Roommates

This is Sam, the guy who lives in my room. He was tired from his trip to Galway so I seized the opportunity for a photo. Sam is from Boston, so naturally he's an insufferable supporter of Boston sports. He goes to Indiana, so he likes college basketball as I do. He has an internship with the Irish Sailing Authority or something like that on the coast. Its pretty plush but he has to get up early. I forgive him for liking Dave Matthews.











This is Danny. As you can see, Danny is in the fraternity Sigma Nu and he is fond of pastels. He has the good fortune to be named for both the main character of Karate Kid and the rebellious son in the Ninja Turtles. Danny has a Sean John coat with a furry hood, much like the one Cody has, that he is very attached to. He's from New Orleans - his family just moved back into their house. Danny is a compulsive eater of eggs, and he likes rap and pumping iron.




















This is Perry, who has just authorized the use of military force against Cuber. Perry is from New York, so he supports the Knicks. He has a ballin' Knicks hat that he often wears out. He also likes the Giants so the playoff run has been fun, because I can support a Manning. Along with Sam, Perry has a relationship with a variety of local casinos, which are unlicensed and quite interesting. Either through blackjack or the lottery, Perry and Sam are going to win us an Aston Martin or a dishwasher or both.


<--Chris. Chris is from New Jersey, but you can only tell when he's ordering pizza. Along with Perry and Danny, he goes to Washington University in St. Louis. Chris is fond of watching short internet films like "Bubb Rub and Lil' Sis" and "Charlie Bit Me" He got the single room in our apartment, so naturally we don't think very highly of him. Chris raucously flirts with our RA, Caroline, to the amusement of all. She's warming up to him.

Cockles and Mussels Alive, Alive-o

Tuesday was windy as hell. It was a kind of Irish Kenny the Pooh and the Blustery Day. There was a ~40 mph sustained wind, with gusts that must have been well over 50 and up. My walk to class was accomplished by leaning forward about 20 degrees to preserve my forward momentum. Sideward gusts allowed me to perform a highly difficult feat multiple times - spitting on a wall while walking parallel to it and spitting directly forward with no mind to aim.

Dangerously, I've discovered a kind of chocolate chocolate-chip muffic called "Magic Muffins" that is sold at discounted prices in Trinity's student union shop. These muffins taste very close to a similar confection called "Puddin' Cake" that I used to eat as a child. Whatever is in these muffins, I hope it's not bad for you.

It takes an average of 25 minutes to walk to Trinity from my apartment. Sometimes, I leave with plenty of time, sometimes I don't. The answer is to treat myself like a lawnmower, with a few fixed speeds. The gearshift in this case is the music I listen to. If I can afford to stroll, I'll play some Earth Wind and Fire. If I'm pressed for time, some late-era Judas Priest.

In other news, any surface in this city that has raised edges and does not drain properly grows moss. This includes buildings. Nicole's getting in this weekend, so there will probably be more pictures because we'll do touristy stuff.

General Update

I'll try to have something up about my roommates soon. I'm torn between attempting to arrange mugshots of them and taking unannounced photos of them, preferably either ones of them talking, resulting in oddly contorted mouths, or running in their rooms while they're asleep and taking pictures then. I'll save further information about them for later.

I've run across probably the best way of describing the difference in pricing between Dublin and home. Not only is the exchange rate from dollars to euros apocalyptically horrible, criminal even, but prices in Dublin are very expensive as a result of Ireland's rampant economic growth in the past decade. So - at home, Domino's has the "555 deal," or 3 pizzas for $5 dollars each...here, Domino's has the "888 deal," which of course is in euros, and when converted results in the $12$12$12 deal. Special thanks to sub-prime lending and sloppy-ass monetary policy for our increasingly flaccid currency.

I dropped our mop out of the 2nd story kitchen window today. I was trying to balance it so it would drip out the window, and did not take the windspeed into account, which was many knots. Humorously, it fell in front of the living room window of our downstairs neighbors, so all of them saw it. I just looked at them like it was their fault. In other news, I found a rough equivalent to Frosted Mini-Wheats. This is good, not only for taste and comfort purposes but because it has good fiber, which is essential in a diet featuring beer and fat in majority. Furthermore, Axe is called "Lynx" here, but its still a Unilever product and all the smells are the same. Finally, they not only carry my American toothbrush brand and model of choice, but they actually carry the "firm" variety here, and I can only find "medium" at home.

We went to a pub tonight that advertised that it was showing NFL games. There were a bunch of obnoxious Patriots fans inside. We decided to boisterously support the Chargers, except of course Sam, who is from Boston, and Chris, who decided for the sake of humor that he would scream and curse with bestial vigor whenever ill things befell the Patriots. Last night Sam and I went to another pub to watch an Irish rugby team compete in a European championship match. The pubs were jam-packed, and the atmosphere was great. Munster, who are an excellent team, advanced with a win. I believe it's now time to doze off slingboxing the NFC Championship.

School

We had a trial-by-fire introduction to the way business at Trinity is done right from the beginning when we had to register as students at the university and register for classes all on the first official day of lectures. They sent us back and forth across the city just getting our documents approved to be real students. In order to sign up for classes, you have to walk to each department, look at their bulletin board, find a class that looks cool, and then manually scribble down the timetable for it with a quill-pen and inkpot. Once you've done this for every department you're interested in (in my case, English, Irish, History, and Linguistics), you can start going to each department secretary and asking them what to do. They then refer you to the department visiting students coordinator, who usually gives you more papers to sign, tells you you can't take some courses, and then sends you back to the secretary. You have one master document that your courses must go on, and you leave it with that department over night so they can track down the department head so he or she can sign it. That means that for four departments you need at minimum four days for your forms. Also, they only do business between 10am and noon, and between 2pm and 4pm. If you come during lunch, they will tell you to piss off. After all that is signed, you have to take it to the international office and have them approve it. As you can see this is all a big circus of malarkey and nonsense. The guy in the Linguistics department in particular was an ass to me. I didn't have the heart to tell him that where I come from, a computer does his job.

I've been to at least a lecture for all the classes I'm taking so far. My linguistics class is an M.Phil (masters) class on semantics taught by a British Middle-Eastern guy who seems really cool. All the people are older, but I've played that game before. My Old English class is bigger, but the teachers are cool. Ian McKellen is in the class. He must have decided to go back to school. Some poor soul in my tutorial for Old English had to ask for an explanation about direct objects and subjects and predicates. I turned her over to the police after class was over. My Irish language and literature course is basically taught by a couple of bards who weave tapestries out of legend and myth for an hour and then let us go. It doesn't suck. Finally, I have a history class with a really interesting professor on the historiography of the English in medieval Ireland. He's blatantly vitriolic about the British which is great. Our first class was us reading an article by another historian and him going through it line by line, making jokes about the scholarship and ridiculing the author.

Trinity is great as ever, it's like going to school at Hogwarts. The dining hall is lined with 20 feet tall paintings of famous college deans and various nobles. At our orientation, we were served wine. The priests from the chaplaincy recited all these Irish proverbs to welcome us and told us when we could join them for Eucharist and a complimentary glass of sherry. We haven't been back to the school pub yet but its a cool place.

Apartment

Here's the front door to ole' No. 88. It's got the nice center doorknob and the Georgian window above. The downside is you have to unlock another door inside and the key looks like it was forged by a 17th century blacksmith.















The view from the carpark. The illuminated window is the living room. The one to the left of it is the kitchen.

















Our street sign.













My and Sam's bedroom from the door. Notice the newspapers I crammed in the window to attempt to keep it from banging in the wind. Also, the white line is not the top of the window - it goes all the way to the ceiling and is made out of
foot-thick submarine glass.








Alternate view of our room from the bathroom. My bed is the one on the left.

















Checking to make sure the mirror worked. All systems nominal.












Our bathroom - a beautifully restored replica of the shower facilities on a WWII-era Soviet submarine. The little white box converts peat moss into hot water. Dumb as it sounds, it's far more effective than the shower in the other bathroom, which gets its hot water from a small-scale replica of Sputnik in one of the hall closets that has about 50 dials and hoses. There's a nice little pullstring heater that warms up the bathroom at the cost of making it smell like a 10-year old hairdryer.










The view from our window. For sharpness I had to choose the picture with the ghost in it.












The galley. The orb light fixture was stolen from a nearby Waffle House...or Bangers n' Mash House. The model of the Millennium Falcon on the counter is actually our newly-purchased George Foreman grill. We have two mini-fridges. On the far left is the combination washer-dryer. It requires a college education, a blood sacrifice, and about 30 hours to complete a cycle. Perry started a load of shirts early Saturday and they were done Sunday evening.











The living room. The fireplace has fake bricks of peat moss. Unfortunately, the chimney is blocked up. I've strategized other ways to make fire, mostly for purposes of cooking barbecue, but all would probably result in my arrest.















One of the bad ass paintings in the living room. They're both on canvas and have actual brushmarks and stuff so we presume they're real paintings. So far the leading candidates for this girl's name are Shonde' and Towanda. Feel free to post suggestions.














The other great painting. I title it The Stench of Avarice.

Welcome to the Madness

Sorry to those I haven't communicated with yet. It's been a bit crazy around here getting settled because there's been a lot to take care of with school and living arrangements and so forth. There will be more to come soon.