Checking in From the Emerald Isle

 Hello everyone!

Sorry I have been lax in updating you. I'm in Europe now, after a brief sojourn home to celebrate my Mom's birthday. There aren't too many pictures to show you - between my work schedule and the jet lag which is only just starting to lift, I haven't ventured much beyond my little neighborhood. I am right in the heart of Dublin, though, so it's not a bad neighborhood to stick to! 

Since there aren't any wild tales to tell right now, here's a smattering of things I've learned or noticed:

• This is a wildly international city. I can probably count on my fingers the number of actual Irish accents I have heard! Almost everyone here, myself included, seems to be from somewhere else. Maybe that's just my neighborhood (see "haven't been anywhere else," above), but it has certainly been a surprise. 
• Fireworks are a Halloween thing. I gather they are illegal in Ireland but legal in Northern Ireland, and with the open border you basically get fireworks going off all over Dublin for a solid month leading up to Halloween. On Halloween itself it was nonstop for hours. When I went out that evening, the whole city smelled of that unique smoke/ash that they generate. 
• Churches EVERYWHERE. 
• Frustrating but also supremely useful: they don't have American junk food here. Junk food aplenty, to be sure, but it's not American brands and even the ones that seem like they will be straight dupes actually taste quite different, and not usually in a way I enjoy. So my eating habits are being kept in check whether I want them to or not! My kingdom for a bag of plain unflavored potato chips. 
• Also on the subject of potato chips: they come in every flavor I've never even thought of - Balsamic vinegar. Curry. Shrimp. Cheddar and onion. And if it looks like a big US-style bag, it's not - it's actually a big bag filled with six mini bags. 

Double rainbow, as seen from my window

My time in Dublin is wrapping up here shortly, and from this point on I actually hop around quite a bit for the next couple of months - a week on the other side of Ireland in a tiny little town, staying over a pub, then a couple of weeks in London and a couple of weeks in Paris, then home for the holidays (again, a couple of weeks), and then I join my first Chapter with the WiFi Tribe! I'll talk more about them in another post, but in short it's a really neat digital nomad group full of people doing just what I'm doing - traveling while working remotely full-time - that sets up shop in various places around the world for a month or so at a time. I'll be spending January with them in Dahab, Egypt! 

Petite Nootka

My little roommate at Laura's apartment:

Meet Nootka, a 4-month mini Doberman

She licks everything. Voraciously.

Ginormous ears, one floppy, one not.

Under attack

Cuddly

Directionally Challenged

Those of you who have spent much time with me anywhere other than Edmonds probably have learned that I am directionally challenged. I blame my mother- on several occasions, our individual senses of misdirection have combined exponentially and led to some truly epic instances of being lost. On my own, I'm not quite as much of a hazard-in-the-making, but adventures still abound. I'm finding that, in Paris, my directional adventures generally work out to be about one hour in total from the point of getting lost to getting truly back on track.

I thought to document parts of one such adventure a few weeks ago:

It began as I attempted to make my transfer at the Montparnasse-Bienvenue Metro station. While normally a new train comes every 2-6 minutes (depending on the time of day), there was a huge back-up. The entire platform was filled with people, and the display said that the next train was over 20 minutes away. Clearly, some sort of blockage on the line or malfunctioning train somewhere. I first decided to instead go above ground and find the bus that would take me home.

Problem: right around Montparnasse is where my bus line splits in two for about 8-10 stops, depending on the direction you are going. And the whole area is very confusing anyway. Enter the first 15 minutes of being lost. I wander about, looking for my bus. I eventually conclude that I'm not going to find it any time soon, and I might as well just walk. It's only about 20 minutes from here....

I consult my map, determine my course, and resolutely march off.

In the wrong direction. I learn of this about 20 minutes later, when I somehow manage to end up crossing the same street I started from. Reconsult the map. I am still not entirely certain how I managed to loop around, but at least I figure out that I was heading the wrong way down the street. The obvious step here is to now head down the street in the reverse direction.

Somehow this doesn't work either. I stop to get a crepe to sustain myself.

Hair looking incredibly blowsy, but a nice warm crepe does wonders to warm up the hands in all that wind!

I choose yet another likely-looking path and set off. Fortunately, I have no scheduled plans for the evening!

A little fuzzy, sorry. All of the streets started to look the same after a while.... (but I'm still in love with French architecture) 

After over-shooting my turn-offs on several occasions and doing some backtracking, I start to have a little more confidence that I am going in the right direction. But I have absolutely no clue when I am to turn off. In a sudden burst of luck, I come across the random little eBay store that I know is kitty-corner to my favorite grocer, and thus finally know where I am.

My salvation!

All in all, my trip home that normally takes about 30 minutes in total took about an hour and 40. But I made it! In heels, thank you very much.

Home at last! The view from my window.