The Gift of the Blarney

After a rather relaxed morning, with breakfast at the Centra convenience store, the whole lot of us (around 11) took a bus into town for some shopping. The girls were super-excited, and I didn't mind tagging along (you could say that I'm used to it, with Christy and Allie). I also needed to get some shoes, or try to find some. Over the course of our shopping, we went into nearly every other store on Patrick Street, with not so much success for anyone but Ruth and myself (surprisingly). At the end of the day, I ended up with a new pair of shoes (which were slightly tight, but I love them!), a belt, and a nice linen shirt for tonight. I also bought a duffel bag for my short weekend travels while I'm here. It functioned nicely as a means of carrying all the stuff I bought also.


From there, we went to the bus station and traveled out to the town of Blarney, where we entered Blarney Castle. It's supposed to be really touristy (my guidebook said to stay away), but it was slightly rainy and late in the afternoon, so it wasn't crowded at all. The grounds of the castle are gorgeous - lots of gardens, a stream, and even a "rock garden"! We explored the grounds for a bit before heading off to the castle proper to kiss the infamous Blarney Stone.


Climbing up to the top of the castle was slightly creepy. All we had was a winding, spiral stair with nothing to hold onto but a rope going up the middle. We all made it, somehow, and were given lovely views of the surrounding area as a reward. Then, it was time to kiss the stone. I got on my back on a tarp, where a guy held me down and told me to lean back and hold the two bars nearby. After grabbing them, I slowly lowered myself down to where I could kiss it. Even though I thought I was down far enough, he said "lower!", and gave me one last shove down. My adrenaline surged! My view went from seeing nothing but wall to the ground hundreds of feet below. After I caught my breath I kissed the stone and came back up. I don't care what the book said - it was worth every second and dime! So very cool!


Legend says that the owner of the castle had a way with words, thus in kissing the stone you are endowed with the "gift of gab". It also says that you should never be at loss for words for 7 years, or something like that. We'll see how that goes. From there, we headed back to catch our bus to Cork (after buying pictures of us kissing the stone). Since we had an hour to spare, we stopped off at a pub to stay warm/keep dry, and then got on the bus back.

When we got back, Ruth's parents picked us up to bring us out to Rochestown, one of the suburbs of Cork, where she lives. The drive was nice - we were out in the country for a good bit of it, with winding roads and huge houses. Ruth's was a very nice one, set right next to this huge grassy field. Her family had cooked burgers and wedges for us, and they were really, really good! All 11 of us enjoyed the meal and visiting with her family, as well as the two exchange students living with them for the summer (one from Spain and one from France). After raiding her DVD collection for films to watch back in Corrib Village, we were driven back to the house to get ready for a night on the town.

I think the plan for the night is to start at the Old Oak, which we passed earlier today, and work our way around town, meeting up with Sarah at some point. Should be lots of fun, especially since all of us get along so well and have a great time together!

More pictures from the day can be found here.

Onward to Corcaigh!

Work today was relaxed, especially with our trip for the afternoon. Dani, Sarah, and I had packed our bags and walked with them to work so we could head into town and catch the bus straight away. It was actually sunny today, so the walk wasn't half bad. We got to leave work around 3:30, and walked to the City Centre to do some snack shopping and meet up with Josh before catching the half four City Link Bus down to Cork. The bus was pretty empty, so we got to spread out and relax for the 3.5 hour journey.


When we arrived, we walked along the River Lee and into the central part of Cork City. It's huge! Cork is the 2nd largest city in the country, and that's easy to tell. There were people everywhere, shopping and such. Since it was around 8PM, we just headed off toward Sarah's house to wait for the rest of our group to arrive (they'd taken the 6:30 bus). On the way, we stopped at Lennox's (a chipper - basically a take away, or to-go, place that sells fries, burgers, fish and chips, etc.). We ate the food when we got to Sarah's place, which was about a 15 minute walk from town. The food was really, really good.


Once we'd finished, we had time to get ready and hang out until the others called us. We walked down to a pub near Sarah's house and hung out there too until catching a cab out to Ruth's aunt's house - where we were to stay. It was a really nice place, actually, with tons of room for all of us to sleep. After we took the others to McDonald's (they were starving!), we got ready and walked down to Barry's - a pub in this part of the city - and had a good time hanging out and laughing. We even made origami animals!


After that we stayed up for a while chatting and playing cards before going to bed. Tomorrow should be a big day - shopping, Blarney, and downtown Cork at night!

Four Showers in One Day?!?

That's right, today I had four showers. Only one of which was voluntary. It rained. Poured, even. All day long. We got caught in one on the way to work, one on the way back from lunch, and the last on the way home from work. We were all wet, cold, and tired of rain. Boo. (I'm eating my words from the first week, when it was 70s and gorgeous...).

Work was easy enough today. Not too much to do, really, just the typical PCR and gel electrophoresis. After work, we relaxed a bit and then did laundry. This took FOREVER. For some reason, one washer and dryer were broken, and the rest were filled. We must've sat in the laundry room for three hours. Bad memories of the Lavilles freshman year.

After that, I met up with Shelby and Amanda to go to town for dinner and such. Shelby and I went to this excellent Chinese place and had a full course meal. It was really good, and the closest to "American Chinese" that we've gotten thus far. I can't wait to get back to Great Wall in Baton Rouge, though. After that, we met up with Amanda and other LSU kids at the Roisin Dubh, where they were listening to a concert. The opening act was interesting, but not our style, so we headed off to do our own thing and came back later to see Ted Leo and the Pharmacists (one of Amanda's favorites). They were actually really good. I was impressed. I'll have to check them out next time they come around Baton Rouge.

From there I took a cab back to Corrib Village and pretty much crashed. I have a lot of packing to do for tomorrow. Headed to Cork for the weekend, so that should be great fun. Hopefully we'll make it to Blarney Castle as well.

Oh, and another bit of Irish wordage for you. The word "craic" (pronounced like crack) is used to describe a good time - fun, music, dancing, drinks, etc. So, our time at the Roisin Dubh was great craic. Cheers!

Another Typical Day

Lab work is becoming pretty routine here. It's a regular pattern. In the mornings, I load and run gel from my PCR reaction from the previous night. Then I do some antibiotic sensitivity testing and API tests after tea, and then go to lunch. After lunch, I set up a PCR, and that's about it. We usually head home around 4PM.

Today was just as above. It wasn't too bad, though. After work, I hung out on the internet for a bit back home, and then went to the Menlo Park apartments to meet Shelby for dinner. I ate in the restaurant there with her and a bunch of other kids I know from LSU, including Caitlin Hill (who is the daughter of Mrs. Wilburn - my kindergarten teacher). It was a good, easy meal and a lot of fun. I walked back in the decently nice weather and met up with my roommates.

It was another nice, relaxing weeknight at home. We watched two episodes of "Brothers and Sisters", which was fun. I'm proud to say that I've gotten everyone addicted. After that we all pretty much went to bed. But I did talk to Liz back at LSU for a while to catch up on Student Government stuff. There'll be a lot to do when I get back, but it's exciting. Anyways, we're all planning to go to Cork this weekend so that should be grand. Til later. Cheers!

Exam Celebrations

We had our first "Journal Club" this morning, which wasn't all that bad. We basically listen to a presentation on an interesting article someone found and discuss it afterwards. Today's was on an assessment done of the hospital's use/overuse of a particular antibiotic. They found that despite warnings and education to stop using the antibiotic unless it was necessary (since it is one of the few that certain bacteria are still susceptible to), the rates of misdiagnosis and misprescription of the antibiotic had not gone down. It was a nice discussion as well - Martin (our boss) was actually there too, and it's always nice to hear him speak. Dani, Sarah, and I also got to play tour guide to Ruth, Ala, and Melissa, who joined us in the Bacteriology building for the presentation.

It was back to work after that, with a short tea break in between. Work has gotten better (not that it was bad before, mind you) since my PCR reactions have actually begun working. So that's exciting. I'm slowly working my way through finding this tetA gene in my isolates. Only 100 or so more to go. For lunch, we went to the College Bar and met up with Niamh and Marit, which was fun as usual. We got back to work in decent time and finished around 4 again.

All of us were pretty exhausted, so we took naps for a few hours after work. It was nice and relaxing. We had a quick dinner after that, and watched TV until it was time to go out. The NUIG students had gotten their exam results the day before, so we went to celebrate. My friends Shelby and Amanda from LSU joined us as well, which was fun. Our first stop was Bierhaus, where we've been numerous times, and then we met up with Melissa and her friends from NUIG to go to a club called Central Park (or CPs, as they call it). It was empty, but a lot of fun. A few of us got sick, so that put a damper on the evening, but other than that we had a grand time before coming home to pass out.

It's a Case of the Mondays

Only not so much. Today actually wasn't half bad. It's the first week in the lab that Sarah and I are pretty much independent, so we kept busy for most of the day doing different tasks. I learned how to perform antibiotic sensitivity tests again, using discs covered in antibiotics. I read off plates I had prepared on Friday, took the measurements via computer, and recorded them. It's a nice insight into the prior steps of the project before the PCR, etc. Speaking of, it finally worked today! That was quite a relief, actually. I used a few different solutions other than my own, so I'll have to do a few more trial runs before I determine what exactly was causing the problem. I'm just glad I finally got results!

After work, Dani and I biked to Tesco to do some grocery shopping. I picked up a ton of food, but I suppose I needed it. I bought a lot of random stuff with which to make pasta. And cook I did! It turned out much better than expected. But I kinda just added a ton of different things and mixed it all together. I sauteed onions, mushrooms, and a bell pepper in olive oil/red wine/soy sauce, and then cooked some chicken in that. I added sun dried tomatoes, olives, and feta cheese, and mixed that into rotini pasta before adding parmesan on top. It was excellent, though! All my roommates loved it. I'll have to be experimental again another night soon.

"Braveheart" came on TV tonight, and I sat down and watched the entire three hours of it. I'd actually never seen it, and it wasn't a bad movie. Kinda depressing, but made me want to go to Scotland even more. I'm definitely going to go once the program's over for the extra 4 days. Just gotta plan it out completely. After that was over, I just went to bed. A good, lazy night again. Cheers!

The Plane! The Plane!

Bowling last night = lots of fun. A group of about 10 of us walked to the Shopping Center and into this cheesy kiddy place (reminded us of Chuckie Cheese's, except for the bar inside). It was a great time, though, despite the lanes being somehow sloped in the middle. This undoubtedly threw off our game (or, at least, that's our justification for being as bad as we were that night). We played 1 1/2 games and had an excellent time laughing and attempting to get strikes and spares. After that, we played a bunch of arcade games, pool, and air hockey before the place closed. I found a DDR machine and went to town (yes, I know I'm a nerd) but it was grand. After that we decided to go out on the town for a few hours. We hit up the Living Room again and had a blast. After a taxi ride back to the apartments, I crashed and slept in (Yay for Sundays!).

Our plan for the day was to bike to Salthill to go see the airshow. Good thing there was excellent weather. NOT. It rained. Poured, rather. Which made biking the 5km from NUIG to Salthill that much more interesting. We stopped at a gas station and sat under the overhang until the showers held off a bit. They were just starting as we biked into town and strapped our bikes to the nearest light posts we could find. We found an open standing area and watched as a large jet did a few fly-bys. After that was a smaller prop plane followed by a sort of military plane that did tons of neat maneuvers. It was really, really loud as it went by, but it was neat. Lots of memories of going to the shows with my grandparents as a kid.


After that, we were freezing and decided to go into one of the restaurants nearby for soup and tea. It was excellent and, most importantly, warm. Once we'd dried off and defrosted, we headed back outside in time to see some helicopters fly by and then watch a group of RAF stunt jets do formations and that sort of thing. Pretty cool (though not as good as, say, the Blue Angels). The rain clouds in the distance started getting darker and closer, so we packed up and biked back to Corrib Village. I think we still got caught in some of it, but missed the bad stuff. My hands were freezing, though! When we got back, we could hear and see the Air Force jets flying overhead, so that was pretty cool.


The rest of the evening was spent in laziness, watching episodes of Friends and the Simpsons with the roommates. Sometimes it just doesn't feel like I'm in Ireland. Moments like these are included. I'll leave you with another new Irish word - "manky". It's the equivalent of filthy. I was highly amused to hear it for the first time. Well, cheers!