One Great Big Sigh of Relief.

Units of Alcohol: 0, Slices of Pizza: 6, Cups of Tea: 25, Radio Executives: 5, Circus photographs: 180 (edited down from 600), Hours of Overtime: 29.5.

I apologise once again for my blogging neglect but really and truly, I have a good excuse. After I organised a radio station circus (with a little help from an actual circus and one kick ass project manager ;) ) and got over 600 photographs, the hard work of actually putting together the related document kicked in. In case you're all lost, I was working on a licence tender document for a radio station which is basically a request to set up shop in a particular region. There's only one licence on offer at a time and the various radio entities all vie for it trying to out do the other contenders by producing a more amazing tender request.) Since the content for this document only showed up on Monday, it was literally, a circus in my office all week long culminating in a 20 hour work day on Friday that didn't wind down until half three in the morning followed by a 10 hour Saturday in the office getting all the artwork ready for print and designified. There was much stress, a bit of drama (as is the way when yer office is full of execs who have more money than God and know it). There were a few laughs, a few scares, one cartwheel (I was overtired, you can't blame me.) There was extreme overtiredness and tea and bicuits at three am when we finally got sign off on the content and lastly but definitely not leastly, there was 14 hours spent in my bed catching up on sleep last night followed by one extremely long and extremely hot shower.

Now that this baddie is out the door and gone to print, I feel like I've just been released from a passionate (yet destructive) love affair ;), a whirlwind romance where we met under auspicious circumstances, we flirted, there was that first kiss, the first fight, there were promises made and promises broken, there were tears, there were triumphs and at the end of the day, we parted, how could it be any other way?! and yet we left the closest of friends... And now. I'm a new woman and god, there's just so much time to not have to think about pagination and colour balance and the negative vs. the positive merits of clown imagery on the marketing intentions of the brand... haha. I'm free. Now I can officially turn my energy towards an upcoming holiday that for me, here, doesn't actually exist. Despite that unalterable fact which means that I will be at work next Thursday like every other ex-pat, I am organising a little 'Giving for the Thankless this Saturday which will involve lots of cooking and cooking of large, meaty birds. Since I've always had my Gourmet parents to turn to for large holiday feasts and I am for all intents and purposes a semi-vegetarian, I have never in my life attempted to cook a turkey... all I know is that you stick it in the oven and baste it sometimes... Well, it can't be harder than putting together a 400 page licence tender document can it?

Bank Holiday Lovelies

Everyone loves a three day weekend (except my liver who looks forward with trepidation and back with horror...)

Work has been crazy busy lately (although I HAD to go to the circus last week to do RESEARCH so I can't really complain...even though it was technically a 16 hour day.) Three days of sleeping, drinking, eating, and other loveliness was well deserved. The party actually started on Thurs. night when one pint turned into last call with a couple of co-workers. The next day included a leaving do for another co-worker and therefore, bottles of wine needed to be drank (?) with lunch. Trying to go back to work and be productive after that was ridiculous, I tell ya.

I went to a "fancy dress party" friday night which is Ireland's strange and oddly innapropriate name for a costume party. (I guess if they called it a costume party everyone would show up with their suntan lotion and their bathing "costumes.") As it was pretty last minute, I just grabbed all my goth gear (fishnets, black clothes, leather bracelets, etc...) and had a friend pickup some white face paint and vampire teeth. Can't say I was very original but at least I wasn't lame and totally uncostumed like soooommmmmeeee people (Tom included.) There was lots of dancing and ghost lollipops and cool costumes to be had (and my liver got a much needed break if you don't count the bottles of wine we all drank with our tasty thai dinner pre-party.) Funny how no matter where you are there is always that one guy at a party who is ridiculously shitfaced, with or without really bad B.O. (with in this case) who runs around talking too loudly and trying to either start shit or vomit in your boots. This time, the guy was also one of those close dancers and the bang off him (as they say here) was worse than three day old feet. He was also strangely obssessed with talking about the 'ra and he wasn't from the North. Maybe that was supposed to be his costume, "disgruntled IRA man." He kept walking by people and saying Up the 'Ra and Tiocfaidh Ar La. (Note: Pronunciation of that bizarre looking alphabet vomit is "Chuckie - are - la," and is a nationalist slogan meaning, "Our day will come." Next time you find yerself hanging with a bunch of Northies talking about Chuckies, you can tell your own personal kneecapping story and they'll all think yer the coolest thing since sliced bread. ;) ) Anyway, other than wierd, smelly, drunk, political-rambling guy, it was a good night out and followed by that most necessary of a good, long, lie-in.

Had a couple people over fer dinner on Saturday night and Sunday was back at it with Tommy as we went to see the Scratch Perverts (Hip-hop / scratch DJs.) They didn't actually go on till 1am making me feel very old as I was already yawning by the time they showed up on stage. Had to drink multiple red-bulls (which I generally hate, btw) to stay awake. More dancing and minimal drinking was had and other than a few hundred smelly men in one smallish room, it was good times. We left round quarter to 3 and given that it was a bank holiday Sunday combined with Halloween, the streets were absolutely mental. It was like Dublin's 3am version of Times Square at rush hour. Hundreds of people everywhere in every state of "fancy dress" and every state of drunken debaucherousness. Temple bar is gross at the best of times at 3am on a weekend but this time, superman and his sexy nurse were the ones puking on their shoes. The excess of a drunken Dublin weekend is truly something to behold. It's filthy (read: dodge the growing pool of piss on the sidewalk coming from drunko in the corner; dodge the pile of puke and unidentifiable chunks of someone's stomach.) It's rowdy: ("You lookin' at me?") And yet, it's festive somehow. It picks you up and carries you along with all the allure of a train wreck. You just have to have one more look at the stumbling girl with a skirt so short that you can see her belly button. You have to see if that guy really is going to blow his hand off with that sparkler. It's like one big, dirty, drunken carnival... Watch yer step, like.

For a change of scenery, I woke up "early" this morning after staying out till 4am and went to meet up with a couple of people to watch another friend run the Dublin Marathon... From complete debachery to complete self-denial in a few hours. The Dublin of 11am is a far cry from the Dublin of 3am. I watched serious athletes looking like death warmed over as they crossed the 26 mile mark... and then I went home and took a nap.

Well, back to the grind tomorrow. If any of you plan to be in the Dublin area next Friday and want free tickets to the circus (so I can run around getting photos of ya...) give a holler. ;) If only I could beam you all over... Till then, Be good, be happy, and don't run any marathons or puke in any gutters.

I know why you really read this...

Don't worry, I'd have to live her for 30 years before I would run out of new Irish slang for the blog. I'll take a break from discussing the meaning of life to bring you more of what you really want... Working in an office is an endless source of new slang... I practically have enough to write a book so here's a few of my new favorites:

Nosebag: Heard this one the other day while eating lunch with the co-workers and no, it doesn't have anything to do with white powder or American Psycho. One of the co's leaned over to the other and asked him, "Good nosebag?" In the great tradition of animal feed...I guess, she was asking him if his food was nice.

On the batter: There are so many ways to describe being on the piss in this place, it's truly amazing. Not sure where this one comes from unless it's a reference to the battering your head takes after a night of hard drinking.

A cuppa / A Rosie / Scald: In the words of Death Cab for Cutie, they're all, "different names for the same thing," that most important and ubiquitous drink, tea. Everyone in my office drinks at least three cups a day (and some as many as seven) so it's no surprise that there should be so many monikers for it. Several times a day I'm asked, "Anyone for a cuppa?" The less used cup of Rosie is one of those cockney rhyming things...A cup of Rosie Lee / Tea. I have absolutely no clue who she is and so far no one in the office does either...It's a mystery. A cup of scald is my favorite...so rough and ready and given how many times I burn the shite out of my mouth everyday, it's well apt.

Hummin: This one came up when we were trying to brainstorm a campaign for a bank at work and I found out that someone who's humming isn't necessarily singing in the rain. Said hummer is in fact just a smelly b*stard. Can be applied equally well to people or things... "That bathroom is hummin' since you've been in there." Quite a good one I think, especially for things that smell so bad, they're practically vibrating. I can think of a few people who fit the description but I suppose I won't name and shame you, ya smelly feckers.

Well, the list goes on but my lunch break doesn't so the rest will have to wait. Happy Tuesday, hope yer all enjoying yer nosebag and a cuppa.

The Grim Reaper at the Door

I don't mean to be morbid but I've been thinking a lot lately about mortality. I found out yesterday that my English Professor from Hampshire College recently died at the age of 40 from Leukemia leaving behind a wife and children and a life only half lived. Looking through the Hampshire memorial section, I found three women ex-hampshire grads who all died last September in freak traffic accidents within 5 days of eachother. All we're young, recent grads, 21 or 22 years old and apparently well loved (although not known by me). I'm currently waiting for news on another person, a family friend to find out the extent of the Cancer eating into him (and the Dr's seem to be stringing him along - but that's another story all together.) Heard an anecdote at work the other day about a woman from Donegal, 32 years old, who felt ill a few weeks ago and died of Leukemia within a few days, again leaving small children behind.

We try to fool ourselves. I suppose we have to in order to function. We have to tell ourselves it won't happen to us. But who's to say. I sometimes wake up in the morning and think, today could be the last day of my life and I just don't know it yet. I was reading the blog of a friend this morning who was talking about the nature of fear and how sleeping outside in the pitch dark with nature's sounds all around made her think about the rise of religion and superstition and all the rest of it. We need to think that we're not alone in the dark. We need to think that our teddybear nightlight is powered by more than just electricity and that our mother will protect us from anything that might be lurking under the bed.

It would be so much easier to believe in a god in the sky, to really believe in that old lady phrase, "It was just her time," to be able to look up and think that there is a master plan, a method to the madness but I can't help thinking, when I lie in bed at night that shit just happens, randomly and for no good reason. Children are left without parents, Parents are left without children, grave injustices are perpetuated all over the world by the hands of other humans or the hands of fate or just plain bad luck.

My question is this, How do you live with this knowledge? How do you go about the mundane details of your day knowing how fragile and precious your life really is? How do you let the people you love walk out the door, knowing the world is out there for better or worse? I've always been a sensitive, ruminating type person but I can't possibly be the only person who thinks about these things and millions of people get out of bed every morning without a god to hold their hand, myself included. For those of us who don't prescribe to a religion with a big pappa in the clouds, who live without that teddy bear nightlight, where do you find your meaning, comfort and solace? How do you make sense of the monsters under the bed who are so much worse than you ever thought they were as a child?

A Softer, Silkier Rain with half the fat and twice the fibre?

I should credit the following poem but to be honest, I'm not sure who wrote it. It came to me from my most fabulous mother who still manages to be the hippest 60something I know.

Hard Rain

After I heard It's a Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall
played softly by an accordion quartet
through the ceiling speakers at the Springdale Shopping Mall,
I understood there's nothing
we can't pluck the stinger from,

nothing we can't turn into a soft drink flavor or a t-shirt.
Even serenity can become something horrible
if you make a commercial about it
using smiling, white-haired people

quoting Thoreau to sell retirement homes
in the Everglades, where the swamp has been
drained and bulldozed into a nineteen-hole golf course
with electrified alligator barriers.

You can't keep beating yourself up, Billy
I heard the therapist say on television
to the teenage murderer,
About all those people you killed—
You just have to be the best person you can be,

one day at a time—

and everybody in the audience claps and weeps a little,
because the level of deep feeling has been touched,
and they want to believe that
the power of Forgiveness is greater
than the power of Consequence, or History.

Dear Abby:
My father is a businessman who travels.
Each time he returns from one of his trips,
his shoes and trousers
are covered with blood-
but he never forgets to bring me a nice present;
Should I say something?
Signed, America.

I used to think I was not part of this,
that I could mind my own business and get along,

but that was just another song
that had been taught to me since birth—

whose words I was humming under my breath,
as I was walking through the Springdale Mall.



Too bad I spent my day creating posters for a building society so that it can more effectively peddle its personal loans to entrepreneurs and suckers alike... "I'm only a pawn in their game..."

How Now Brown Cow

Okay so I did have a tan (a fairly dark one) and I did ask a question about Malaysia, but still...

I was at a wedding, less than 24 hours after landing in Ireland from Boston, I found myself in Belfast at said wedding schmoozing with people I sort of knew and plenty of people that I knew not at all. Tom's cousin had been showing off his Malaysian made suit earlier in the evening and pointing out how finely crafted it was. I saw another guy who had a similar looking suit (and a similar looking face - probably a brother or cousin of the Malaysian suit wearer) and I asked him if he also had his suits made in Malaysia...His wife (I think) looked at me in response and asked if I was Malaysian... Huh. I've been mistaken for many ethnicities...Spanish, Jewish, French but never in my whole life has anyone looked at me and thought, small Asian Island chain... To make matters even stranger, I was asked earlier in the evening by another wedding guest if I was from Belfast. An easy mistake, you might say, except this woman had heard me speaking more than a few sentences and unless she was asking me if I was from Belfast, ME, I really don't know how my Yank accent could have been missed...

So now I'm not sure if I'm exotic, ethnicity unknown in the eyes of the Irish or one of the locals...talk about Identity crisis. Tom's granny refers to me as the dark one (when she remembers me at all) but I think this is meant as a compliment or at least a simple descriptor to help her failing memory. How strange and somewhat wonderful to be exotic...except when I'm not... I think I better go research my family tree now... maybe I am actually Malaysian and just don't know it. I'd say cheerio in Malaysian except I don't speak it. So, uh, see ya all later.

a long holiday...

It just doesn't seem right to jump back into ex-pat blogging without some explanation of where I've been for the last five weeks and why I've been away for so long... Most of you already know that I flew back to Boston for September to get married (again - second time, same man.) Wedding planning is first and foremost, ALOT of work so my poor wee blog was deprived. Apologies to all who were waiting with baited breath for the next installment ;).

To make a very long story a little shorter, here are some of the highlights of the month and season o' the wedding:

The shower: A Barbecue where it didn't rain and we managed to eat dinner for 40 (even though there were less than twenty of us there.) Tom called on the telly and somehow managed to talk shit to Marina about her new voiture and didn't get his teeth handed to him (he was 5,000 miles away afterall.) Lorraine coined the term vagiterian...don't ask... and I found myself the new owner of red silk lingerie and a pepper grinder with multiple settings (among other lovelies...) I also ate my face off...did I mention that. Culinary deliciousness by mom and the ladies. You go.

The Hen: Margarita's and Mexican food. The introduction of long-distance friends and family into my local calling area...heaven. The Cantab lounge where it was the Chicken Slacks (Soul Revival) anniversary gig and involved amazing soul music, a wierd R&B belly dancer, a circus act, and more booze than you can shake a stick at.

The rehearsal dinner: Afternoon mani-pedi's with the ladies, my cuz, my bro's g.f. Between the hair, nails and skin, I've never been so groomed in my life. Grooming follow by Upscale Chinese food (Damn, I really did a lot of eating, no wonder my pants don't fit...) All the Irishies and all the Yanks in one place. Once again, more food than I even thought possible. Beautiful tall vases of flowers, a surprise champagne toast, c/o a most thoughtful and ever generous friend, cosmopolitans, and general good will going on between all present. This month was just a love fest. Seriously. The night was ended with more candle-lit drinks and a swap of family for friends... wine and good conversation and the first time my bro and his friends met up with some of my friends... A crazy mixing of worlds all round. V. Nice.

The wedding: A little breakfast with Tommy boy at our B&B and then more mad grooming, exfoliating, shaving, hair, make-up, and a mad dash from the cosmetics counter back home to don the dress, and all the rest of it...By the time the wedding day actually came, I was much calmer and the pre-wedding preparations were a (mostly) happy chaos which involved running around my crowded house in a bustier and knickers yelling, "just pretend I'm wearing a bathing suit." Thanks to extreme helpfullness on the part of my friend/photographer and M.O.H/Cousin, it all came together pretty damn well and we made it to the venue on-time and in Beamer style. I was well nervous about the ceremony but managed not to trip over myself on the way down the aisle and while I was more fancy-pants looking than ever before, I still felt like myself, no long trainy bullshit or veil over my face or drag-queen make-up. I had always imagined that I would be completely stressed out during my own wedding but I have to say, I had a fukking blast. It really was a stellar, stellar, day. Beautiful tall orchids in black pots, that dappled autumn light everywhere, people handing me delicious things to eat and drink and most importantly, the company of almost all of my favorite people in one place all looking relaxed and happy. I could go on and on and tell you about the Irish musicians, or the mojitos or the giant vase of lemons and sprays of yellow and green flowers but I'll save the details for my journal and not bore you all with them. Needless to say, it was a peak experience for me, and all the more so for being mostly unexepectedly wonderful. I was never one of those little girls who played bride or imagined my wedding day. I never really gave it much thought at all... but it is definitely something I'll look back at more fondly than I ever looked forward to it. It really rocked.

Post-Wedding: More eating (of course). A brunch the next day...something like a mini-wedding part two (or three?) with bagels and quiches and casual clothes. One last hurrah before people started catching flights back from whence they came. The day ended with a drive to the end of the Cape (Cod that is...) and a search in the dark for our holiday house. The week on the Cape was a very, "This is your life," moment where people came and went, Irish and Americans, family and friends, and we had leisurely dinners, and gorgeous bike-rides, swims in the crisp atlantic, sunbathing, picnics, walks through provincetown admiring art galleries and drag queens, raw oysters on the pier, barbecues, afternoon naps... I had forgotten how much I love New England, how much I love warm, sunny, weather and wild atlantic beaches and quirky New Englanders who are everything from whiskery, reticent, fishermen, to half-dressed flamboyant hippies, to sunburned tourists with melting icecream cones... I love it all. Really I do.

In the interest of not writing a novel and completely intimidating any potential readers, I leave it here, the hole in my blog writing sufficiently filled. I'm back in Dublin and attempting to get back into the routine of my life here... Alas, the party's officially over, time to jump back into life as a stranger in a strange land. I'll keep y'all posted.

-D.

The hardwork of being a girl

Fuuuuuuuuukkkkkkkkkk. I have been spray tanned, had my face prepped and primed and cleaned and coloured, had my hair coloured and sprayed and pinned and teased, had my boobs stuck into a madonna style bra that goes from my armpits to my waist in order to fit into a dress with a 27 inch waist. I've been moisturized and exfoliated and moisturized some more. The make-up artist at mac reccommended a 300 dollar facial to get rid of the "dead skin" and "fine lines and wrinkles" on my face (as if! 300 feckin dollars. They better fill my fine lines with gold leaf for that price.)

I guess there's a reason why celebrities look so good. It's a fulltime job and requires a bigtime pocketbook to look that sparkly. I feel like a mastercard ad: cut and highlight $200, wedding make-up done by goth guy wearing rainbow eyeshadow, $45. Nervous breakdown caused by wedding planning overload... priceless.

Why wasn't I born a boy? Shit, shower and shave sounds pretty fukin fabulous to me right now.

Why I hate Aer Lingus - Part II

I should have titled this entry, why I love the Shannon Airport - Part I but since I like to complain, I'll just gloss over the fact that the Shannon airport has free wifi which does actually rock when you find that your flights been delayed for an hour and you've already been waiting an hour for said connecting flight. Bast*rds. So, here I am in Shannon, been here since around 2pm and my flight was supposed to leave 15 minutes ago. Argh. So close and yet so far... I am actually dreaming of homemade pesto and tomatoes from my parents garden and yet... am surrounded by rambunctious American children, giant bags of tayto and cadbury vending machines, all conspiring to make me a) cranky and b) fat. I will do my best to love the wifi and stave off a desire to eat ten bags of crisps and someday, gawdwilling, I'll see you all in Boston. At least, I've managed to escape from the mid-western jesus-geeks student group I was traveling with from Dublin. The best shirt yet: GAP (in giant letters, not unlike the ubiquitous clothing brand of sweatshop fame). Underneath the words GAP, the phrase: God Answers Prayers. Well, jesus, if yer up there, can you get me to Boston sometime this century??? Onwards and upwards.

From A to Zed

Here's another batch of Irishisms for the foreign ear. I never get tired of this.

Naf - Usage: "That club sounds completely naf with its lads in track suits dancing to white boy hip-hop." Have to say I love this one... almost as good as manky, naf is used to describe something supremely cheesy, tacky or otherwise lame.

Gaff - Today is rhyming day. Don't ask me why I decided that naf has one f but gaff has two... but it's my blog so I get to do the spelling. The plaid carpeting in my gaff is completely naf so it is. I really do have green and orange plaid carpeting in my apartment and it is quite eye-catching - in a bad way. For those of you who've seen it, I apologize, for those of you who haven't, come visit. You can sleep in the spare bedroom with it's equally naf, nautical wallpaper.

In case you haven't copped on to the definition of gaff, mine is clearly a wonder of modern interior design. So much better than calling it an apartment or a flaaaaatttt.

Holliers - Just as I had embraced calling them, "holidays" and dispensed with the yankophile, "vacation," I find that I'm still out -o- the loop. Holliers, baby. The beautiful thing is that I'm actually on my "holliers" starting tomorrow when I fly off to warmer climates and an office-free lifestyle. I'm all for it.

Half-inch - More fun with rhyming. To "half-inch" is to pinch. As in, I'm going to half-inch Tom's suncream tomorrow when I fly off on my holliers to warmer climates and leave him to the cool Irish shores. In case you're incredibly thick, to "pinch" something is to steal / gank / obscond with items that are not rightfully yours.

Buck your ideas up - This one only really works if you have a strong Northy accent and an air of righteous indignation about you. It basically means, "Get it together... sort yourself out... catch yourself on." Example, if Tom thinks I'm doing the dishes after I cooked him the loveliest meal of the century he will be bucking said ideas up...

I didn't just lick that off a stamp - This one implies that the speaker can back up his facts, that it came from a reputable source. Heard spoken during a meeting by the most bad-ass, tattooed web developer while dropping f-bombs left and right and telling us wild stories of corporate conspiracies. This guy went on, no holds barred in a room full of suits throughout the wankiest marketing meeting ever. Fair play... or in American, you go. I'll take a geek over a marketing exec any day.

So there ya go. Pretty soon I'll be playing on the other side of the pond. Hopefully, you've learned your lessons well and when I half-inch the last piece of cake at our next dinner pahty, you can tell me to buck my ideas up.

cheers. see you all on the flipside.

It's a small world afterall...

Have had many six (or fewer) degrees of separation moments lately... the strangest being that I met one of my present co-workers over a year ago and we only recently figured this out. We were being being tortured by having to attend one of those ubiquitous "networking," events. From Ireland to California, these things are the same load of sh*te. Fingers foods and fake smiles and handshaking and self-promotion. Gross. I was being introduced to many by my companion (who it must be said was trying to be helpful) and I met my current co-worker in her previous job in another design agency. We were both pretty uncomfortable and immediately escaped to the snacks and wine table and set upon the mini-quiches and the glasses of wine and agreed that except for the mini-quiche, this shindig was indeed horrible. A few weeks into my current job, this networking debacle came up and a few minutes later, it all became clear. Stranger still, we never would have pieced this together had my current company not been doing work with my original companion who invited me to the networking whoredom. Confused? So am I. Dublin is a tangled web of people who all know someone's brother's sister's nephew and it's even more magnified in the little world that is design.

The other night, I was out for a few pints. I arrived with my current co-worker and met up with his girlfriend who I had met before since she is close mates with someone who dates someone who works at another company I used to do work for. Other people from this other company were also there as was a coworker of my coworker's girlfriend (ha. Try sorting that one out.) This person turned out to be the sister of someone I worked with at yet another design studio and I had met her once before at a design lecture. It's a small island afterall.

more euros please

Sitting here in the office (have actually been working in one all summer) and just heard on the radio that Dublin is the 8th most expensive city in the world to live in... that's IN THE WORLD... shit. As I was going off to the bathroom to slit my wrists, the radio announcer said that this fact doesn't particularly matter as Dubliners are paid relatively more than people living in other cities... I dunno if I'm convinced. I think I should get a raise.

The Cheek

It's Aluminum, FFS... or maybe just tin foil... but I'm all for real chips and real beer. God save my waistline.

Subject
BRITS REVOKE USA INDEPENDENCE


A Message from John Cleese

To the citizens of the United States of America:


In light of your failure to elect a competent President of the USA and thus to govern yourselves, we hereby give notice of the revocation of your independence, effective immediately.

Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II will resume monarchical duties over all states, commonwealths, and territories (excepting Kansas, which she does not fancy).

Your new prime minister, Tony Blair, will appoint a governor for America without the need for further elections. Congress and the Senate will be disbanded. A questionnaire may be circulated next year to determine whether any of you noticed.

To aid in the transition to a British Crown Dependency, the following rules are introduced with immediate effect:

1- You should look up "revocation" in the Oxford English Dictionary. Then look up "aluminium", and check the pronunciation guide. You will be amazed at just how wrongly you have been
pronouncing it.

2- The letter "U" will be reinstated in words such as "favour" and "neighbour". Likewise, you will learn to spell "doughnut" without skipping half the letters, and the suffix "ize" will be replaced by the suffix "ise".

3- Generally, you will be expected to raise your vocabulary to acceptable levels (look up vocabulary).

4- Using the same twenty-seven words interspersed with filler noises such as "like" and "you know" is an unacceptable and inefficient form of communication.

5- There is no such thing as US English. We will let Microsoft know on your behalf. The Microsoft spell-checker will be adjusted to take account of the reinstated letter "u" and the elimination of "-ize".

6- You will relearn your original national anthem, God Save the Queen.
July 4th will no longer be celebrated as a holiday.

7- You will learn to resolve personal issues without using guns, lawyers, or therapists. The fact that you need so many lawyers and therapists shows that you're not adult enough to be independent.

8- Guns should only be handled by adults. If you're not adult enough to sort things out without suing someone, or speaking to a therapist then you're not grown up enough to handle a gun.

9- Therefore, you will no longer be allowed to own or carry anything more dangerous than a vegetable peeler. A permit will be required if you wish to carry a vegetable peeler in public.

10- All American cars are hereby banned. They are crap and this is for your own good. When we show you German cars, you will understand what we mean.

11- All intersections will be replaced with roundabouts, and you will start driving on the left with immediate effect.

12- At the same time, you will go metric with immediate effect and without the benefit of conversion tables. Both roundabouts and metrication will help you understand the British sense of humour.

13- The former USA will adopt UK prices on petrol (which you have been calling gasoline) - roughly $6/US gallon. Get used to it.

14- You will learn to make real chips. Those things you call French fries are not real chips, and those things you insist on calling potato chips are properly called crisps. Real chips are thick cut, fried in animal fat, and dressed not with catsup but with vinegar.

15-- The cold tasteless stuff you insist on calling beer is not
actually beer at all. Henceforth, only proper British Bitter will be referred to as beer, and European brews of known and accepted provenance will be referred to as Lager. American brands will be referred to as Near-Frozen Gnat's Urine, so that all can be sold without risk of further confusion.

16- Hollywood will be required occasionally to cast English actors as good guys. Hollywood will also be required to cast English actors to play English characters. Watching Andie MacDowell attempt English dialogue in Four Weddings and a Funeral was an experience akin to having one's ears removed with a cheese grater.

17- You will cease playing American football. There is only one kind of proper football; you call it soccer. Those of you brave enough will, in time, be allowed to play rugby (which has some similarities to American football, but does not involve stopping for a rest every twenty seconds or wearing full Kevlar body armour like a bunch of
nancies).

18- Further, you will stop playing baseball. It is not reasonable to host an event called the World Series for a game which is not played outside of America. Since only 2.1% of you are aware that there is a world beyond your borders, your error is understandable.

19- You must tell us who killed JFK. It's been driving us mad.

An internal revenue agent (i.e.tax collector) from Her Majesty's Government will be with you shortly to ensure the acquisition of all monies due (backdated to 1776).

Thank you for your co-operation.

When Ireland is Hampton Beach, NH

You would think I would tire of talking about the weather but New Englanders and Irish folk are endlessly fascinated by weather and since I am of both worlds, I fekkin' love it. Anyway, maybe global warming is to blame but we've had a spate of warm, sunny weather again. On Tuesday temperatures were the hottest recorded in Ireland since 1887. All the gorgeous beaches finally got some use and the newspapers were full of pictures of splashing kids and hotties in bikinis. lovely.

Went to a wedding up north last weekend that took place in a seaside town and damn, it was almost like a proper hot, New England, summer weekend. The seaside town was, like seaside towns everywhere, a main street morphed over time from quiet, sleepy, village, overlooked by mountains and on top of the sea, choc-o-bloc, with kids eating soft serve icecream and begging their parents for change to play the penny arcade. There was the local hardware store selling inflatable dinosaur water-wings and family-run hotels and little greasy spoon diners for your fried breakfast. Despite how diverse the world really is, it's comforting to know that from Wolfsborough, NH to Newcastle, Northern Ireland, little kids get icecream all over their faces and play ski-ball and run around on the beach while their parents nurse their hangovers with a platefull o' grease...nothing like eggy goodness with toast and coffee to help recover from a late night. The more things change...

Well, paint me brown and call me spud

I have truly become accustomed to my surroundings so it would seem. I am no longer reomotely surprised or disappointed by the weather here (last summer was a shock I tell ya) and have learned to expect to wear "trousers" and carry a jumper all year round. But that's not all. I have flipped, joined the darkside and embraced the world of the fake tan.

The last time I used fake tan I was about twelve years old and had already turned my hair a horrifying shade of orange with sun-in. (Don't tell me you don't remember sun in. Every pre-teen girl was walking around with brassy orange hair that year pretending to be a California blond...) Apparently orange hair was not enough for me that year, I needed orange skin to match so I bought myself a bottle of fake tan and smeared copious amounts of it all over my pre-teen self. I, of course, didn't know to wash my hands after applying and my hands and feet turned an even brighter shade of pumpkin orange than the rest of my body which more closely resembled a bengal tiger with uneven stripes. Never again I told myself. At a time when I thought Bic perfume (pronounced Beec in a french accent and shaped like a Bic lighter) and strawberry lipgloss were the height of sophistication, even I knew that the fake tan was a disaster.

Either fake tan has come a long way or I've become a lot better at exfoliating and applying various creams and lotions... cuz I'm in love. I found this moisturizer with just a bit of fake tan in it and I'm using it to top up my real tan (and yes, I do have a real tan. It might not be hot here but the sun still shines from time to time. ;) ) I'm a brown goddess... Oh joy for small pleasures. Just like fiji it is, only colder and rainy and expensive.

Yank Spotting

I had the strangest experience... I am starting to be able to identify Americans on first sight and I have no idea why. I'm not talking about the obvious ones with pot bellys and two cameras around their necks loitering around the Guinness Brewery with shopping bags full of Guinness t-shirts. I was on the DART today (Dublin's commuter train) on my way home from Ringsend where I'm currently working when I spotted two Americans. The train was sitting at the main train station in Dublin while a million sweaty, rumpled commuters tried to get on and off the train at the same time. Amidst the crowd, I noticed a girl, probably around 8 years old and an older woman (presumably her mother) and right away I knew. They weren't particularly overwieght or overwrought with technology or decked out in Old Navy gear or reading a Dublin map so I honestly have no idea how I knew. The woman was pale and freckly with ginger hair and an Irish looking sunburn and the little girl was skinny and tan with light, sunbleached hair and brown eyes. There was nothing about them that obviously said that they were yanks and I was preparing myself to be wrong. Onto the train they tumbled with the disgruntled office workers of Dublin and sat right across from me. I waited for them to speak (sad the things you find to amuse yourself while commuting) and out came a little American girl accent and an American Mom (not a mum or a mam.) Spot on.

At this point, I get kind of a cozy feeling when I encounter Americans here - I mean your average, everyday Americans, the kind of people you'd see on the street everyday in any American city just going about their day. Sometimes someone will pass by me on the street and I get the same feeling I got today. I just know they're yanks. Maybe it's an earnestness in their faces or the casual way that they're usually dressed (more for comfort than couiture) or the way they seem to be taking in their surroundings. Was it the gangly kid legs with super white trainers on her feet, the sun kissed hair? Honestly I don't know. People are just starting to look American to me in the same way that you might say someone looks Italian or Jewish or Irish... Given the multi-ethnic nature of Americans, the identifying characteristics are vague but nonetheless there.

At sixes and sevens

It's been a while but believe it or not, I never get tired of disecting all the euro-slang I can get my hands on so here's another installment:

Butchers: Used in such colourful sentences as, "Giz a butchers at your tits love..." heard at 3am on the rowdy and drunken streets of Dublin. Translation, "Can I have a look at your breasts if you wouldn't mind." This is one more in a long line of cockney rhyming slang...somehow look became butch became butchers... I have no idea how but surely Tom does. I'll have to ask him and get back to yas. ;)

Class: This one is used nearly as much as brilliant and means essentially the same thing. "That new bike of yours is class."

Sorry: This one drives me crazy mostly because the first person I ever heard using it is someone whose presence is like nails on a chalkboard... Not a board game or an apology, this word is used by everyone, everywhere to mean simply, "What did you you say?" Example: "mumble, mumble, mumble." Response: "Sorr-y?" You have to lilt your voice up in a really annoying way at the end thereby making the mumbler think they just said something stupid or obscene. Hate it. Hate it. I'll stick to, "what," thank you very much.

Yoke: Gotta love those words that can be used in so many ways to mean so many things. Examples: "Give us a look at that yoke," or "Where is that yoke-joker?" Can be used in place of any person or thing. Kinda like hoobajoo or thingamabob but not quite as cool.

Knock you for six: This must be one of those granny phrases cuz you only ever hear it on TV or see it in print ads. "The taste of this new fizzy, crap-filled shite drink will knock you for six." "The savings will knock you for six." Again, the origins of this one are a mystery but the closest Yank phrase is probably something like, "knockin' your socks off" (but definitely not knockin' boots unless there's something I don't know about fizzy, crap-filled, shite drinks on TV.)

In Fairness: Filler, like the word essentially, basically, in actuality... It's used to distill or support a point, and used at least as much as we say basically. Example: "Yer man was absolutely bolloxed last night and boked on his own trainers on the way home." Response, "In fairness, you also boked on yer own trainers on the way home so give a man a break." In fairness, this phrase is not used quite as much as the dreaded, "Sorry?"

Sarnie: Sambo, sandwich... not to be confused with a Shambo which is a *trademarked* sandwich shaped like a shamrock. Magically delicious.

Jammy: Used most often with that other favorite of all favorite Euro slangisms: C-U-Next Tuesday. Means something to the effect of smug, cheesy, lame. As in, "Look at that Jammy cunt over there in his new jumper thinking he's the dogs bollocks."

At Sixes and Sevens: There's the number six again for no notable reason that I'm aware of. Being at sixes and sevens seems to describe me a bit too much lately. Translation: Being at a loss, at a loose end etc... I'd rather be knocked for six thanks very much.

Hey Thanks Everybody

Am feeling well loved on me birthday despite being several thousand miles away from most of my favorite people. Got a few lovely, thoughtful pressies in the mail, several international phone calls, a few emails and texts and an off-key rendition of Happy Birthday sung to me last night by a bunch of very drunk buddies in a very loud bar. There was even a shot of goldschlager involved (cinnamon snot in a glass...mmmm) Even Tommy boy managed to get his very hungover self out to the Dublin Mountains today for a bit of a hike and some Irish seafood. Good lad. So, thanks very much everybody. It is well appreciated and makes turning t(h)irty (*gasp*) almost bearable. Cheers.

playin' baseball by the airport

playin' baseball by the airport
Originally uploaded by di_juice.

Getting out asses kicked is more like it but it was still a decent game. I'm actually one of the tiny people in the picture. Look closely... hint: I'm playing second base. ;)

Everybody loves an Italian girl?

The World Cup has descended upon Ireland (and the rest of Europe) like a medieval plague...highly contagious and completely incurable. And I admit, I'm feeling a little feverish. It's pretty near impossible not to be at least somewhat interested when every newspaper, television and radio presenter has something to say. The bookies are filled with people considering their odds. It's the talk of every barbecue and presented on the big-screen in every self respecting pub in Dublin. So, okay, I give in. I watched the Poland vs. Ecuador game (rooting for Poland of course as every third person you meet in Dublin is Polish.) I even watched a bit of the England vs. somebody-or-other until I got bored and left Tom and co. at the pub to go shopping. But not until last night, did I actually watch a game that was truly riveting. For that you need to actually care a little bit about the outcome.

I spent yesterday afternoon playing a softball tournament in the blazing sun (no complaints there) except part of our team was missing and we got our asses absolutely kicked. I had a great day personally, stopped some hardcore line-drives that came in my direction but those innings get long when you're standing in the sun and the other team is going through it's batting rotation over and over again. Rough. Anyway, after we picked our sorry selves off the field, we decided to go watch the USA vs. Italy game in the city centre. Italy was predicted to run-over the US like an SUV over a baby-carriage but hey, what's a little more defeat after being the big-time tournament losers.

When we got to the bar, it was absolutely packed. Tom's Italian co-worker estimated that the place was made up of about 50% Italians, 20% Irish and 10% Yanks. Outnumbered once again. Tom asked me who I was going to root for but living abroad has made the answer only too obvious. To a european, I am only one thing, an American, pure and simple. To claim anything else as your own is simply comical and/or prepostorous. Who do you think you are? In the states, it is pretty much assumed that while you may be an American, you also carry with you another ethnicity or nationality. You're Italian-American, Irish-American, Russian-American, Jewish, African-American etc... Here, it doesn't matter if you can make a mediterreannean feast that would rival mama tuscany. It doesn't matter if you can step-dance or jig or play the bagpipes or pepper your speech with yiddish. If you sound like an American that's what you are. Unless you can speak the language of your ancestors, you're just freeloading. End of story. So. okay, I accept it. And I embrace that fact that yes, I am an American, first and foremost, shaped as much by my country of birth as by anything else, and god-damn it, I'm going to be proud of that fact.

Except there's a problem. When the Italians get rowdy, start talking with their hands and chanting at the top of their lungs over and over again, "Italia, Italia, Italia," it sounds sexy as hell. When the Americans (small in number though we may be) start chanting "U-S-A, U-S-A, U-S-A," we sound like frat boys or marines about to go kill a bunch of Iraqis. It may sound stupid but I really wanted to be able to be proud of my people, and not the people who left Italy 100 years ago but the people of my birthplace and yet... It's hard to have national pride when you hail from a country that is currently acting like a spoiled child on crack. Still I did my best.

And it was a good game to watch. They were an aggressive, feisty bunch of footballers (on both teams.) A few minutes into the game, an Italian player elbowed one of the Americans in the face and basically split his face open. The Italian was sent off (a red card) to the horror of the Italians and the American was cleaned up, washed up, patched up and sent back to play. Two Americans were later sent off for, "Bad Tackles," and the US got a game winning goal that was awarded and then taken away because one of the players was, "off-side" by about an inch. Not a dull moment I tell you.

Ultimately, the game ended in a 1-1 tie which seemed like a win for the Americans since everybody expected them to roll over and play dead. I suppose for us, that might be as good as it gets. If the Americans get eliminated, I'll start chanting Italia cuz it really does roll off the tongue, but until then I'm joining the frat. U-S-A in the house.