Current Landmark Project

The last few months most of my time at work has been consumed in trying to get documents together, in conjunction with another architecture firm, for the redevelopment of an entire pier in Dun Laoghaire, a city just outside Dublin. The competition was held several years ago and the winning design is Proposal D. The other architects, Heneghan Peng, have been great to work with, and it was also nice to hear another American accent that I could understand very clearly and we could have the rest of the room wondering what the heck we were talking about.



There is a derilict building on the pier right now which would be removed. Then two residential towers would be built on top of an aquarium, retail shops and a large carpark. The whole thing is glass so there are uninterrupted views of the Irish Sea and the harbour. Ben and I went out there on a windy, rainy day and grabbed a few shots, and even in the dreariest weather, it still is a good site. Here is a link to see some more of the competition drawings. I would love to see this project completed!

Strange Anomaly #13

Tree roots are paved over. When the sidewalk is concrete or concrete pavers, they take asphalt and pave all the way up to the trunk of the tree. My theory is it stops the roots from buckling the concrete and is easier to repave/maintain.

Happy Christmas

Father Christmas almost missed our house since we do not have a chimney but he made it. We had a very quiet Christmas. I got up at 6:30am to do a conference call with my parents so they could open their gifts that I had mailed to them and I could open the ones they sent to Ben and I. Each item was individually wrapped with its own bow and cards, fancy! We got some yummy food stuff that I have been itching to make such as waffle batter, muffin mixes, graham crackers, other crackers and Mexican sauces. My girlfriend Michal also sent us a care package that can help expand our dinners for sure! All of our Christmas cards are lovingly taped just above our oven so that way I can see some of our loved ones smiling faces while I make breakfast in the morning. Not a bad way to start out my day!


Muffin mixes that require a muffin tin, but with everything closed up it was hard to get a muffin tin. Now when I say everything, I mean everything. Just a few select pubs open on Christmas and St Stephens Day (the day after). At 7:00 Christmas Eve the whole city shuts down, pubs close, since they don't want people completely drunk when they show up for midnight mass.


Ben got a new phone for himself and I got a 4000 piece puzzle of Botticelli's Birth of Venus. Five days later I had the whole thing done. Ben has been creating a whole new interface for his computer phone that has a Xmen theme. We were supposed to head out west, but when it came time to hire the car, there were no cars to be had in the entire island. We could get a train, but the problem is when you head out to the country, if you have no car, you cannot get anywhere else but the station. We just will have to wait until another break to head out to Kerry. We have been watching tons of movies to pass the time. It has been sunny in the mornings, but by afternoon it is raining and windy. Not much of an incentive to leave the house if you ask me. We plan on a quiet New Years at the pub with Claire and then it is back to work on the 2nd. It was nice enjoying 11 days off work!

Photographer: Next Career Move?

The social committee at work puts on every year a in-house photo competition. There were 6 categories, and you could enter only one into each category. The pictures had to be taken by you in the last year. I submitted three: humour, architecture and nature. We rented out the top floor of the closest pub to our office and headed there after work for some dinner, entertainment and the competition. A fantastic spread of food was put out and we enjoyed the show of last years Christmas party, sports day, study trips, trip to London for the office's 15th anniversary and other work gatherings. Lots of pictures of the 4 o'clock girls (as Karen, Claire and I are now known as since we promptly go down for our tea break in the canteen everyday at, you guessed it, 4:00) doing a variety of things, bungee run, soccer tournament, London mischief and just fun in the sun at a lunch break.

Then the competition began. A co-worker's sister is a professional photographer and after she went through a few hundred pictures to select the winner out of the four finalist for each category. First up was abstract, which I did not enter since most of my photos are mainly of buildings. Then was Office Related, and although I am always there and were in some of the photos, I usually never am the one taking the photos. Then was movie clips, but I have not been tech savvy enough to learn how to do movies on purpose with Ben's camera, just on accident. The came Humour. My picture of Manekin Pis with his orange raincoat was not selected, but I was not disheartened, this was just the first of three. Then came Nature, which I had a Bend waterfall picture from right before I moved. I was not selected, but I was a top finalist! Last but not least was architecture. Now working in an architecture firm with about 130 or so other architects in four different offices with Europe at our fingertips, I knew this would be a challenge. First one up was a great black and white of a Gothic church. Next was a famous Japanese church that when photographed at the right time of day has the most amazing shadows. Then was some roman ruins with cats running about over them. Then finally was mine! The Guggenheim in Bilbao! Everyone was cheering, and they were all shouting out their favorite, up until now there had been all male winners, but not this time! I WON! I got a 100 euro gift certificate that can be used and a variety of different places. Very popular here, I can get a new outfit, get something for the kitchen, sky dive, horseback ride or go TANK DRIVING! I mean, how cool would driving a real military tank be, not a chance every person gets to have...... we will see. After the holidays I can figure out what to do with it. Look out photographers, here I come!

Jacquie has left the island.....

The Legend which is know as Jacquie has departed Ireland to make her way back home to Johannesburg, South Africa. She has lived all over Ireland and Africa, but is looking forward to heading back to her husband's home town of Jo'burg where his parents have been living in their house. Jacquie was a fast friend of mine, since we are both foreigners, and she had the energy and creativity to match my intenseness. As I have said before she showed me the ropes of not only our own neighborhood, but also the rest of Dublin. We both have about the same amount of experience so I took over her work when she left since we are on the same team. So in about one week, she had to impart all her architectural knowledge to me since we were no longer in denial that she was leaving.


The weekend before she left, we had one last girls night out. We headed to Tullia's who lives in the heart of Temple Bar to dine on some South African food, drink some wine and just have the craic. She brought her mac laptop which has the most wonderful program, Photobooth, that can manipulate photos, so she got a good and crazy picture with each of us. The gang was Catherine, Katherine, Tullia, Ruth, Claire, me, then Jacquie, Karen, Clementine and Edell in the hat. Here are just some of the samples from that night. It was great to all hang out together one last time, and it was a happy time with no tears.




Since Ben and I just got here and have nothing, and Jacquie and Phillip and wanting to leave with nothing, we did inherit some of their things, so with Africa now hanging on my wall, there will always be a piece of Jacquie here.

Hungary Like a Wolf

As I have said before the 80s are making a comeback. Duran Duran made their way through Dublin so of course I had to go see them. Tullia and Franchesca are my two little Italian beauties that are old enough to know who Duran Duran were back in their heyday. The three of us arrived and we made our way to the front. I realized that I was by far the tallest girl in the entire place and one of the youngest. I was even taller then most of the guys, Irish people are not that tall. I could see the stage clear since we were only about 12 feet back, but my counterparts were having a harder time being able to see. I had to save one of them from being crushed behind some drunk girl who was thrashing about a little too much. Duran Duran came out with a newer album and they played a few of their new songs, but they played all their old hits! They were the only act and played for just over an hour. Simon looked great for being nearly 50 and danced and shimmied the whole time. We came away delighted that although we were too young to go see them back in the day, we got to now!

The Short And Dirty: Christmas Is Coming!

There was Thanksgiving, and now there's Christmas. We are on a hiatus from traveling at the moment, but we are looking to do a bit of local traveling through a few of the counties of Ireland over the Christmas break (many service businesses close up shop between Christmas and New Years, and our offices are on board...yay!). I've been keeping myself entertained with a new Pocket PC phone that I got on the cheap from a guy at work, which I lovingly call iPseudophone. It's a hold over until I can get myself a proper iPhone, which probably won't be until I move back to the States. Mariah has been working on a 4000 piece puzzle which will likely take up the whole floor of our living room... Work is work - extra hours for both of us. We've been trying to frequent the gym with mixed success. We have managed to upgrade our internet connection, so communications are working much better at this point. Look for a reissue email of our contact data in the near future.

For Christmas it will just be the two of us. Pretty much all of our friends will be out of town, so we will be braving Dublin on our own. This will be different and good in a lot of ways, at least for an experience. We have blissfully managed to avoid most Christmas chaos given our remoteness, which is nice as well.

That's it really...

Look for a more interesting post at a later date...

Thank You Ireland!

The long awaited Thanksgiving blog...Sorry about that...

As it turns out, they don't celebrate Thanksgiving in Ireland. I know, I know...you are surprised... For the most part, though, nobody here really knows anything about Thanksgiving beyond what they see in movies, so a big part of our Thanksgiving this year has been about introducing the concept to our pool of international friends. Leading up to Thanksgiving Mariah arranged the importation of a variety of thanksgiving foodstuffs that we couldn't find around Dublin. Nobody here has ever heard of pumpkin pie, so that was the big one. (We did later manage to find a shop that is very internationally oriented and had a bit of canned pumpkin - it was only there the one time we went in and bought some, the next time it was all gone - along with some canned cranberries, so next year we may be able to collect everything we need if we start buying things up early.)

Since no one had ever heard of pumpkin pie, Mariah made it her mission to introduce this taste to everyone...well...everyone at her work anyway. She baked up two pumpkin pies which she toted into coworkers and watched a very mixed range of expressions as people experienced the flavors for the first time. For the most part it started with extreme skepticism or expected disgust and ended with enjoyment. Often the enjoyment took a lot of confused bites to get to. "Interesting" was the most common descriptor and a whole piece of pie was in some cases not enough for people to decide whether or not they actually liked it. No plates were left uncleaned, so someone definitely liked it in the end.

Our supplies of pumpkin were limited, so I got stuck with offering up apple pies to my coworkers (I wasn't baking, so these were bakery bought). American enough, I would say, but by no means uncharted territory for people's taste buds. Hopefully next year we can round up enough goods to give my office a taste of the pumpkin ecstasy.

The main event ended up being held on Saturday instead of Thursday. Since it's not an Irish holiday we still had to work on Thursday and we preferred to save our days off for adventures into Europe and we knew no one but us would really know the difference. We also had visitors coming over to join us for the holiday that couldn't make it on Thursday. My sister Holly has been studying for a term of exchange in London, so she came, along with her friend Ellen, over to the little island to enjoy some Turkey and see Dublin in one fell swoop. Good craic.

On the day of the big event we got started relatively early (for a Saturday), had some breakfast, and then headed into town a bit before noon. Thanksgiving was to be held at Bruno's place (of course), so we were to gather up groceries, including the turkey, and then head over there for an afternoon of food preparation. The dinner wasn't to begin until 7:00pm or so, but turkeys take a long time to cook and the prep, I am told, is half of the fun. We were also expecting about seventeen people total, so a lot of food was to be prepared.

We found one shop that would order us a turkey (it seems the Irish only eat turkey for Christmas dinner, so this was harder than it sounds) and we headed there first to pick that up. Here's where the trouble started. It seems the delivery guy forgot to throw the turkeys in his truck, so he was going to have to go all the way back to the meat packing plant to pick them up. The predicted time was round 2:00pm for arriving back at the shop. We were also getting the "crown" of the turkey (which is just the breast portion of the turkey) instead of a whole turkey. The crown wasn't what we were expecting and the delay was a little disconcerting, but...what do you do.

We headed on to the grocery store and picked up the rest of our supplies, a few of which were no where to be found, but we made due. We lugged everything back to Bruno's where Holly and Ellen started cutting up produce while Mariah started putting together side dishes and hors d'oeuvres. I, on the other hand, spent the whole afternoon walking back and forth from the apartment to the shops - walking to the turkey shop only to find out the truck was late, or walking to the grocer to grab this or that which had been forgotten. Multiple trips were made to the turkey shop before the finally said they would just call me when it was actually there. This call came around 3:30pm. When I got there they somehow managed to give me too much turkey and I ended up half way to Bruno's before realizing this and took the excess back.

I arrived back at the apartment with turkey in hand (a 5kg/12lb slab of pure breast meat with no bones or anything) just after 4:00pm with some serious doubts about the achievement of our timeline. The butcher had said this crown should cook faster than a full turkey with no bones or excess, but we only had three hours until dinner was meant to be served and I was still skeptical. The oven was hot, ready and waiting when I arrived, so the turkey went straight in, and we were left to simply wait for people to show up and hope our time would be enough. As it turns out, a meat thermometer is harder to find than crack (real crack, not craic...craic is easy to come by...) in Dublin, so we had to make cuts here and there in the end to discern the turkey's level of cookedness (this is a new word designed exclusively for this blog...share it among your friends...).

People started filtering in at 7:00pm. It was our usual mix of pan-world nationalities: Americans, Portuguese, South Africans, Belgians, Irish, Czech, Polish...you know...the works. Conversations trickled between new and old friends and Holly got to see a bit of what we get to enjoy while living here. The turkey was done (or at least done enough), though a bit late, and we had the full spread laid out by 8:00pm. We ended up having so much food that it took all of the table space to set it out, so people were forced to stand or sit with plate in hand and eat, which didn't seem to end up a problem for anyone. We would have preferred to gather everyone around a table and eat in a more traditional style, but when you're lacking for space you adapt. The food spread was amazing and all credit goes to Mariah for putting this together. We had everything: turkey, ham, mashed potatoes, gravy, macaroni and cheese (craft style), salad, corn bread, dinner rolls, zucchini with cheese, sweet potatoes with marshmallows, cranberry sauce (canned style, which I think only Mariah ate), stuffing, garlic bread. Did I say everything?...I meant EVERYTHING!. It was ridiculous. Everyone enjoyed everything. Despite the fact that nothing seems to be easy in Ireland and the build up to the meal was fraught with frustrations, it was a really spectacular end result and everyone really enjoyed themselves. Given the quantity of food I expect that all of our non-American friends got a good taste of what Thanksgiving is really about...food...lots and lots and mounds and piles of food! And to end it all off...pumpkin pie. Mariah saved half of her pumpkin pie supplies for Thanksgiving proper and so lots more folks who had never experienced pumpkin pie had the opportunity to have a go.

As the evening closed the truth came out: the European appetite couldn't handle it. "Eat until you pass out" was established at the beginning of the night as the Thanksgiving credo and not one person lost consciousness. How disappointing... Even with seventeen people we had leftovers galore. We left a good chunk of the leftovers for Bruno and his roommate Joao, quite a few of our guests were berated into taking a plate home, and I think we still took a whole half of the turkey back to our wee refrigerator. We ate turkey at least once a day for a week. I suppose that's how it's supposed to work out, but....jaaayyyysssus! (This expression is very Irish, by the way.) There was much talk early on of going dancing after the dinner and, when things were all said and done, not one foot stepped onto a dance floor. Everyone was too full. I guess I can consider this a consolation prize, given the lack of unconsciousness.

Kudos to all of you folks out there that orchestrate this type of thing every year. Hard work, that.

We ended off the weekend with Holly and Ellen hitting up a few of our favorite touristy hot spots: Kilmainham Gaol and the Guinness Brewery. Hopefully they had a good time, because I know we did. They got on a plane Sunday evening and we were forced to drag ourselves back to the reality that we had to be at work the next day.

What are we thankful for? Well, if the above doesn't say it enough, it is all about Ireland. Despite my personal frustrations with shops and availability, and being in a technological black hole, we wouldn't be able to do any of the great things were are doing or meet the people we are meeting if it weren't for Ireland and it's "open to architects" immigration policies.

So...THANK YOU IRELAND!

Little Slice of Heaven

The closest friend I have made to date is moving back to South Africa very soon, more to come on that bit. So before she goes, she is imparting all her wisdom to me. We took a little trip around Dublin to show me all the ins and outs. It now truly feels like home. I now know exactly where to go to get a tattoo, a piercing, Rainbow Bright satchel, leather pants, leopard print tops, false eyelashes, bowling shoes, striped tights and wigs galore. Retro Shops in Temple Bar near Sun Studios, Harlequin near Georges St. Arcade, Wild Child Vintage Clothes on Great Georges Street, Savage on Bloom Lane, Also Flip in Temple Bar beside central bank and the Eager Beaver, Eamonn Dorans and the Bad Ass Café on Crown Alley. Now, I may not need any of those things, and they may seem silly to some, but I feel better knowing that in a pinch I know where to get them. She also showed me some great retro shops of used clothes, some with strange clothes, and others for work clothes with an extra kick. Small creature comfort, but one I need to know to keep my sanity is such a straitlaced dressed place that has an very 80s look to it. All of my off the beaten path little shops are just hidden in plain sight, so if you do not know to go halfway up the alley, or turn into a small alcove hidden next to a large retail shop, you would never know they are there. From Chanel to 60's classics, I have it all. Fashion world, here I come!

Dry Skiing

In January my office is taking a group of 30 to go skiing in Scotland. Although I have lived my whole life within a 45 minute drive to several ski resorts, I have never learned to ski. I have snowboarded a few times, but that is about it. Since 28 out of the 30 people have never skied either, we decided to take a class. Now you may be asking yourself in a county that has no REAL mountains and no consistent snow falls where could you do that at? Just 30 minutes from Dublin in the little village of Kilternan there is a dry slope. It is sort of like diamond shaped hairbrushes that you ski on. Not soft at all if you were to fall, but I was determined not to fall. I picked it up rather quickly and seemed to be the best in the class. Multiple classes later I am cutting down the slope, turning and STOPPING! Stopping on my own accord is key. Now I don't mind falling in snow, but I am glad that as of yet, I have not fallen onto the hairbrush from hell. If there is no snow in Scotland, a group of us may go to Andorra for another weekend to try out our new skills. Now we will see how good I do in January. Update to follow......

Warning: Fitness Centre may cause extreme exhaustion......

We finally found a gym that we are able to join that has a rock climbing wall! YAY! They also have a pool, sauna, spin classes, yoga, aqua aerobics, free weights, workout equipment and the climbing wall. What more could you really need. It is across town though at Trinity College, but we hope to someday live close to it. Luckily Ben's office designed the place so we get a super discount, essentially a two for one deal. The hardest part (besides making ourselves go) is learning just how heavy 9 kg is. I know how much I could lift in pounds, now I just need to get better on my conversions. 20 pounds is definitely not 20 kilograms!

Girls Next Door

We were watching the telly late one night and the show the Girls Next Door (the reality show of Hugh Hefner and his girlfriends) came on. We stopped for a few minutes just to watch how crazy their lives are when all of a sudden we realized there are no blurry bits. That's right! After 10:00 when all the little kiddies have gone off to bed you can have any nudity or language. Now that was quite a treat. Anyone up for some late night shows when they come to visit?

Strange Anomaly #12

I am a woman, so I know all to well that women go to the bathroom together, but we don't actually go together at the same time. This was from a pub in Sligo that if you wanted to go, you had to go in with your friend. Puts a whole new spin on the buddy system.

Sligo Jaunt

A few of my team members have recently moved to our new Sligo office. Since many of us had never been to Sligo, we made a team trip of it. Half of our team was on holiday so it only ended up being me, Tulia, Ross, Fiona, Susan, Ruth, Edell, and Kate (who was my roomie in Valencia) who made it down. We took the train across to the west coast which took about three hours. It was drizzly, but what is to be expected of a coastal town. We checked into our hostel and headed straight out for pints. We first went to Shoot the Cock for a few scoops where we met up with the Sligo bunch. We then headed to the restaurant for a lavish dinner. You would never had expected a fancy restaurant just above an old rundown pub. I learned my lesson from the past few team outings and stuck with beer. We headed down to the pub after dinner and then off to the dance club. Sligo is a smaller town and so there was a great range of age at the club. I would say that I would have been on the younger side where in Dublin when I head out, I am by far one of the older. We had an early night of 4:00am after stopping by the local market to chug a few gallons of water before bed.


We had to be checked out of our hostel by 10:00 so up and out of bed early to hunt for a place to eat. We were to all try some surfing that day. When we arrived at the beach, it was cold, rainy, windy and the tide was going out so there was a nasty undertow. Only two braved the 5 minutes in the water in their full wetsuits. Maybe int he spring I will give it a try. We hung out on the beach watching our co-workers kids make sandcastles and then it was back on the train. A quick trip, but it was great seeing the ocean!

българин опит

My friend Eric has been working in Karlovo, Bulgaria for the past three years for the Peace Corps. We went to Benson high school together, both were in architecture there, had our first architecture job at Group Mackenzie and then both went on to University of Oregon for architecture. He met a wonderful girl there, Dimitrina, and they are newly married as of the week after we left. Congrats to them! She is a very talented artist so both have such a creative energy about them. So I don't know what I really expected of Bulgaria, I think bland communistic buildings, bland food and oppressed people. I was wrong on all accounts which was wonderful. The architecture varied so much, a little run down, but still had a warmth to it and diversity from the Ottoman influence. The food was an explosion of flavour (cheesy expression, but there is no better way to put it my taste-buds have not been stimulated since Portugal because of bland Irish food). And everyone we met was so friendly!

We started out in Sofia, the capitol. We stayed in a great little hostel that night after a nice meal and a good tour of the older areas of downtown. It was grey and foggy, but no rain, until the next morning. Dimitrina has a place in Sofia where she is taking English classes. We walked around the old town, and tried out the Bulgarian food. We just wandered the streets since it was a nice night out and then headed back to our hostel. The following morning we got on a super packed double-decker bus for a three hour journey to Plovdiv. The city was hilly with several old Roman ruins. It had to have been one of my favorite older ruinous cities. Run down with a lot of character and various cultural influences. It was a foggy day but there were some clear patches which was perfect since we climbed to the top of one of the many hills to oversee the whole city. There were cats everywhere. And when we stopped to take a picture of one, he called all his buddies and next thing we knew there were cats running towards us. As the day started to wind down, we met up with Dimitrina's mother who drove us to Eric's town!

Karlovo city centre is quite small, but there are many cute little shops. There have been some great programs for street improvements recently, but the actual repaving of all the old cobblestone streets with asphalt and selling off the old cobblestones is quite sad. Other cities in Europe will have old Bulgaria cobblestones lining their streets. We got to see some of Eric's many bus shelters that he designed and had created all over the city. This was one of his projects while he was in the Peace Corps. We went exploring a little bit on our own so Eric and D could have some time together so we hiked up behind the water turbine plant and checked out the local waterfall. The water was so clear and clean. The leaves were just staring to fall and all colours of autumn were abound. If I could bottle the smell of a crisp cold autumn day with a hint of a smoke from the neighbouring chimneys, I would be forever happy. Autumn is one of my favourite times of year! We luckily remembered Eric's directions back to our hotel and after winding around some streets and up some more hills, we arrived. The four of us had a wonderful dinner at our hotel, they had everything there, and it was all amazing. The next day we got up early and Eric showed us around the outskirts of town. We went back to Eric's place so he could bake a pie for his birthday. It is a European thing to bring cakes/sweets for your birthday to share with your friends. Although Ben had never met Eric before, they became fast friends due to their love of Macintoish's. They could geek out together on Apple stuff which Ben needed since I am unable to share in that area of expertise. While they talked computers I enjoyed watching the local kids play below us, one kid was afraid of cats so they kept putting a kitten in front of his face and he would start crying. It was entertaining, as I made up what they were saying since I do not speak Bulgarian. After the pie was done, we went to the best restaurant in all of Bulgaria and got to meet all of his friends. We had a great meal (once again) and great company. Dimitrina is the sweestest person and I am glad that I had a chance to get to know her over our dessert and strong rakiya. That stuff puts hair on your chest!

The last morning we got up before the crack of dawn to head back to Sofia on the bus with Dimitrina. We all left Eric in Karlovo. D showed us where to go and set us on the right path and taught us how to say "to the new airport please" (към определителен член нов самолет харесвам). We meandered through the town, had some lunch and then it was off to the airport and back to work...... Once again, another great trip, but not enough time off from work!

What a BEACH!

More! I want MORE! Two and a half short days on the beach was just not enough!

For those of you who hadn’t heard, a while back we had a long weekend in Portugal with my good friend Bruno. Bruno (see my earlier post for more information) is from Lisbon, which made him a great candidate for tour guide on the trip. Bruno also likes to organize events and adventures, so he went to town putting together a trip for himself, Mariah and I, and two of our South African friends Mark and Samantha. You don’t have to tell me twice…I wasn’t stopping him. Generally my favorite kinds of vacations are the ones where I don’t have to think about anything or do anything. This trip involved both.

We left at the crack of dark, cold morning on a Friday. The flight was easy. I don't really get stressed out flying, but I do get stressed traveling in general. Fortunately there were no surprises this time for gate changes, or delays, or reading the time wrong for the flight... We arrived in Lisbon around 10:00am to rent a car and head into the city center. We were all starving, so we headed straight for a famous pastry restaurant just off of the river. The restaurant was really interesting, seeming to meander endlessly into a beautiful old building. It was just room after room of small tables and little bars here and there. The wandering nature seemed to carry over to the waiters as well, but we eventually put in our order. The waiter brought us out each a croissant with ham and cheese (like a sandwich – very common in Portugal it seems) and a plate of custard pastries that look like little tiny pies, which the restaurant is famous for. We tore through our ham and cheese croissants, simple but lovely, and then moved on to the main event: CAKES! The little pies were just amazing. Think of the kind of custard they use in crème brûlée and then bake it into a flaky pastry crust. Now pull it steaming from the oven, dust it with powdered sugar and cinnamon, and you might have an idea of the oral pleasure we were experiencing. Yeah. We got another plate.

The restaurant sat just down the street from a huge Catholic monastery, so we went inside and took some pictures, primarily of the church, and then walked down by the river to look at a few monuments there. After that we drove down into the heart of Lisbon and just started walking. The city is really quite interesting and beautiful. Big public squares and meandering streets (though by no means as meandering as Dublin). The light there seems much warmer, though this could have just been a psychological side effect of actually seeing the sun… We had drinks on the rooftop terrace of a hotel bar, with a fabulous view and just relaxed in the sun; lunch outside in the middle of a pedestrian side street; it was amazing, and did I mention sun? At around dusk we went to another hotel bar to meet up with Bruno’s girlfriend Marta, who would be joining us on this adventure, and sat out on their rooftop terrace to have a few drinks and watch the sunset. It was an amazing view and a nice relaxing time. We couldn't stay long, unfortunately, because we were bound for a traditional Portuguese restaurant, which Bruno set up reservations for.

The restaurant sat on a hill high above the city where we could look out over the city with its many sparkling lights. They have a bridge there that mimics the Golden Gate bridge in San Francisco, so we got to have a little piece of home while we were there as well. Portuguese food generally involves good, tasty raw materials with minimal flavor enhancements. Lots of salt though... We got to try somethings we wouldn't normally choose, I would say. Portugal, being almost all coast, has a very large fish industry, so fish is very common. We had sardines (not the little tiny canned sardines - these were full sized fish about twelve inches long) and another fish I can't recall the name of (it was basically the same). They were full fish with skin and head and bones and everything, so eating them was an experience. I now can say that I have a serious problem with eating anything that can look back at me... It is just wrong. Maybe if I just ripped the head off and tossed it like you do with prawns... We also had some pork and beef, some salad, bread, potatoes, and some chorizo sausage. A few of Marta's friends were there as well. The conversation segregated a bit between English and Portuguese (as it often does when you have groups with different first languages), but it was a really fun night and we made the cross-over here and there.

Once we finished gorging ourselves we got in the cars (our rental and Marta's car - the six of us couldn't manage to squeeze into one) and began the two plus hour drive down to the south coast of Portugal, to an area called the Algarve (basically a county in Portugal), where we would be spending most of our trip.

Beach!

Fortunately Bruno and Marta were the drivers to start heading out of Lisbon. The first four lane street intersection (an intersection of two four lane streets) where there were no lights, no stop signs, no words on the pavement, no old bums waving there arms...just cars not so carefully yielding or not yielding depending on what seemed convenient at that time, was enough for me to understand that I didn't want to drive inside Lisbon. A little ways outside the city we stopped at a gas station and I got to take the wheel from there on through. We were on the open freeway at that point, so it was easy and I just had to follow Marta's tail...lights. We made it down to the beach apartment we were staying at without event. Well. Almost without event. Arriving into the town where we were staying we got stopped at a random police checkpoint (they have these in Dublin too) where I had to get out and do a Breathalyzer test. This was ironically funny and nerve wracking at the same time, and I was glad Bruno was there to translate. Of course I passed and Marta passed and we went on our way. It was pretty funny when the officer checked my driving license: I handed it to him and he looked at it for a few seconds, then shrugged as if to say, "I have no idea what this is, but it looks official," and gave it back to me.

We made it into the apartment, dumped our bags and fell asleep. It was about 2:00am when we finally got there.

The next morning we woke up relatively late to a beautiful sunny morning in a beautiful resort (Bruno's family owned the apartment, despite the resort environment - it seems it is common in Portugal for people to have a beach home...sign me up!) with a pool and a five minute walk to the beach. Bruno and Marta had already gone and picked up breakfast from a nearby market (croissants with cheese and ham - are you seeing a pattern? - some fruit, juice, and yogurt) so we ate a leisurely meal and then headed down to the beach.

BEACH!

Beach for the win! Really beautiful! We spent most of the day swapping between dozing in the sun and swimming in the ocean (the ocean wasn't too warm because it was late September, cold compared to sitting in the sun, but it was not bad once you got used to it). We walked up and down the beach and just enjoyed the relaxation. We capped off the leisure time by walking back and having a dip in the pool. For the evening Bruno took us for dinner at another great Portuguese restaurant located where the river meets the ocean. More great views and good times. After dinner Mark, Sam, Bruno and Marta headed to the resort bar for a few drinks and some pool. We were tired, so we just headed for bed and ended a nice, restful day with a long rest.

Sunday was a repetition of Saturday: Breakfast (yes, croissants with cheese and ham were involved, but this time I went with Bruno to get them), beach (sun, swim), pool, great dinner, entertainment, sleep. This time we joined them for some pool (the tables were a strange amalgam of snooker and US tables - not quite as large as a snooker table, but with the tight pockets with their evil rounded corners sized for the US style balls) which was a bit long and arduous, even for a moderately skilled player like myself. Those round corners are unforgiving when it comes to rail shots...

The first half of Monday was more of the same. We only got a few hours on the beach this time, but we took all that we could get. Late afternoon we packed up, piled back into the cars and headed for the big city. On the way back to Lisbon we got to stop in a really interesting outlet mall where we had about an hour to shop, but could have used half a day. There was everything there and for really good prices...at least for Dublin. After a little shirt buying and a Speedo (don't ask) we headed into the city for a final dinner. Another great restaurant in the heart of Lisbon city center. Bruno brought his little brother, who was quite the interesting kid, and Marta invited a pair of her friends to join us as well. After dinner we were just about exhausted, so headed to Marta's place to sleep a few hours before the plane flight home.

Our plane flew out early Tuesday morning and we were home by around 2:00pm. Bruno went straight to work. We weren't that committed and preferred to take the afternoon and evening to recenter ourselves and get ready to finish out the week.

Portugal: Highly recommended!

It was a really great time and we only have Bruno to thank for putting the whole thing together. Someday maybe he will open his own tour guide business for trips to Portugal, but until then you will just have to be satisfied to hear the stories.

Water Management

One of the most creative ways of dealing with the water since it rains so much, it to make little gutters in the sidewalk. It is brilliant! Or they turn the bricks with large spaces between them on the pedestrian type streets to funnel it into the gutter.

Strange Anomaly #11

There is no smoking in pubs, bars, restaurants, or anywhere in a public place for that matter! The rest of Europe did not think they could do it since they drink so much, but they did. The one draw back, is that late at night the sidewalks outside are packed with people, but I would rather dodge cars by walking in the street, then sit in a smoky pub!

Hens and Stags

Women bachelorette parties are called Hen Parties. And most dress up in a theme. We have seen some great ones; Ladybirds, 50’s Grease inspired “The Pink Ladies”, and Pirates (which so far is my favorite). See, I was fitting in before I even knew it with my own bachelorette! The bachelor parties are called Stag Parties and they just go out and get really drunk and skip the costumes. I personally like the dressed up version better!

Bruno: The Devil’s Angel

Bruno is the closest friend I have made in Ireland thus far and generally his craziness is what keeps me holding on to my own sanity at work (Bruno works on my team at HJL, though we work on different projects). Bruno is a very outgoing guy, very talkative, and loves to be social. Now, you might be asking yourself how my closest friend here could be a socialization lover, since I clearly am not, but I guess it falls into that “opposites attract” category. Bruno isn’t Lamda-Lamda-Lamda social, which is, I think, what makes it work. Bruno likes organizing parties and events, dinners, but he’s fairly selective about who he likes to spend his time with and he doesn’t just indulge in mindless prattle - he enjoys having real conversation, not just waxing romantic about the weather to fifteen different people over the din of a pub. This gives us a solid foundation of conversational morals to build a friendship on.

Bruno is Portuguese (and in Portuguese his name would be pronounced Broo-noo, though no one here seems to pick up on that), so he is charged with that fiery Latin spirit that tends to get people in trouble. He has been involved in his fair share of trouble which he generally refers to as his “stupid kid stuff”. This “kid stuff” didn’t end that long ago and he isn’t that much younger than me… He often enough has this mischievous gleam in his dark eyes that suggests he could be up for making trouble at any moment, but at this point he seems to have scaled it back to your odd veiled insult and a few overt pointing and laughing incidents. That or just blatantly saying controversial things to get people fired up, something I wouldn’t be a stranger to either.

That Latin vibe also has a tendency to feed into his inter-gender relationships as well. He would by no means not be the “dogiest” of men, as men and dogs go, but he’s told me more than one story that made my eyes bulge out of my skull a little. These days, however, he has a steady girlfriend that he has been quite happy with. She is a fantastic girl, but he still can’t seem to help himself when it comes to flirting with any person with a discernible set of mammaries. He, somehow, doesn’t seem to recognize this thing he does as flirting. As he would say he “is an angel”. And perhaps it’s not. Perhaps it is just a smiling-eye-batting-sweet-nothings womanizing gene grafted into his genetic code… Perhaps it’s flirting… I really don’t think he can help it though.

Beyond causing him to do things he shouldn’t, that fire tends to have the added benefit of getting me to do things I normally wouldn’t: namely leaving the house. Bruno has been referenced more than once in this epic tale in relation to hosting most of our United Nations style dinners and often enough he is responsible for getting us to come out for a dinner or movie or trip to the beach when I would be more inclined to stay at home, honing my in-progress piece of living art: The Simpsons’ Couch Testimonial.

Our shared sense of humor tends to be the strongest thing that draws us together and we spend most of our “tea” breaks (where we rarely drink tea) cracking jokes, bitching about work, or pining over our next occupational endeavor when we finally give up the ghost and realize that Architecture is only for soulless puppets and masochists (I currently fall into the masochist category, but the soulless puppets have a really good benefits package…). This is the part of the day that keeps me sane and/or just not miserable, so…YAY BRUNO!

At some point Bruno is going to move back to Portugal, or at least away from Ireland, and on that day the dark-gray blanket of sorrow that is the Dublin day is going to get a little darker and grayer.

Things that make you go hmmm?

Where there are deep holes, missing sidewalk skylight pieces, tilty concrete pavers, broken covers into basements or missing steel covers to utilities in the sidewalk, do they cover them up? No, you just have to watch where you are going. It is your fault if you are stupid enough to trip over them, so watch where you are going.

Everything is surrounded with wrought iron fencing with gates. Sometimes it is in mint condition and other times it is rusting and large pieces are missing. What I witnessed was the later one day, when a man was coming home, opened his gate and latched it behind him. He could have walked a few feet in either direction of his fence and walked around the gate, so why bother to open and close it when you have many “entrances” within the fence. Maybe so it does not bang in the wind?

They really think if you just stick your trash into the adjacent bush when you are done with something, it is OK to do so. Is there some sort of new photosynthesis that I did not learn about in school where plants take in the garbage and spit out carbon dioxide instead of oxygen? That would explain global warming then. Even when you do it in front of the Garda, there is a law about not littering, but like the other laws here, they are guidelines. Hmmmm…..

Getting Paid to Have Fun in the Sun

If I had been told a year ago that I would have an all expense paid trip to a European city, have the tour guides and buses taken care of, and be able to swim in the Mediterranean and get paid for it, I never would have believed it.

My office sends the whole office on study trips in groups of 15-30 to study the architecture of another city. This year is was Stockholm or Valencia. I went on the Valencia trip with 15 other people. I knew a few by name, but had never hung out with them before, so it was going to be a great way to get to know my co-workers. And what decided to show up that morning; the flu.

Saturday we landed late afternoon so we had some time to go explore before the group dinner. Kate and I headed for the city centre but after realizing we went the wrong direction we just stopped for pints, life you do. We thought we had several hours to drink, so we kept on drinking, but then realized that we had forgotten about the one hour time difference and showed up fashionably late for dinner. We had a wonderful 5-course meal with lots of wine. About this time, the flu had me coughing and sniffling, so they got me whisky. Since I cannot be the only party pooper on the first night, I headed to the clubs with the rest of them. I went back to beer since the bubbles felt good on my throat. After dancing on top of tables, watching the guys get hit on by other men, two guys going into the toilet stall together after I was done and witnessing an erotic dance with a blow up skeleton, whiskey became a good idea again. Oh I wish I had had thee foresight to stop at the wine with dinner, but I was having fun. About 4:00, the group was heading on to the next club on the beach, I opted for my bed. Thorsten (my 6’-8” co-worker that made us feel safe), Kate and I jumped into a cab and headed for the hotel. Little did we know this would be our earliest night in, so we set the alarm for 9:00 to make sure we had enough time for breakfast before the tour.

Who needed an alarm, I had had too much fun the night before. Kate made sure that I got some breakfast into me before we loaded up onto our little tour bus. Most of our group had only just coming in at 8:30, so I am glad that I choose to head home for sure. Our bus driver spoke no English, so I tried to translate since he was asking where our guide was, but between the flu and my hangover, I just managed to tell him I was sorry that I was sick and I cannot understand what he is saying. He just smiled and nodded, since I think I was a nice shade of green. We managed to find our tour guide after a few others pulled out their phrase books. We drove around the whole downtown area seeing most of Santiago Calatrava’s work, since he is from Valencia. We got out and walked around the city. It has been revitalized in the last 10 years since it went into decay after the river flooded terribly about 30 years ago. The city eventually rerouted the river so it goes along the outskirts of town, and turned the old riverbed into a beautiful pedestrian walkway that is uninterrupted for 30 km. It has been a work-in-progress for the last 30 years, and it is a sight to see. We tried to view some of the cathedrals, but mass was in session. We stopped for coffees, tapas and drinks at one of the many outdoor cafes. About this time I started feeling better, since my cold medicine kicked in. We headed back to the bus for our siesta before heading out for the night.

The Rugby World Cup Ireland versus Namibia was on, so we tracked down an Irish Pub, and settled for a few scoops. Of course we won since we had a brilliant season in the 6 Nations Finals. A group of the lads, along with Kate and I nibbled at some more tapas around the corner at the local Spanish chipper that was about as good as deepfried lard. To work off such a fattening meal, we decided to change directions and head toward the Pier where the American Cup yacht races are held. We settle for an open-air pub right on the water. Dancing a debauchery ensued. One of the women putting her off the shoulder crocheted shawl on one of the blokes. He decided to get the bright idea to unbutton a few buttons, but of course the women make him take it off. They then put jewelry on him, and then out came the cameras. I was his human meat shield protecting him from most of the camera flashes, but a few squeaked by. It was closing time, and since we were a crowd of drunken Irish, the police we called to have a presence to encourage us to move on. We walked along the beach for a bit until all our beers and wine bottles were drank we began the long walk back to the hotel. I was just glad that I was not wearing my tallest heals, just my medium sized ones. Many Irish songs were sung and as we headed for a nightcap in the blokes room. I instead went straight to bed since it was 5, in the full throws of the flu.

Kate crawled into bed around 7 and was up by 9 for breakfast. We declined to join the group heading to the museums, since we went straight for the beach. The perfect cure for her hangover and my flu is to float in the Mediterranean. Warm waters and sunny skies can make any day better. After several hours of relaxing, we made our way back to the hotel for a quick shower, lunch and some shopping. We wandered through the streets searching all the shops for a Valencia football jersey for Kate’s husband. Kate picked out a beautiful red dress that was a must have for our paella feast. It was great having a group size that could be accommodated all at one table, and that we were able to stick together for most of the time. We had a wonderful meal that took hours to eat with so many starters and lovely dessert. We went for a moonlit walk along the beach where there were naked people abound. We also nearly stumbled over a huge jellyfish. We went to a club right on the beach that had beds in the back harem style that 5 people could lounge on while sipping their drinks. One of the women pulled a stunt on one of the guys by rubbing “a soothing cream” on his sunburns which really was tinted moisturizer. (People did comment on how great of color he got while on holiday when back at work, HA!)

The next morning we stopped at the shop to pick up chocolates, wine for less than a Euro, Aqua de Valencia (that is a local drink), and champagne. We boarded our bus and toasted our great trip with our morning mimosas. The craic was 90’ and great memories were made! I am already looking forward to next year’s trip.

When You're On The Right, You're In The Wrong…Lane…

On the last day of August we had a visitor. Our very good friend Emily came to see what Dublin had to offer her (you may know her from her supporting role in our wedding) and boy did she find out! No…not really… But we did definitely enjoy the time with her. She came bearing great news! She had just accepted an offer for her dream job (congratulations again Em!) at the Oregon Ballet Theater in Portland, so she will be leaving New York for Oregon (something I have been telling her she needs to do for quite some time, but I guess my advising, begging, chiding, and sarcasm-laden-lovingly-irritating-tantrums aren’t as good as a dream job…) at the end of this month. Of course after all my attempts to get her to move, she does it when I’m not there… Hmm…I wonder if I should be reading more into this…

It was Friday morning when she arrived and after we had breakfast and she got settled, she spent the afternoon wandering between shops on Grafton Street. Mariah and I met her after work in City Center and we had dinner in Temple Bar, had some gelato, and just wandered around town a bit. She was tired from her trip and we had big plans for the following day, so we called it a night fairly early and headed home.

Saturday marked the beginning of a big adventure and a first for me in Ireland: DRIVING… Mariah and I got up early and went to pick up the car. All I had to do was drive it back to our apartment, where we conveniently have a parking space. Despite the fact that it was much too early to be thinking that hard, we made it from the rental shop to home without any problem.

That wasn’t so bad…

After everyone was ready we began the big part of the adventure. We were venturing into the Wicklow “Mountains” to see a place called Glendalough which essentially means “Glen of Two Lakes” in Irish. It is the site of an old monastery and graveyard with one lake just at the edge of the monastery and the other up the hill a bit. The lakes are nestled comfortably between two hills and above the upper lake there is a small but beautiful waterfall. Mariah and I had been to Glendalough the first time we came to Ireland, but we really enjoyed it, so we thought we would share it with Emily since it is only about forty minutes outside of Dublin.


Before we could see all of that wonderfulness, though, we had to get there. We had purchased some good maps for this occasion and plotted a course that took us on the motorway (freeway) for a short bit, and then off onto the back roads, through villages, on our way to see the Wizard of Glendalough. Motorways are fairly scarce in Ireland and you inevitably are going to end up on the winding roads with stonewalls or hedges pressed closely against the invisible line marking the edge of what would be your lane if it were actually described that way. This is good, for the most part, because the countryside of Ireland is decidedly one of my favorite parts and you can’t get much out of that if you are speeding along a freeway. And now for the scary part…

Actually…it wasn’t that bad…amazingly…

Of course you are driving on the wrong side of the road, so that’s different, and concentration is required for you to stay there. Turns tended to be the place where I felt I needed to pay the most attention, so that I didn’t accidentally turn into the wrong lane (which would be bad, as you might imagine). Fortunately this didn’t happen. I found that it wasn’t that hard to keep in mind which side of the road I should be on, primarily because I was on the opposite side of the car.

Take everything to the left of the radio and stick, pick it up, and drop it on the opposite side of the car, and that’s what sitting in a left side car is like. Everything is in the same place that it should be except…you…and the gearshift. That was really the hardest thing to work with: Shifting with my left hand. The gears are in the same order they would be in the US, so first ends up being farthest away from you, not to mention that my left hand is much less coordinated than my right and definitely lacking in the pre-programmed movements repetitively knocked into my brain from learning to drive in my old ’69 VW Bug. Shifting was really the only thing I struggled with. I was even able to carry on conversations and glance at the odd bit of scenery.

We made it, then, to Glendalough safe and sound. Despite having been there before, we never had done the whole walk up to the second lake and the waterfall, so this time we did – a good three or four hours worth I would say. The place there is just magnificent. It’s no wonder the monks chose it as a place of introspection and contemplation. I’m not the only one that thinks it’s a cool place, either, because you can see it and it’s surrounding areas in a number of movies. One that I recognized specifically was King Arthur (the new one with Clive Owen). When they are fleeing the Vikings and cross a big frozen lake, that’s the lake I am almost positive. The movie was definitely filmed in Ireland and in that area.

We spent a good part of the day there just walking the trails and then headed off to a little village that Mariah is fond of called Enniskerry where we had lunch. There is a big waterfall nearby Enniskerry, called the Powerscourt Waterfall, so we got to stop and show Emily that as well. We had seen it before, but the last time it was just pouring rain, so this time we got to see it without feeling we were under it.

We also tried to go up and see Johny Fox’s Pub, “The highest pub in Ireland”, but on our way up there ended up being a accident involving a tractor and a car which was completely blocking off the road. No one was injured, fortunately, but we had to skip the highest pub and headed home for a relaxing evening. We made it back without issue and I am now confident that I can drive on the wrong side of the road without too much difficulty. So…yay for that!

On Sunday we slept in. Well…I woke up, but everyone else slept in, so I just quietly waited until everyone else woke up. I’m nice like that. By the time we had finished getting ready and making a big breakfast and whatnot we only really had time for one attraction. We ended up deciding on Kilmainham Gail (pronounced and meaning jail). Yes, we had one opportunity to go see something that day and we went to a jail… It’s a really cool jail, as jails go… We had gotten a lot of recommendations to see this historical site, but had never gotten there, so having Em in town gave us a good reason to get out there and take a look.

The jail is where a lot of the revolutionaries from the uprisings against the British government were held and executed, and then was used after the Republic of Ireland was established to imprison and execute people during the Irish civil war. For any history buffs out there this was a great place to go because it gave a good deal of history in their museum about these events. And for those who aren’t that big into history, but still find it interesting, it presents the information in a fairly concise way… The building itself is also very interesting, as were the conditions for prisoners. You can see Kilmainham Gail in the movie Michael Collins (recommended), which is about the Irish uprising and the birth of the Republic – specific to the role of Michael Collins.

We then made another stop at the “oldest pub in Dublin”, The Brazen Head. We just had a drink there…and some craic… and then headed off for dinner and another easy evening. Emily never saw the real Dublin - the, drunken, stumbling, vomiting Dublin - but I think she was OK with that.

Monday we had to work, but Emily made a full day adventuring in the city and then we met her in town again where we had set up a dinner with friends graciously hosted by our friends Bruno and Joao. I try to do a dinner like this when friends are in town because my favorite part of Dublin is the people I have met here, so we try to share that with visitors as much as we can. Along with many of our regular multi-national friends and guests, Mariah was able to invite one of her work mates, so I got to meet someone new as well, since I have yet to see most of the folks she knows there… They are shy...

It was a great evening, though unfortunately completely lacking in photo-documentation, and I think Emily got to enjoy a bit of what we think Dublin is all about.

For her last day Emily had the morning in Dublin again, then had lunch with me and afterward I got her on a bus heading toward the airport and she made it back to New York only to begin packing for her big trip back to Oregon and the new job.

GOOD LUCK EM! WE LOVE YOU!

Middle Eastern Taco Bell

With no 24-hour drive-thrus at Taco Bell, I have found an ever better substitute. There are the walk-up Kabob places all over and open late. Maybe not 24-hours, but at least you can get something to eat at 4am on your way home. Zaytoons has become our favorite. Not exactly as cheap as Taco Bell, but the quality is much better!

African Modeling

I have befriended a lovely South African woman, Jacquie, who is just about as crazy as I am, and is even taller than I am! We are the “twins” at work since we both have short brown hair, are statuesque and tall. Quite a stretch for twin, but I will run with it.

She invited me to a free concert and I said yes. I had no idea where it was, what kind of music, or whether it was indoors or outdoors. She laughed when I did not hesitate in my answer, it was in that moment we both knew that this was a good start to a friendship. It was an all weekend event with multiple concerts on each night, with of course a reasonably priced beer garden. 5 Euro per pint which is only about a 25 cent mark up from the pubs. There were some great DJs and we danced and danced. On the last night of the venue, it was an African band. Her French friend, Clemantine who was also an architect, joined us and helped as a translator since the band was from the Congo and they were singing in French.

Since Jacquie works part time at a South African shop, she knew about the upcoming African Festival. Karen, Jacquie and I started the long bank holiday weekend with an Art Gallery Opening the first night. The Lord Mayor of Dublin kicked off the festival. During the speeches I noticed the commentator kept checking me out, but since I happened to be front and center, I did not think that much of it. We enjoyed some beers, African food, poetry readings as well as some wonderful artwork that if I had a few grand just lying around, I would have brought home a piece. We had just left when the commentator, Joshua, recognized us and stopped to chat. When he asked if we were going to the fashion show, which we all promptly replied no, since 65 Euro is quite spendy. He then asked if my name was Jo, which it is not, because I looked exactly like his ex-girlfriend. Hence the staring. He then whipped out 3 free fashion show tickets for us and made us promise to go.

And how could we pass up such a great free experience! The three of us again met up, but this tim with Karen’s friend Niamh it tow, who we scored yet another free ticket for. Helps to look like the long lost love….. There where 6 different designers to see, along with two musical acts. About a third of the way though watching some very innovative designs, Joshua got up and introduced the biggest designer of Uganda, Madoi Latif, and said that he needed two volunteers for the designer to make a dress for them, in just 4 minutes. Jacqui told me to stop making eye contact so I kept listening, but was somehow drawn to look at Joshua again who smiled a smile of desperation thinking that no one would volunteer, and next thing I knew, my hand shot up. Oops, well I am known to act without thinking! Joshua asked me to again if I was sure, and I said of course, I want a pretty dress! Good thing they had free drinks that were pretty stiff, that helped to get over any stage fright I could have had.

volunteers. We were whisked away to a back room. The designer sizedI got up on the stage, and then another hand shot up from the crowd and he had his two me up, and gave me first color selection which of course I choose black, so the other volunteer got white. We went back out and waited while he got started so we did not miss the musical acts. A few minutes later they were done. I had to quickly borrow Jacquie’s shoes since I had flip flops on (nice to finally have a friend that is about my same size!) and I seemed to have the perfect jewelry on for a floor length, scoop neck, back dress with a long train. The other dress was a little shorter than mine, and of course see through, which is why I was so happy I picked black. We then had to go out and do our thing on the catwalk. And I was ready! I even kept the straight face, did a few poses where I needed to and showed off the dress very well, until I turned to final turn and saw my friends when a smile just lit up my face from the excitement. I made my way up to the stage to be further photographed with the designer and then were escorted back to change. I had Niamh grab a few more pictures of me to let the other girl change in privacy. After I was done changing Latif let me select a hat for Ben and I got to keep my dress. What a keepsake to have after my successful modeling debut!