More of Dublin

We took a guided walking tour of the 1916 Easter Uprising sights. It was lead by a lecturer at Trinity College who had just released a book on the subject (but who lectures in Crusades). I found it very interesting and had I still been teaching the topic at school it would have been very relevant as well. There are plenty of the important locations still to be seen: Trinity College, where Aussie troops joined the Brits in shooting up the rebels; St Stephens Green where Brit artillery was set up after rebels were forced off it; The GPO which still has bullet or shrapnel marks in its columns; Abbey Rd, the rebel start point; and so on. We also saw some later points of interest, such as the Brit intelligence HQ where Michael Collins managed to arrange a night reading all the files, including his own. All in all, well worth the money.

We had a quick flick through the shops after that (I think - it's all a bit hazy after so many days) before jumping on a train as far as it would go around Dublin Bay. There were some decent views and we had a walk in Bray where the train finished up. It was still raining off and on so it was a short walk. We decided to have dinner there and found a nice restaurant. J made friends with the baby at the next table so we had a chat with those people before heading home.

The train passes by the old Lansdowne Road grounds which are currently being bulldozed. The game has moved to the new Croke Park stadium which replaced the old ground where (if memory serves me right) the Black and Tans machine-gunned the crowd during the Troubles. (Please excuse the quality of the pic, which was taken from a moving train.)

In Dublin's fair city

We took a hop on - hop off bus around some of the highlights of Dublin. It gives an overview of places to see at least. I saw my first 'celebrity' - David Rasche who played Sledge Hammer in a TV series back in the 80s. (And was in United 93 more recently.) Are you all overwhelmed with excitement?

We only hopped off at two historical places: Trinity College, originally an elite Protestant university but more recently just elite; and Kilmainham Gaol where various political prisoners from Irish history joined the general prisoners for a bit of reformation. Parnell and later all the leaders of the Easter Uprising were in here, and this is where all but de Valera were executed by firing squad. The gaol had been built as a model prison

where inmates would be reformed by isolation, observation, silence, and hard work. Sadly the prison was overcrowded from almost the beginning so all of these 'ideals' went by the wayside. Indeed, the Irish Famine had this and all other gaols so overcrowded prisoners slept in the halls as well as the cells, and there was no chance at all of keeping them silent.

All sorts of famous Irishmen went through Trinity, but I can't remember any of them. Probably James Joyce, Oscar Wilde and so on...

We awaited summer, much as I remember waiting for it 15 years ago...

To Ireland

We flew out on our 2p trip to Ireland on Monday afternoon. There were armed cops at the airports, bollards had been placed at the doors, and vehicles were not allowed in front of the buildings. Otherwise life was as normal. We had left slightly early (2 hours) due to a mix up over the 24 hour clock, and it was a good thing, as the bus went racing by us without even slowing down...

Sadly the clouds obscured most of the view on the way over. Our B&B was nice enough, and we wandered off for dinner. This was at a pub with nice ambience, but the dinner was average and J reacted to something - meat products in her vege meal most likely - so we headed home smartish.

A quiet weekend

I can't remember doing much on the weekend except finally getting a drive in the car. The weather was horrible, so not really conducive to any outside activities. I caught up a little on the stuff I had found in the archives, trying to map places.

Of course the big news was the attempted bombings in London and Glasgow. J and I were very nearly killed. If we had been in London precisely 1 week and 3 hours later we would have been around 600 metres from two bombs that didn't go off! It is good to see that Brown's Govt has kept a less hysterical approach than other attempts have brought. They are referring to 'criminals' rather than 'Islamic terrorists', and there is less of the panic that seemed to follow the 7/7 bombings. It's more like the response to IRA bombings of 2 decades ago. It's curious that attempts to murder multiple people seem at this point to have been organised by several doctors who would, up to that time, have been working trying to save people's lives...

Home again

On Thursday I had no work so started to catch up on what I had actually gathered while in London. Sometimes the process is all consuming so you need time to sit back and cogitate on what you've got, and what you've not. I was exhausted so had a bit of a sleep in too. It's a good thing that J can keep me in this fashion! 8-)

We went for a walk and ended up going to Ocean's Thirteen. Don't ever see this movie. It is BORING, with feck all storyline and less acting. I could have walked out and not missed anything, and I've never walked out of a movie before. Mea Culpa.

I ordered Nachos and a drink and you should have seen the size of the drink! It was served in a bucket. I really would have preferred less of it and a lower price and I guess it goes to show how valueless the drink really is. I managed to get cheese dip all over my trousers as well so the snacks were a bit of a disaster.

Friday brought a new school - Abbeyfield. It was in Chippenham, so quite a way out of town. A train and a bus away to be more precise. I asked the agent if he'd be sending me home for work. Anyway they promised a nice school, but 4/5 of the classes were the usual crap. I've really got to get out of this line of work. It's doing my head in.

J had the pleasure of the car, which I have only actually seen for 15 minutes or so since we bought it! Weird. This means that for a change she was home before me. After doing email and stuff we headed out for dinner and a drink which was pleasant enough, and it was still sunny although a little windy. You may have read that it has been very wet over here, with fatal floods further north. So much for summer, eh? Apparently Italy has been having a heatwave though, so fingers crossed that some of that is still around when we get there.

It appears C has done well in her first exam that she has results for so we are looking forwad to the rest. We are very proud of her, but she does work hard, so deserves it. We're making plans for her Christmas trip, or at least throwing ideas around. It'll be nice to see her (between shops).

Our ISP has decided to block the editing side of our blogs so we can't write them directly or edit previous ones (like "shooping"). These recent ones have been emailed in so may have looked a bit funny until I edited them.

Archives and stuff

So where was I? On Tuesday the IWM was closed so I went out to the PRO to look up some more war diaries. I photographed all of these for J so he has a hell of a lot to work through now. Sadly I didn't get to the stuff on the fall of Cassino in May '44, so will have to visit again.

Scene 1. A new arrival to the dorm had been at the pub, so at about 2.00 am he came in and tried to find his bed. He started to climb into his allocated one (you are given numbers) when the current occupant was awoken. "Who, what, what are you doing? Who are you?" "Sorry man, you're in my bed and there are no more free." "I've been here for a week." "I'll check with reception." So he goes down to find it's impossible for all the beds to be full, then comes back and more discussion until it is revealed that earlier occupant has dropped his gear on another bunk as well. Finally we all get some sleep. The sleepy response of the bloke woken by a stranger climbing in his bed was a classic.

Scene 2. Another new arrival at the door tries his key (which works) but doesn't turn the handle hard enough to open the door which is a bit stiff. Card, handle, card, handle, card, handle, card, handle, etc about twenty times. Then he goes down to reception to have the key reprogrammed then card, handle, card, handle, card, handle, etc. I could have got up to let him in, or just told him to push harder but it was much too much fun seeing how many times he repeated the same behaviour. Eventually he found someone who pushed the door harder and we all got some sleep.

On Wednesday I got back to the IWM photo archive. First they told me that they closed on Thursdays, then announced that they were also closing early that day. All this due to lack of staff. If the overruns from the Olympic Games, or even the funding for J's ridiculous bureaucratic b.......t for the schools were applied to the IWM what a wonderful resource it would be. However, I tried to make the most of it and did find some good stuff. I had a look around the museum itself afterward as my bus didn't leave until 7:30. I would have done more sightseeing if I wasn't dragging my verdammt bags around with me. I'd like to have seen my old workplace just down the road from Victoria Station. I guess it can wait.

Shopping in London

We headed into town again to see the shops. It was quite a different scene to the night before. None of the revealing attire of the women out pubbing and clubbing; no people dressed for the theatre; no hen's parties. I managed to spend 4 hours in two shops - a small one with a reasonable military section and then Foyles, which is large and has a great military section. J, meanwhile, managed to walk from one end of Oxford St to the other and back again. She had rather tired feet by then, and I had a sore back from the awkward reading position one has in a bookstore. (We're getting old you know...) We decided to check out the movies but there wasn't a great selection so we headed back to the hostel again. There we watched 4 episodes of Everyone Loves Raymond back to back. Ho hum.

Neither of us got a good sleep due to various aches and pains, and were up earlier than planned. Hence we have to kill time before the IWM opens. J has gone for a stroll in the sun, while I am here in an Internet Cafe. That sums us up pretty well doesn't it? 8-)

See y'all.