No snakes in Eire, thanks to St. Pat

hmmm, st patrick's day in dublin. i wish i could say that it rained guinness and 4-leaf clovers and leprechans danced in the street - but no, it wasn't quite that exciting. in fact, the irish themselves don't seem to make such a big deal of the holiday, it's really all the tourists that make it so festive. i found myself wishing that someone had come to visit me, so that we could get dressed up in green and silly leprechan hats and beards. most of my irish friends wouldn't have been caught dead doing that. (it reminded me a little of the way most local Austinites talk negatively about SXSW - their precious city being overrun by tourists and wannabe rockstars. I on the otherhand thought SXSW was the funnest week of the year), and St. Patrick's Day was the kinda the same thing. Yes, there were lots of drunken tourists which might be a little annoying and somewhat clausterphobic, but at the same time everyone was smiling and seemed to be having a grand time. Anyway, I did intentionally wear a green jumper (that's irish lingo - it means sweatshirt/sweater, not dress).
Friday night, I had every intention of going out, but got a migrane at work about halfway thru the day, and ended up just going home to bed. Not exactly how I had planned to start off my 3-day weekend, but what can a girl do...?
Saturday, Eithne and I walked to the city center to see Crali Mor (traditional Irish music and dancing). On the way we managed to catch the tailend of the parade, which was cool. Lots of colorful costumes and floats, and I was surprised at how many American marching bands there were.

Eithne's sister Elaine, met us at the Crali Mor, we hung out there until it got to cold. and then headed back thru St. Stephens Green (the Guarda were stationed at the gates to check bags for alcohol!) with the intention of getting coffee and going to the National Library. We got the coffee on Grafton Street (a pedestrian shopping mall, that was packed with people) - and decided to skip the library and go wander around a giant expensive dept. store instead. We eventually made our way to the home furnishings dept. and found a big couch to sit on and chat for a while. We were reminded that we were in a dept. store, when a salesmans finally came over asked if we needed help - so we left and went to the off-license (liquor store) to stock up on wine and vodka for later that night.
We decided to eat dinner at a Thai/Vietnamese restaurant that I'd been wanting to try. It was really good once they got our orders right - didn't really taste like the Pad Thai that I'm used to - but still tasty. Our plan after dinner was to go home, have a couple drinks while we waited on the boys who'd been riding bikes all day, and then all head back out together. Just as Eithne and I were unlocking our bikes, I got a text message from a friend who was out in Temple Bar, having a few, so Elaine and I decided that we would just stay out and meet up with the lads later. So to make a long story short:

- we snuck in and drank two bottles of vodka (you have to pay for mixers here, so I've taken to just ordering a glass of tap water and mixing with that - stay hydrated - no headache the next day!)
- hung out with Dubliners dressed head to toe in Irish tweed
- got duped by some scenester English boys into thinking they were a famous rock band
- got a couple of St. Patricks Day kisses
- tried to go to an afterparty, but it was too cold and far, so i didn't make it any further than my house.
- forgot about my bike that was locked up in the city centre, and didn't go back for it til Monday afternoon! Thank god it was still there!!
On Sunday, we tried to go to the beach, to walk Lucky the Dog, but just as we parked the car, it started snowing - blizzard style. So we ran to the nearest pub, and I had a Guinness and fish and chips instead. Sunday night was spent on the couch watching movies - I'd had every intention of going out for karaoke, but when it came time to get on my bike in the cold, I couldnt' peel my butt of the couch. Oh well.
Monday was a bank holiday - no work! yah! (This 9-5 gov't agency stuff is getting old. I like making money - but I don't know if it's worth it. I still feel like I'm playing dress-up right now - and I know that it's only a temporary situation - but if I knew I'd still be doing this 5 years, 10 years, 20 years from now...oh no. The film/art/music industry may be difficult to be successful in, but I think that might be my only option.)
Anyway, that's going off on a tangent. Monday was freezing, but Pete, Eithne and I walked into, and around town. We went to a few stores, and a checked out a St. Patrick's Day carnival - they're the same in every country - overpriced rides, sleazy looking guys running everything, and lots of teenages being obnoxious. The difference here is that, half of the teenagers are probably drunk.
All in all, it was a good holiday. Now I've got to catch up to what I did this weekend - but seeing as it's 3 am, and I have to wake up in 5 hours to go to work, I'll save it for another day.
(the B&W photos are ones that Pete took with my Holga camera at the carnival - I had Sarah ship it over from the states - click on the image to enlarge it)