcast but dry, so we hop in the car for a joy ride. End up going to Innishannon and found a painting gallery that we walked through, not real large, but some nice stuff. Stop by the “Found Out” Café for coffee and one of the best slices of lemon meringue pie that I’ve had in a long time. The next stop is Bandon, we walk around St Peter’s looking at all the old gravestones, some date back to the late 1700’s. After a brief walk through town, we head home to make dinner.
Entertainment tonight is at Muddy Maher’s, we listen to Seanjohn again. It’s amazing over here, the band is scheduled for 10:30, we get there at 9:45 and the place is lightly occupied. At 10:45 the band finally starts, and the party goers start arriving about 11:00. From then until 1:00, you can walk through the place it’s so jammed! The music was all covers, from the 80’s and 90’s again, and everyone knew the songs, lots of singing and dancing. We meet two guys from England who are here for the weekend, Sam is originally from Australia, and Gerald is from New Zealand, but they now work together in England. We stayed til the bitter end, getting home about 1:15.
