Welcome Home Happy Christmas
The weekend before last I went to London for my Croatian language school's annual dinner (first one I've been to). It was nice to catch up with a few familiar faces, and to see a ton of new ones. It would have been silly to go to London just for dinner (even if I did get a 1-cent-each-way ticket; Ryanair is my new friend - with air taxes, you end up paying what you would have paid in the old days for ticket and tax, the days before airlines started tacking on profits and calling them 'taxes'). I spent the weekend with friends in Richmond, a really nice neighborhood with a totally different feel than I'd gotten in London proper before. ['Proper' as in downtown, gotta get the accent going.] It was almost like heaven getting out of the city for a while, staying in a quiet neighborhood, in a clean and quiet home, with a couple of good friends, away from the whole scuzzy city backpacker scene which I've probably been getting sick of for the last 10 years but have had a concentrated dose of lately.
I guess every place has its price though, and in this part of the world it comes in multiple digits of pounds sterling. I decided to just enjoy the weekend and have fun with people instead of paying attention to the bank balance, and good thing. Just to get a train from the airport into town was more than £9 each way (about $18) for the cheap fare. On an incredibly beautiful end-of-autumn English afternoon, I was walking around town & saw a sign for Kew Gardens. Decided to walk up that way and see what it was, since the name was familiar, figuring it was like a normal city botanic garden. Except when I reached the gate I saw that there was a £12 entrance fee - that is, about $25. Clearly out of the question (if it was something I'd always wanted to see I would have considered it, but not for a whim) I thought I'd at least walk around the edge & see inside. But off of the entrance rose a giant brick wall, complete with metal stuff on top making a barbed-wire effect. Not even glance allowed here! Perhaps it's how they keep the roughians out, folks who just want a free weekend wandering around the city. The day was nice nonetheless, a beautiful town to enjoy, a pleasant walk along the River Thames to get back to the house in the evening, and perhaps the best part - after getting nice and chilly-tired - an evening nap while the girls were at work. It was so quiet, all I could hear was occasional raindrops being blown against the window. Haven't slept like that in months!
On the way back to the airport I was at a station waiting for my next train when I saw across the tracks a sign on a little kiosk which read, 'Ethically Sourced Organic Coffee'. My first reaction was, how cool that people are becoming more aware and you can even find something like that in a train station. My second reaction was, wait a minute! How sad that this is the exception rather than the rule. Honestly, should it be a big advertising point that people didn't abuse or take advantage of other people or do something harmful or destructive to provide people with warm drinks? Have we really come so far as a race that we get a pat on the back when we actually do something right for a change?
Ok I know I've got a drastically melancholy disposition, but could it be that circumstance actually has as much of a say in that as inherent nature? I mean, ignorance is bliss, so if you think, you're bound to be unblissful sometimes, right?
The flight was good though. I've learned that even though they tell you to turn off all your electronic devices for takeoff and landing, things like music don't really matter, and they don't look too closely, and that 20-minute landing is way more pleasant when you have some tunes going instead of just sitting there twiddling your thumbs thinking, 'almost there.... almost there.... almost there.... almost there....' Plus you don't have to hear that blaring announcement Ryanair plays on the overhead speaker every time they land on time. 'That's right folks, we've landed on time again!!' More pats on the back for doing what you're supposed to.
I was a little nervous about going through customs, or rather about what the outcome would be. Normally I should have been allowed a 90-day visit in Ireland, but the first time I came over the guy asked me a bunch of questions and then wrote '30 days' in my passport. Dang. So I asked nicely (and of course was praying in line the whole time) and the guy extended my visa to the full 90 days... Which means I can hang tight a little longer, and my Dublin/Oslo tickets are still valid, and everything is just going along peachy for the moment!
Leaving the airport on the bus, I saw out the window huge letters at the exit with lights strung all over them for the evening, that said, 'Welcome Home Happy Christmas'. Indeed!
Back to Dublin where life is like a shopping mall, people on the streets everywhere, Christmas rush and just general city busy-ness. I don't know that there's a such thing here as just taking a nice walk. It's pressing the flesh, zooming in & out, zipping back & forth, racing everyone or else getting stuck behind really slow people, and then getting run into just as much. Even if you are standing at a corner with no one around you, it is inevitable that someone will come up and try to stand exactly where you are standing. One person said to me that running in a busy city was more like playing a video game than actually running. Exactly. Finally dragged myself out the other day, to the remotest corner I could reach in 5 minutes. It was drizzly and wet and grey and cold outside, and as soon as I started out the drizzle turned to rain, but I ran away-away from the busy city centre, and back into it again, and it was short and cold and wet and it's been so long that I'm still a little sore, but dang if it didn't feel great. There's supposed to be a big park out here somewhere, but I haven't investigated it yet. One of these days!
Speaking of rushing - ok you're going to think I'm totally obsessed with jaywalking now - but it just makes me laugh... I was surprised at first to notice that among the cities frantic jaywalkers were old ladies and men, people who look like they can just barely walk, and wouldn't break a rule to save their lives. Then people pushing babies in strollers (this one gets me kind of mad, they push the stroller out in the street in front of cars & then have to back up really quick-like... as if the kids are saying, 'Sure mum, I don't need to see my 2nd birthday, just get us there!'). So then the other day I saw a priest jaywalking. I'm starting to think it's really not against the rules here. I mean a priest? And last but not least, 2 cops. Right through a red light. I don't see how this jaywalking story can get any more interesting or surprising, so I should probably leave it here.
Speaking of the law, is it time for the News installment? First of all I have to say big THANKS to Eric, who really overdid himself this time. Eric has been my most responsive reader, and the most entertaining, sending bits of information about all my random questions, and some that I didn't ask about, and geeky stuff about word origins & stuff that I totally love reading... Well this time in honor of the town of Limerick [where, by the way, a woman was found face-down in a bathtub this week, investigation pending] the almost-legal-father-in-law-of-my-parents'-son - or let's just say the all-around-great-guy-and-cornucopia-of-knowledge-and-beloved-essential-part-of-the-family - wrote a limerick, which he has given me permission to reproduce here! He did warn me that something might be wrong with my head for wanting to share the Limerick limerick (exact words were, ' Post it if you like, but don't forget to duck!') but honestly, anyone who spends their time reading what I have to write can't be that much saner than me, huh?
So without further ado...
There once was a looting in Limerick,
in a grocery with nice beer and spices to nick.
When the law laid them low,
"why?" the judge wanted to know.
The thieves claimed their curry lacked tumeric.
How many people do you know who have written a-one of them babies?? Thanks a million, EQ!!
Now it doesn't seem to me that the rest of the country is much better off than old Lim-town there. I've heard on the radio of at least 5 cocaine overdoses in the last week or two. I don't know if that's really sad - I mean it is really sad, but... - maybe it's a good thing that things of that nature are still on the news here. I mean it's better than mass murders at shopping malls, right? Which, by the way, seems to me to be domestic terrorism, no? Shouldn't the government be shutting down shopping malls to avert continuted terror attacks on mall-goers? And how about all these school shootings? Shouldn't they be deporting students to isolated interrogation camps? And shutting down schools? Shouldn't we make bumper stickers for our cars that say 'God bless America - down with schools and shopping malls'? They're terrorist hotbeds I tell ya. But seriously, isn't that kind of thing getting a little too normal in 'that' part o' the world (the starry-n-stripey one) and doesn't it seem like these things are just passing by as isolated incidents?
Finally in the news, I heard on the radio last night that there are searches on in two different towns for men that fell into rivers. The person who read one story right after the other didn't seem to notice that there were two of them in a row. I haven't been here that long, maybe it's a common occurrance on the Emerald Isle?
Well the other day was a day for good news - a nice change. S is dangerously close to realizing his big dream. I won't say any more now, except that dreams are good no matter what anyone says (even S himself!) and that they don't have to be things in the sky that people don't attain. I think dreams are truly the birthplace of goals. A man's heart plans his way, but the Lord directs his steps. That is to say, we get to do the Dreaming, and then by the grace of God one day we can get there! And secondly, congratulations to T for finding two, count 'em two brand new heartbeats in the workings!! T and S and all the rest, I am praying for you!!
Well autumn has officially turned to winter. I love autumn. When it comes I usually think it's my favorite season, even though summer is always too short. But winter is good too, especially when it brings holidays! The light has been absolutely beautiful here on days when the sun comes out. Have been taking photos of doorways and shop fronts and statues. This time of year I find myself wanting to take photos of the season, not the place. I mean they are of the place, but it's really the season that makes it perfect.
I don't know if I ever mentioned how surprised I was that the Gaelic language is still alive and well here - there are signs in English and Gaelic in the airport, at bus stops & on all the public transportation, on the street, everywhere - it's pretty amazing. Though there are probably more people on the street speaking Polish than anything else, it's fun to catch some TV shows or radio in the native language. Like the movie Polar Express the other day. It was actually better than the English version, the voice-overs didn't yell quite as much as Tom Hanks & co. I still don't understand why the train conductor had to be mean to be nice. And whoever did the soundtrack should have been fired; talk about a faded photocopy of every other movie theme. It was nice to see a Christmas movie though. Even after years in retail (granted with some space in between) I still love Christmas music and movies! Last night on the radio I heard a Gaelic version of 'Somewhere Over the Rainbow'. They seem to play this more at Christmas time too, maybe because it is the season of dreaming. It occurred to me that I've never really liked that song. I think it's one of those that you're really supposed to like - everyone is supposed to like it. The concept is ok, but the melody is really pretty annoying, and the words are so-so. It's a little better when Judy Garland sings it, but that usually means watching the movie. Which is ok but I don't know if I really like that either?? Hmm. It does have cool old-ness factor, but I don't know. And then there's that version of SOTR [yep we're on an abbreviation-basis, me 'n' the old tune] where the Hawaiian guy sings & plays it with his ukulele or something; his sound is nice and mellow, but did he have to screw up the words? Did he have a problem with the language, or was he too lazy to learn them, or did he get nervous and forget them, or was he drunk maybe? It could have been so good.
Well another hour has passed and if you are brave (or really bored) you have finished yet another installment from the Rambling Mitch. It used to say that on my page somewhere I think. Maybe I used up my word quota and it got deleted. See there I go again, rambling!! This is what happens when all of the people I like talking to are really far away.
Ok, get back to your life now, but one last question before I go... Have you ever seen the phrase 'coconut palms' used without being preceded by the word 'swaying'? Swaying coconut palms. Just think about it.
I guess every place has its price though, and in this part of the world it comes in multiple digits of pounds sterling. I decided to just enjoy the weekend and have fun with people instead of paying attention to the bank balance, and good thing. Just to get a train from the airport into town was more than £9 each way (about $18) for the cheap fare. On an incredibly beautiful end-of-autumn English afternoon, I was walking around town & saw a sign for Kew Gardens. Decided to walk up that way and see what it was, since the name was familiar, figuring it was like a normal city botanic garden. Except when I reached the gate I saw that there was a £12 entrance fee - that is, about $25. Clearly out of the question (if it was something I'd always wanted to see I would have considered it, but not for a whim) I thought I'd at least walk around the edge & see inside. But off of the entrance rose a giant brick wall, complete with metal stuff on top making a barbed-wire effect. Not even glance allowed here! Perhaps it's how they keep the roughians out, folks who just want a free weekend wandering around the city. The day was nice nonetheless, a beautiful town to enjoy, a pleasant walk along the River Thames to get back to the house in the evening, and perhaps the best part - after getting nice and chilly-tired - an evening nap while the girls were at work. It was so quiet, all I could hear was occasional raindrops being blown against the window. Haven't slept like that in months!
On the way back to the airport I was at a station waiting for my next train when I saw across the tracks a sign on a little kiosk which read, 'Ethically Sourced Organic Coffee'. My first reaction was, how cool that people are becoming more aware and you can even find something like that in a train station. My second reaction was, wait a minute! How sad that this is the exception rather than the rule. Honestly, should it be a big advertising point that people didn't abuse or take advantage of other people or do something harmful or destructive to provide people with warm drinks? Have we really come so far as a race that we get a pat on the back when we actually do something right for a change?
Ok I know I've got a drastically melancholy disposition, but could it be that circumstance actually has as much of a say in that as inherent nature? I mean, ignorance is bliss, so if you think, you're bound to be unblissful sometimes, right?
The flight was good though. I've learned that even though they tell you to turn off all your electronic devices for takeoff and landing, things like music don't really matter, and they don't look too closely, and that 20-minute landing is way more pleasant when you have some tunes going instead of just sitting there twiddling your thumbs thinking, 'almost there.... almost there.... almost there.... almost there....' Plus you don't have to hear that blaring announcement Ryanair plays on the overhead speaker every time they land on time. 'That's right folks, we've landed on time again!!' More pats on the back for doing what you're supposed to.
I was a little nervous about going through customs, or rather about what the outcome would be. Normally I should have been allowed a 90-day visit in Ireland, but the first time I came over the guy asked me a bunch of questions and then wrote '30 days' in my passport. Dang. So I asked nicely (and of course was praying in line the whole time) and the guy extended my visa to the full 90 days... Which means I can hang tight a little longer, and my Dublin/Oslo tickets are still valid, and everything is just going along peachy for the moment!
Leaving the airport on the bus, I saw out the window huge letters at the exit with lights strung all over them for the evening, that said, 'Welcome Home Happy Christmas'. Indeed!
Back to Dublin where life is like a shopping mall, people on the streets everywhere, Christmas rush and just general city busy-ness. I don't know that there's a such thing here as just taking a nice walk. It's pressing the flesh, zooming in & out, zipping back & forth, racing everyone or else getting stuck behind really slow people, and then getting run into just as much. Even if you are standing at a corner with no one around you, it is inevitable that someone will come up and try to stand exactly where you are standing. One person said to me that running in a busy city was more like playing a video game than actually running. Exactly. Finally dragged myself out the other day, to the remotest corner I could reach in 5 minutes. It was drizzly and wet and grey and cold outside, and as soon as I started out the drizzle turned to rain, but I ran away-away from the busy city centre, and back into it again, and it was short and cold and wet and it's been so long that I'm still a little sore, but dang if it didn't feel great. There's supposed to be a big park out here somewhere, but I haven't investigated it yet. One of these days!
Speaking of rushing - ok you're going to think I'm totally obsessed with jaywalking now - but it just makes me laugh... I was surprised at first to notice that among the cities frantic jaywalkers were old ladies and men, people who look like they can just barely walk, and wouldn't break a rule to save their lives. Then people pushing babies in strollers (this one gets me kind of mad, they push the stroller out in the street in front of cars & then have to back up really quick-like... as if the kids are saying, 'Sure mum, I don't need to see my 2nd birthday, just get us there!'). So then the other day I saw a priest jaywalking. I'm starting to think it's really not against the rules here. I mean a priest? And last but not least, 2 cops. Right through a red light. I don't see how this jaywalking story can get any more interesting or surprising, so I should probably leave it here.
Speaking of the law, is it time for the News installment? First of all I have to say big THANKS to Eric, who really overdid himself this time. Eric has been my most responsive reader, and the most entertaining, sending bits of information about all my random questions, and some that I didn't ask about, and geeky stuff about word origins & stuff that I totally love reading... Well this time in honor of the town of Limerick [where, by the way, a woman was found face-down in a bathtub this week, investigation pending] the almost-legal-father-in-law-of-my-parents'-son - or let's just say the all-around-great-guy-and-cornucopia-of-knowledge-and-beloved-essential-part-of-the-family - wrote a limerick, which he has given me permission to reproduce here! He did warn me that something might be wrong with my head for wanting to share the Limerick limerick (exact words were, ' Post it if you like, but don't forget to duck!') but honestly, anyone who spends their time reading what I have to write can't be that much saner than me, huh?
So without further ado...
There once was a looting in Limerick,
in a grocery with nice beer and spices to nick.
When the law laid them low,
"why?" the judge wanted to know.
The thieves claimed their curry lacked tumeric.
How many people do you know who have written a-one of them babies?? Thanks a million, EQ!!
Now it doesn't seem to me that the rest of the country is much better off than old Lim-town there. I've heard on the radio of at least 5 cocaine overdoses in the last week or two. I don't know if that's really sad - I mean it is really sad, but... - maybe it's a good thing that things of that nature are still on the news here. I mean it's better than mass murders at shopping malls, right? Which, by the way, seems to me to be domestic terrorism, no? Shouldn't the government be shutting down shopping malls to avert continuted terror attacks on mall-goers? And how about all these school shootings? Shouldn't they be deporting students to isolated interrogation camps? And shutting down schools? Shouldn't we make bumper stickers for our cars that say 'God bless America - down with schools and shopping malls'? They're terrorist hotbeds I tell ya. But seriously, isn't that kind of thing getting a little too normal in 'that' part o' the world (the starry-n-stripey one) and doesn't it seem like these things are just passing by as isolated incidents?
Finally in the news, I heard on the radio last night that there are searches on in two different towns for men that fell into rivers. The person who read one story right after the other didn't seem to notice that there were two of them in a row. I haven't been here that long, maybe it's a common occurrance on the Emerald Isle?
Well the other day was a day for good news - a nice change. S is dangerously close to realizing his big dream. I won't say any more now, except that dreams are good no matter what anyone says (even S himself!) and that they don't have to be things in the sky that people don't attain. I think dreams are truly the birthplace of goals. A man's heart plans his way, but the Lord directs his steps. That is to say, we get to do the Dreaming, and then by the grace of God one day we can get there! And secondly, congratulations to T for finding two, count 'em two brand new heartbeats in the workings!! T and S and all the rest, I am praying for you!!
Well autumn has officially turned to winter. I love autumn. When it comes I usually think it's my favorite season, even though summer is always too short. But winter is good too, especially when it brings holidays! The light has been absolutely beautiful here on days when the sun comes out. Have been taking photos of doorways and shop fronts and statues. This time of year I find myself wanting to take photos of the season, not the place. I mean they are of the place, but it's really the season that makes it perfect.
I don't know if I ever mentioned how surprised I was that the Gaelic language is still alive and well here - there are signs in English and Gaelic in the airport, at bus stops & on all the public transportation, on the street, everywhere - it's pretty amazing. Though there are probably more people on the street speaking Polish than anything else, it's fun to catch some TV shows or radio in the native language. Like the movie Polar Express the other day. It was actually better than the English version, the voice-overs didn't yell quite as much as Tom Hanks & co. I still don't understand why the train conductor had to be mean to be nice. And whoever did the soundtrack should have been fired; talk about a faded photocopy of every other movie theme. It was nice to see a Christmas movie though. Even after years in retail (granted with some space in between) I still love Christmas music and movies! Last night on the radio I heard a Gaelic version of 'Somewhere Over the Rainbow'. They seem to play this more at Christmas time too, maybe because it is the season of dreaming. It occurred to me that I've never really liked that song. I think it's one of those that you're really supposed to like - everyone is supposed to like it. The concept is ok, but the melody is really pretty annoying, and the words are so-so. It's a little better when Judy Garland sings it, but that usually means watching the movie. Which is ok but I don't know if I really like that either?? Hmm. It does have cool old-ness factor, but I don't know. And then there's that version of SOTR [yep we're on an abbreviation-basis, me 'n' the old tune] where the Hawaiian guy sings & plays it with his ukulele or something; his sound is nice and mellow, but did he have to screw up the words? Did he have a problem with the language, or was he too lazy to learn them, or did he get nervous and forget them, or was he drunk maybe? It could have been so good.
Well another hour has passed and if you are brave (or really bored) you have finished yet another installment from the Rambling Mitch. It used to say that on my page somewhere I think. Maybe I used up my word quota and it got deleted. See there I go again, rambling!! This is what happens when all of the people I like talking to are really far away.
Ok, get back to your life now, but one last question before I go... Have you ever seen the phrase 'coconut palms' used without being preceded by the word 'swaying'? Swaying coconut palms. Just think about it.
1 Comments:
oops!! this was supposed to come before the last 2, but i sent it to yahoo.com instead of ubrdo.com... if somebody has a yahoo version of my address, they got a really random long email the other day!!
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