tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26233655786296425362024-03-12T18:39:11.532-07:00Tales from the Emerald Isle or Cows Are Our FriendsErin and A2ron in Ireland 2009Erinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10853407489851250406noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2623365578629642536.post-34409607272688750932009-12-20T20:05:00.000-07:002009-12-20T20:05:47.754-07:00Irish Fry In Ireland, they have sausage. Lovely sausage. Amazingly, I mean nothing crude about it. Clonakilty has the best Irish sausage around. I am in love with black pudding. White pudding kinda rocks too. The beans at breakfast I could do w/out...but whatever!<br />
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</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">So this is my first (very successful!) attempt at an Irish Fry while we were in the Coach House in Dunworley.<br />
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</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">The finished breakfast. Freakin' good. Meat good. um.<br />
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</div>and here's A2's meal halfway thru...beans for breakfast..yuck, sorry! Oh, this is at the hotel we stayed at for a night in Dublin. George Bernard Shaw lived there...whatever. Breakfast was a buffet that was our first Irish fry and definitely the least impressive. Mine was better. 'cause mine rocked.<br />
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</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">And at the Coach House, pregnant cows and new mothers and calves were staying next door...I learned that cows are not as scary as I thought and calves act like big dogs, galumphing around. And that Irish grass-fed beef is AMAZINGLY tasty!!<br />
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</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Ah. yummy Ireland.<br />
</div>Erinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10853407489851250406noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2623365578629642536.post-43554765241948912092009-12-20T19:41:00.000-07:002009-12-20T19:41:44.754-07:00So, I am, obviously, The Worst Blogger In The World. I had all sorts of good intentions of sharing the Ireland experience, but it's hard to find time and I didn't want to have a half-assed thing, which is why I started this...but apparently it happened anyway. Well, as TWBITW, I promise NOTHING now. Nada. Zip. Nichts. so there.Erinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10853407489851250406noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2623365578629642536.post-51829229737062178802009-08-18T21:14:00.039-07:002009-08-24T15:59:15.423-07:00The Rock (not Duane Johnson)On our way back from Dunworley to Dublin, we stopped in the ancient province of Munster. Unfortunately, I didn't know where we were at the time or I would have been on a cheese search! Instead, we went to the Rock of Cashel, a fortress and cathedral.<br />
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Brief History:</div><div align="center"></div><br />
<div align="left">The Rock began as a cathedral in the early 1100s. In the 13th Century, the cathedral that stands today was constructed over the original. In the 15th Century, it was altered and parapets (love that word) and a tower were added.</div><br />
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Lord Inchiquin (you really can't make up these names) "sacked" the cathedral in 1647 (yes, I'm looking at my brochure as I write), but the cathedral was still in use by the Church of Ireland until 1749.<br />
<img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5372262092504350690" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_0NRIrvpjH2Y/So4b6OAEv-I/AAAAAAAAAGY/24g3ZNgeKi0/s400/Ireland+2009+359.jpg" style="cursor: hand; display: block; height: 400px; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; width: 300px;" /> It became a National Monument in 1875 (no typo, that's <em>eighteen</em> 75) and some conservation work was done; in 1975 it was re-roofed and restored and the dormitory was excavated in the 1980s (why the date of the excavations isn't specific, I don't know! They were pretty specific about stuff that happened hundreds of years ago).</div><div><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_0NRIrvpjH2Y/So4bunNkQJI/AAAAAAAAAGQ/IxwEUKsmBfE/s1600-h/Ireland+2009+334.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5372261893113397394" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_0NRIrvpjH2Y/So4bunNkQJI/AAAAAAAAAGQ/IxwEUKsmBfE/s400/Ireland+2009+334.jpg" style="cursor: hand; float: left; height: 300px; margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px; width: 400px;" /></a><br />
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The architecture and remodeling were really incredible. </div><br />
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But what fascinated me were the faces. Not so noticeable at first, because of the grandeur of the building itself. But there, up high...(look close), where the support stone for the long gone upper floor is...</div><div><div><div><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_0NRIrvpjH2Y/So4a6uhzHJI/AAAAAAAAAFw/_uf8_qJNdQo/s1600-h/Ireland+2009+347.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5372261001724107922" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_0NRIrvpjH2Y/So4a6uhzHJI/AAAAAAAAAFw/_uf8_qJNdQo/s400/Ireland+2009+347.jpg" style="cursor: hand; display: block; height: 300px; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; width: 400px;" /></a> a sleeping person? A dead child?:</div><div><br />
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Carved stone faces on top of pillars...:</div><div><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_0NRIrvpjH2Y/So4aXD2Um7I/AAAAAAAAAFY/VuTrMvOzKRU/s1600-h/Ireland+2009+336.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5372260388972043186" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_0NRIrvpjH2Y/So4aXD2Um7I/AAAAAAAAAFY/VuTrMvOzKRU/s400/Ireland+2009+336.jpg" style="cursor: hand; float: left; height: 300px; margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px; width: 400px;" /></a><br />
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faces on top of walls...:</div><div></div><div><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_0NRIrvpjH2Y/So4aLct7jbI/AAAAAAAAAFQ/lT9u8AfBiBk/s1600-h/Ireland+2009+372.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5372260189489302962" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_0NRIrvpjH2Y/So4aLct7jbI/AAAAAAAAAFQ/lT9u8AfBiBk/s400/Ireland+2009+372.jpg" style="cursor: hand; float: left; height: 300px; margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px; width: 400px;" /></a><br />
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...and none of them the same. I don't mean that they were hand carved so that each looked slightly different. I mean NONE were the same. </div><div></div><div></div><div>There were women:</div></div><div><div><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_0NRIrvpjH2Y/So4Z67Co-qI/AAAAAAAAAFI/hp8TA2wYBJA/s1600-h/Ireland+2009+354.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5372259905571453602" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_0NRIrvpjH2Y/So4Z67Co-qI/AAAAAAAAAFI/hp8TA2wYBJA/s400/Ireland+2009+354.jpg" style="cursor: hand; display: block; height: 300px; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; width: 400px;" /></a> children:</div><div><div><div></div><br />
<div><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_0NRIrvpjH2Y/So4ZeMsWtxI/AAAAAAAAAE4/R0aDbGIdriM/s1600-h/Ireland+2009+369.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5372259412093613842" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_0NRIrvpjH2Y/So4ZeMsWtxI/AAAAAAAAAE4/R0aDbGIdriM/s400/Ireland+2009+369.jpg" style="cursor: hand; float: left; height: 300px; margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px; width: 400px;" /></a><br />
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(although this may be a wrestling chokehold)</div><div>and beasts:</div><div><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_0NRIrvpjH2Y/So4ZJZVJfSI/AAAAAAAAAEw/nuOtr98S-0Q/s1600-h/Ireland+2009+367.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5372259054708686114" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_0NRIrvpjH2Y/So4ZJZVJfSI/AAAAAAAAAEw/nuOtr98S-0Q/s400/Ireland+2009+367.jpg" style="cursor: hand; display: block; height: 300px; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; width: 400px;" /></a> Portions were broken or worn with time, lichen and moss crept across lips and eyebrows:</div><div></div><div><div></div><div></div><div><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_0NRIrvpjH2Y/So4Y84z4SDI/AAAAAAAAAEo/kNL_heLFPoY/s1600-h/Ireland+2009+341.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5372258839820781618" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_0NRIrvpjH2Y/So4Y84z4SDI/AAAAAAAAAEo/kNL_heLFPoY/s400/Ireland+2009+341.jpg" style="cursor: hand; float: right; height: 300px; margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 400px;" /></a><br />
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but still the individuality of each piece came through.<br />
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A2 said he read somewhere that they were the faces of people who didn't pay the stone masons' fees, kind of caricatures-I have my doubts about that. But many were strange, funny faces, not carved to be beautiful, but to convey some message or depict some particular persona that the carver had in mind. Were they religious in nature? I don't know...I don't think so, but then my mind doesn't go that way automatically, and we WERE in an old cathedral. So, maybe. In any case, I took a lot of pictures of the faces. </div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div>Erinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10853407489851250406noreply@blogger.com1