Things I Learned While Visiting Ireland

 

Things I Learned While Visiting Ireland:

• I can’t read maps. Once streets are no longer on a N-S E-W grid, forget it. Without the keen eye of Andrea and her mad mapping skillz, I would have been lost. Let’s just say I’d wouldn’t win The Amazing Race.
• Two pints of beer and I’m done. Those Ireland folk sure do know how to drink! And a pint is big! I know I’m out of practice but geez. One town for example had a 1,000 residents /50 pubs ratio. They even have taps on tables!
• The Irish know how to make a good and real cup of coffee! Their espresso drinks were melt in your mouth to die for!
• Speaking of coffee drinks, their Irish Coffee is now my list of “Favorite Drinks.” Good morning!
• The Irish believe in magical fairies. So much so that they change highway construction plans just so that they wouldn’t have to cut down a bush that the fairies live in because that would be bad luck! True story, I saw it.
• Castles have secret peep holes. Great for spying on others. Where do you think the saying “the walls have ears” came from?
• I want to own a castle. One with it’s own draw bridge, moat, trap doors, peep holes. I mean come on! It’s like an adult tree house!
• Wifi on tour buses is a great marketing tool. They should all have it.
• Ireland has had some odd economic problems. For example, they have 100′s of Ghost Towns spread out across the Irish countryside. They are like pockets of nice neighborhoods in the middle of no where. Someone had the smart idea of “build it and they will come.” Except no one came. So these expensive homes, in the price range of $300,000, just sit there abandoned or never occupied and rot away in the Irish rain. Sad reminder of their economy problems.
• The Irish love to have festivals. They have festivals for any and every reason. I guess any reason to drink is a good reason?
• Sheep herding is fascinating!
• I didn’t pack enough Dramamine. Oops. I even told one bus driver, “I need to get some medicine from below, or I may throw up on your bus.” He quickly opened the hatch.
• A grumpy bus driver once told me to “get your rubbish off the bus.” I couldn’t take him seriously, he just said rubbish!
• The sun never goes down. Andrea and I would be laying in bed at 9:45/10:00 p.m. and the sun would still be shining bright as can be through the window. And then it would be a quarter of the way up in the sky by the time we were waking up at 5:30 a.m. Bizarre! You NEED a watch there.
• Andrea taught me how to pop open an airplane bathroom door from the outside. Muhaha
• Having Business class seats flying across the Atlantic is awesome! Totally spoiled now.
• I can’t count the number of old men in the airports I saw reading Hunger Games. Makes me smile.
• And lastly, the constant overcast weather in Ireland is great for photography