Day 2, and all is well.
Grandma got up a bit before me, but then I joined her and we started off the day with a lovely breakfast. Neither of us was brave enough to try the black and white pudding. Maybe tomorrow. There were TWO kinds of potatoes, which we were both pretty pleased about.
Then we set off for a morning on our own. It was our first experience with rain in Ireland, but it was mild enough to be hard to photograph.
Grandma wants everyone to know it isn’t that she’s clumsy – the ground is out to get her. It really is quite uneven – not uncommon to have concrete, cobblestone, metal grates, rocks and tree limbs all within about 3′ of each other. It’s challenging, because there is so much you want to be looking up at…but you really do just have to look down whenever you’re walking.
We explored St Stephen’s Green more in depth today. Everything is incredibly lush right now – the pictures don’t do it justice.
I’m very excited because the weird tall things in this picture are the SAME weird tall things that grow in front of our house in Minneapolis! They’re some sort of sunflower type thing. I’ve never seen them anywhere other than our house.
The park has some ponds as well, which we spent a little time enjoying. We spent less time enjoying the seagulls, but the pigeons were also quite lovely, but the lone swan seemed lonely. We figured out yesterday midday that though there are a ton of birds here, not everything we thought was a bird actually was. When the signal goes off on a street corner, telling you it is safe to walk, it sounds like a bird is cawing. Then, when it is green, it makes a sound like a woodpecker. So you think you’re hearing a woodpecker everywhere you go, even though you’re still sober. That was yesterday; today we are like locals and we just walk where we want, when we want.
We toured a bit more on our own, and learned some additional facts. For instance, if anyone ever strikes up a conversation about the Irish in war/battle/rebellion, and you want to sound like you know what you’re talking about, it’s a safe bet that they A. Lost and then B. Were executed. The Irish always lose, and then they die. This might be why all of the songs are so sad? Literally, in the midst of one of the songs on the radio today the singer warns us “this is going to be a sad verse” and all I could think to myself was holy shite, you mean those other ones weren’t supposed to be sad?!? (He went on to sing ‘When I woke up I was all alone/With a broken heart and a ticket home’ – which was, in his defense, quite sad.)
We also learned that 3million pints of Guinness are made each day, that Irish moonks(you might say monk) were the first to make whiskey, and that locals call the Natural Museum of History the Dead Animal Zoo.
Grandma tried to start a fight with a bunch of Germans on a bus, which I didn’t think was a great idea because it was like a group of 14 men from Germany that were all together and then just the two of us, but thankfully it de-escalated without anyone pulling out a weapon. I was desperately trying to remember how to say “I’m so sorry” in German, but that 4 years I took in high school was almost 20 years ago, and very little of it stuck. (I remembered later, after we had gotten off the bus: Es tut mir leid.)
After that, we met up with the tour group we’ll be spending the next week with. One man, Ron, wears too much cologne, but other than that initial feedback is positive. The bus is roomy, but our legs are too short, so our feet can’t reach the foot rests. 
We went with them to tour Trinity College and specifically the Book of Kells. I’m sure you already know, but the Book of Kells is this crazy illustrated book in Latin of the gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, John and Ringo. It was likely created around the year 800 (that’s not a typo) and is pretty cool but also sort of looks a bit satanic.
The bell tower at Trinity College 
The spirit either took Grandma, or it was just super hot and smelly in the little jam packed room where you get to see the book – but either way, she needed to get out, so we left the group and sat outside for a bit; we cooled off, and mostly talked about how European men don’t swing their arms as much as American men when they walk.
Back at the hotel we all went out to dinner and got to know a few of our fellow travelers better (including smelly Ron); more delicious potatoes hit the spot, AND some really good bailey’s cheesecake. Like, really good. I ate extra of both.
Tomorrow morning, we leave Dublin for Galway.
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