Rowan Tree and Red Thread

We drove down from Dublin last night. Leaving Dublin was a bit of a production. DD decided that she didn't want to travel at night and threw a strop at wash time. She was eventually persuaded that at no point would she be left in the car on her own in the dark and we got everyone loaded into the car.

The trip down was mostly uneventful apart from one crazy bastard who overtook us on the inside, struck our wing mirror, switched lanes into the oncoming lane and drove through the junction we'd slowed to stop at against a red light on the wrong side of the road. No damage done but damn he was close to a head-on collision.

Once on the road proper both kids fell fast asleep. This lovely state of affairs lasted all the way to the last roundabout coming into Cork when DD woke up. At the house both kids were awake unfortunately for the unpacking and I had another half an hour reading books to DD and holding her hand to get her back to sleep.

Which made BB's wakefulness at 4.30 this morning bloody unwelcome I'll tell you. He was awake and chatty for about an hour. After a birthday celebration the day before (admittedly quite a sedate affair) and driving from Dublin I did not need that.

*yawn*

Good holiday though, both in west Cork and in Dublin. Thanks to all the pals who showed up on Friday for my birthday party and to those who couldn't make it but sent along their birthday wishes.

Well we made it, car-laden almost to bursting, down to my wife's parents' place for Christmas. Last minute wrapping completed last night and the kids off to sleep, we wound down and got an early night ourselves.

Just as well as BB was awake again in the night. No sign of Santa so it must have been his tummy that woke him up.

Then it was Christmas morning. DD was up bright and early (before 7am) but relatively restrained for a 5 year old with a serious Christmas fixation.

And now the presents, the food and all the fun of the day. May your day be splendid and calorific, and spent with those you love.

*breathes out slowly*

The holidays start at last. Boy does that sound good. I don't know about you but this year seems to have gone on forever and I need a break.

Best wishes to you all for a restorative holiday with those you love and who love you.

A very happy Thanksgiving to all my American friends. Fun, family and FOOD!

I haven't posted in a while. Partly due to a brief visit to Dublin to touch base with family and friends and partly due to generally fuzzy-headedness on my part.

Dublin was good. We saw lots of friends, and threw an extended birthday party for sammywol, which went nicely. We combined an afternoon party with kids and brownies with a later party with wine and more brownies.

We also discovered the playground at Malahide Castle and boy was that a good find. It's a really well done playground with a good mix of apparatus for little 'uns and bigger kids. Rowan played with D, the eldest daughter of B, the friend who recommended the place to us, until she was exhausted. Oscar even managed to pod about the various pieces with great enjoyment despite his great envy of the big girls and their acts of derring-do.

My mother did the baby-sitting thing too, so sammywol and I got a quiet dinner for two in a nice Italian restaurant round the corner in Ranelagh, which was a lovely way to celebrate sammywol's birthday.

We got home on Wednesday after a night-time drive that left the kids sleeping most of the way. It's the only way to travel.

Back to work tomorrow. Sigh.

We'll be off home shortly, bundling the kids into their pyjamas and into the car in an experiment of auto-induced slumber. (Pardon the pun.)

Here's hoping we reach Cork and home with two entirely unconscious kids and not two wakeful and cranky ones.

A very happy Independence Day to all my US friends. I hope each of you is enjoying life, liberty and pursuing happiness in your own way. Have fun with the fireworks!

I'm off work this week, so we planned to visit sammywol's parents for a couple of days. I say planned because that all has changed. sammywol has come down with something suspiciously like the winter vomiting bug, and all bets are off.

Poor sammywol is stuck in bed, at best, and feeling very poorly. Be gone, foul microbes! Out vile viruses!

We're all home safe and sound after a weekend away down to Killarney, a Kerry town with the distinction of having the most guest beds of any town in Ireland after Dublin. It's very much the tourist destination, but not to be sneezed at for all that.

We were in Killarney primarily for the Lazytown Live! show, a live performance based on the TV show that Rowan really likes. We'd decided that if we were going to be in Killarney anyway we'd best make a family trip out of it, and had booked two nights in the Gleneagle Hotel for the four of us. The hotel was pleasant, if basic, and was a hit with the kids as there was both a pool and a ball-pit/play area.

I've described the dinner we had at Kobe previously. Our meal the second night was at a Chinese restaurant, The Good Friends, and while it didn't match up to the glorious meal of Friday night, it was pretty good and the staff pleasantly tolerant of kids, which was useful as Rowan was less impressed with the food and consequently a little less angelic.

On Saturday before the Lazytown show we went out to Muckross House, a Mock, sorry, Neo-Tudor mansion of 19th Century construction overlooking the lake, Lough Leane, which forms the centrepiece of many of the postcards from the area. I can see why. The view from the house is spectacular, and the play of light and cloud over the mountains must have provided the wealthy residents no end of delight as the seasons passed.

Later, I took Rowan to the show, which was actually pretty good. My sympathies were primarily with the villian's robotic sidekick, Robotacus, as the poor fellow had to perform the whole show, acrobatics and all, in a full body suit, face and all. He must have been uncomfortably hot under the stage lights even before starting the back flips.

On Sunday we had another big breakfast (hotels and breakfasts, nom-nom-nom) and then after a decent pause when for a swim before checking out. We went for a walk round the grounds of Killarney House and had lunch before leaving town. On the way home we stopped at the Coolwood Wildlife Park for a visit, where we got to goggle at lots of exotic birds, some primates and a pair of semi-aquatic deer. (Wikipedia thinks they were Chinese Water Deer, not Chevrotains, judging by the photos.)

Then back on the road and home to a very welcome cup of tea.

We're on the road again, making good time for Dublin, our destination for a few days family time over Christmas with my mother, brother and sister in law.

My wife organised our bug out this morning and managed admirably to squeeze four people and a mountain of stuff into our little car.

So I hope you all have a good holiday and best wishes to everyone for 2008. Maybe I'll get my aircar this year.

comes before a fall no doubt.

Today we went to the Botanic Gardens in Dublin, my first visit there in
decades. We met with friends, getting to met some of their kids for the
first time and renewing acquaintance with another.

The kids played together well, overcame a fraught moment well (Rowan was on
the receiving end of some thrown gravel, but I know full well she could have
as easily been the one throwing it, so I hope a lesson was learnt), and we
all enjoyed the beautiful gardens.

Dodging the rain, we cleverly wrapped up and got to the car before the
heavens opened and returned to Sally's for a family get-together.

This also went splendidly. Rowan charmed and chattered, and both her parents
basked in her reflected glory, while also soaking up the praise for her 'my
he's a big boy' brother who impressed in his own way with smiles and
friendly tolerance of being passes from cousin to aunt to cousin.

Rowan performed a puppet show with three hand puppets (a frog, a dog and a
wolf, who were surprsingly good friends despite their relative positions in
the web of life), which was well received to a heartfelt round of applause
from all present. The look of pleasure and delight on her face made my heart
sing with hers.

The food was lovely (thanks Sally!) and the company easy and pleasant. I was
rightly and ridiculously proud of my children. It's been a good day.

A happy 4th of July to all US friends out there in LJ-land. Watch out for fireworks and undercooked meat.

We spent the weekend down the country with the in-laws, ensconced in the
sleepy valley of the Argideen river. Sleepy that is apart from the angry
hornet sounds of rally cars racing along the valley, taking part in the West
Cork Annual Rally. Rowan turns out to be a bit of a petrol-head and insisted
on being brought down the lane to observe the passing rally cars as they
rounded the bend by the bridge. Perhaps she was keen on the chip van that
accompanied the general crowd of viewers.

Later in the day we went into Clonakilty to watch the parade. We were
misinformed about the starting time, but that only meant we had to go to an
ice cream parlour. We HAD to you, honest.

Rowan enjoyed the parade, which was typically small town; a collection of
local sports teams and clubs along with representatives of the Red Cross,
the police, the fire brigade, the Coast Guard and two lifeboat services.
Oscar slept through the whole business unfortunately as he was a lot more
wakeful last night.

So a more traditional Paddy's day than most I've had, but family fun for the
four of us.

I'm back from the New Year's celebrations and a brief break up in Dublin visiting my mother, brother and his wife. The Christmas period was spent with sammywol's folks in West Cork, the New Year with my relatives, and now I feel like I could do with another break just spent at home. Unfortunately I'm back to work tomorrow (I should have been back on Tuesday but I took annual leave so as to celebrate my birthday (the 2nd) in Dublin and to ease back into the Cork scene gently.

I feel that I should be treating myself gently because I've got a trip to hospital scheduled for Monday. Recently the very clever people in the Cork University Hospital (CUH) decided that I have primary hyperparathroidism, and it's this condition that has provoked the kidney stones I've suffered from in the last 3 years or so.

This means that I'm into the hospital on Sunday evening, overnight there and get a scan on the Monday morning. If all is ready to go, I'm in on Monday afternoon to have the offending gland excised (it's likely one of the four PT glands and I hope I won't miss it). This done, I'm assured that I won't have any repetition of the kidney stone business. Fingers crossed.

sammywol, Rowan and I are off for our Christmas holidays today, down to the in-laws for a few days R&R. Best wishes to everyone out in blogland for a peaceful and pleasant seasonal celebration of your preferred tradition.

We're on the road back to Cork after a few days in Dublin seeing family and friends. In all, I'd say we had a good trip. We met up with several friends, ate well and Rowan got to bounce for Ireland.

She also introduced herself to Neil Hannon (The Divine Comedy) as the little girl who really liked one of his early albums. He was suitably charmed to find out that Rowan sang along to "When the Lights Go Out All Over Europe" in the car. Hannon has a daughter of a similar age to Rowan, who is called Willow. There must have been a tree-meme going through expectant parents a few years back.

Nearly home now. We're entering Rathcormac, a small town near Cork that must warrant a couple of pixels in Google Maps, which is not far from the lovely Lee and the city of Cork.

And then to bed.

It's time for another of our irregular car trips up to Dublin to visit
family and friends. My mother, brother and sister-in-law all live in Dublin,
as do many of my oldest friends from my college days. E-mail, Skype and the
rest serve their purpose but sometimes you have hit the road and do the
rounds in person.

To my daughter's great delight and anticipation, our trip coincides with a
street party this weekend that will be held on the street where my mother
lives. At this party there will be a BOUNCY CASTLE. Rowan's joys were
unconfined. I only hope that it lives up to its promise.

So now we're on the road out of Cork heading for Fermoy, this first sizable
town on the Cork-Dublin road. Fermoy is famous (in my mind at least) for its
bottleneck and the endlessly delayed by-pass. I also recall the story of an
unfortunate lad from Fermoy who was the subject of a long and disgraceful
campaign of gay-bashing, so I'm afraid the town doesn't rate highly on my
list of the urban jewels of our republic.

After Fermoy there's Mitchelstown, famed for its cheese and, at last, its
brand-new by-pass. This will be our first encounter with this new wonder of
roads technology and I wait with bated breath to experience this marvel.

By-passes are a popular subject of conversation for the driving classes.
Cork and Dublin are separated by 261km according to my road map, but the
journey routinely takes 4 hours, in no small part due to the quality of the
roads and the number of towns that have to be passed through[1]. This means
that every working by-pass is welcomed by drivers, if hated by the merchants
of the newly by-passed towns, who can longer rely on a regular passing
trade.

We also like to talk[2] about house prices.



[1] The traffic doesn't help either, to be honest.

[2] I say talk. I mean complain.

It's a rainy Sunday in west Cork and we're all visiting the Clonakilty Model
Village. Like all model villages it's better in the abstract than in reality
but this one has the advantage of a play area for kids out of the rain.
Rowan has discovered for the first time the joys of an enormous pile of
brightly coloured balls in a pool and has spent the last 30 minutes diving
into the sea of balls repeatedly.

This makes the rain not so bad. (It also helps that the last few days have
been scorchers.)

I've been quiet on LJ of late, due to a surge in stuff to be done at work and a lingering cold that's left me with a sore throat. I love waking up feeling like I've been strangled.

On the up side, I've taken a few days off work in an attempt to use up some of my holidays before the end of the current holiday year at work (it runs from July 1st to July 1st) and I'm off Monday and Friday for the rest of the month of June. This week I also took Tuesday and Wednesday off to lend a hand to sammywol who has had another (and hopefully the last) of her vascular laser treatments for her b*st*rd of a verruca that leave her sore and hobbling for a couple of days.

( Some spoilers for X3: The Last Stand. )

Now it's Friday morning and we're gearing up to head away to sammywol's parents for a few days. Swimming, beach-trips and many dog-related amusements are sure to follow.

Thanks to all who remembered my birthday today. (Shared with braisedbywolves, pnh and Isaac Asimov. Happy birthday guys!) My birthday celebrations were low-key as usual, but pleasant and satisfying, also as usual. My mother, sainted and rail-mobile, made the train journey down to Cork yesterday to take us out to dinner last night and then made chocolate brownies with my daughter Rowan in the morning. By my best estimate, she's made brownies for every birthday of mine since about 1974. When I grow up I want to be a mother like her. Friends came round this afternoon and we consumed the brownies along with acres of other naughty food. January doesn't really start until tomorrow.

Christmas was fun and spread over a sinfully extended period, being as it was celebrated first with my mother in Dublin and then again with my wife's parents in West Cork. Rowan benefited from the time-honoured right of an only granddaughter to monopolise the attention and affection of all three grandparents and barely avoided being lost beneath a heaping pile of presents. I didn't do badly myself, and have yet more books to find homes for in our shrinking living space. I also received Imogen Heap and Kate Bush's new CDs and have been looking for excuses to go out driving to listen to them. I don't listen to much music at home while Rowan is awake; my attention is usually needed elsewhere. Never mind, both will be ripped onto my MP3 player for the walk to and from work.

Christmas holidays are usually a time for me to stick my nose in a book or two, and I was pleased to read three books in four days as the year closed. I thought I'd lost the ability, but this bodes well for retirement, only another 28 years away.

And guess what? I lost a couple of pounds over Christmas. I must go and be checked for a tapeworm. It's the only explanation.

I celebrate Christmas as a secular holiday but I do call it Christmas. I'm all for remembering Newton's birthday but it's not much cause for a party. If you're a Norman you might be celebrating William the Conqueror coronation at Westminster Abbey this day in 1066. You might be celebrating the rebirth of Sol Invictus if you're a Roman with a dodgy idea of when the solstice falls. You might be celebrating Babbage Eve to get ready for the anniversary of the great man tomorrow.

No matter. I hope you enjoyed the day and spent it in good company. Peace and the love of good friends for the New Year to you all.

We're off to Worldcon tomorrow, so this is my last post for about a week. I'm sure you'll all find something to entertain yourselves with in my absence.

Our big experiment in childrearing by proxy begins tomorrow too, with Rowan spending five nights with her grandparents. Rationally I'm sure she'll do well; she's very close to them both and has spent a night with them before without a hitch. The worried parent in the back of my head is gibbering slightly nonetheless. I'll run up a phone bill and a half while we're away no doubt, checking in.

Other financial burdens are in sight too, in the form of the dealers' room at Worldcon. I believe we've left extra space in our luggage to allow for the major book 'accident' we're planning on having. Anyone in Cork with extra storage space to share should get in touch.

Bye!