JJ and Maddie Visit, and Sean's 21st!

JJ and Maddie flew in on Sunday morning, and I was so excited to see them. They arrived at 7am, and yes, I actually was up to meet them outside. On the first day they were here I let them sleep in, knowing that they would need it. When they woke up it was nice out, so we ventured out to Howth, where I had taken Meg. It was a cloudy day, but seemed okay to go. We walked out, and laughed at the height of one of the walls that I easily cleared but J struggled with and Maddie was hopeless of seeing over. They were impressed with Howth, just as I was again because this time there was no fog covering the cliffs. They were laughing about the amount of walking that we had to do, but we hadn’t done any of it yet. As we reached the trailhead, we watched people in wetsuits dive off the cliffs from diving board-like anchored structures. We joked about joining them, but then realized how cold that water

actually probably was. We continued on, and I was envious of people who were out on jet skis driving around the cliffs- that would be fun. We hiked up to one of the peaks, and they were tired. I laughed in comparison, as Meg and I had covered so much ground. There were a line of very dark clouds approaching, and they didn’t want to risk getting soaked which was understandable. We headed off to the coastal restaurant that I went with Meg to get fish and chips again, I’d been craving it since I ate it with her. They were just as good as last time, and the girls were getting sleepy. It was the ultimate food coma. We headed back to Dublin and ended the night with a beer at Temple Bar, which was great. It was actually the first time that I’d been in there to sit and have a beer, as usually it is swarmed with tourists and I’m there much later in the night. It was great just to chill out and catch up with them. We headed back to DCU relatively early as everyone was tired.

On Monday morning we all woke up and headed to the Guinness factory to do the tour. It was my second time, but it was so worth it to spend it with Picones. It was the one thing they wanted to do, and I certainly wasn’t about to deny them that after they came so far to see me. We had a great time on the tour, and got to the skybar to find it filled with an asian tour group. Instead of drinking their beer and enjoying the 360 degree view of the city, these people were not drinking and looking down at their cell phones texting. After scanning the room for seats and coming up short, we were beginning to get frustrated. When we finally found seats, we capitalized on them, waiting it out until dinner up there sipping on our Guinness. We left directly from there to Gallagher’s Boxty House for a birthday dinner that Tracy bought for us to celebrate my 21^st birthday.

We had an awesome meal, and I once again sincerely appreciated real food. They insisted after that we see Coppers, one of Meg’s favorite places, and I wasn’t about to deny them that experience. We headed back to my room, and ended up joining everyone to pregame in my room. At Coppers, as usual, we met some interesting people. They had a great time, as everyone always does. On the way home, we played with the DVD system in the taxi and watched Garfield, which the taxi driver said was usually for his children. Whatever, we had a great time. Probably the best taxi ride I’ve ever had, that’s for sure.

The next morning I got a text from my mom, that offered all of us lunch on her. Offer accpeted, that was for sure. After some research, we ended up at The Bakehouse, a place on the River Liffey. It was a place that a couple of the people in my program had talked about, but I had never been. After visitng, I can certainly understand why everyone was talking about it! We had great service, and an awesome meal. Afterward, we went to Kilahamen Gaeol. It was a really cool place as we did the tour. There were interesting parts of the tour including the old jail cells and the overcrowding figures that occurred during the fight for Irish Independence. There was a room with cameras, and we spent at least 20 minutes in there rotating around the cameras to see people and zoom in on them. We waited out the rain inside the gift shop, and walked to Pheonix Park afterward. We walked around the monument, and I took them to the water park. Like everyone else that visited they were surprised by how green everything was.

After struggling to understand from a phone call, Jim sent us a text message with directions to the train stop. We jumped on the DART at Tara Street Station and headed out to Booerstown to meet up with Eithne’s relatives. I was especially proud of myself that I was able to navigate there, let alone lead anyone else. They were awesome people. We got to Jim and his wife’s home and they gave us Budweiser and Doritos, which I immediately appreciated after being away from home for so long. We had a very nice meal, and when we finished, Dan asked us if we’d ever had Rubarb. None of us had, so naturally they ordered 6 of them, one for each of us. It was delicious. We stayed for a long time talking afterwards, and none of us noticed that it had begun to get dark outside, meaning that it had gotten really late. Before we left, Jim paid for our taxi and we headed back to DCU just in time to see security lock the door. After a while of joking about Maddie hiding inside of a suitcase, we finally borrowed ID cards from Kelsey and Gillian and got them in.

The following morning, Picones left at 6am for their flight, and I walked them out. I was really depressed that they were leaving, but knew that I didn’t have too much time left in Ireland after they were gone. Honestly, they probably were what got me through. I waved goodbye to them, and went back to my room to study. My auditing final was at 9:30, and I wanted to be as prepared as possible (ha!). I took the test, and think I did exceptionally well on it, but only results will tell! I’m still waiting on those. I headed off to Sean’s place in Maynooth after a quick nap, and spent the night there after going to a club out there. Because Maynooth is a college town, and it was exams week, everyone was either back studying or home, so we were the only ones in the club. I walked in after paying the cover charge, but they didn’t want to let Sean in because he was wearing shorts. The funny part was that I had gone ahead of him, and I had gotten in wearing them. We spent a while there until it closed, stopped to grab pizza and headed back to his dorm for bed.