It's not the size of your steeple...

Haven't had internet for a bit, so here are a couple from a few days ago...

First, I’m an idiot. It was going to happen eventually. I’m not a very forgetful person on a regular basis, but when I do forget things, they’re usually pretty bad. I just that realized after I’d moved on from my last hostel, I left a couple things behind. One was my towel that I’d left hanging to dry. I yelled at myself for a little bit then figured I’d be fine for a couple days until I get to Dingle where they’ll probably have a store to buy a new one. Then I decided to put on my nicer shirt that I’d brought to upgrade to something a little fresher than the same long-sleeved pullover I’ve been wearing the past several days. Well, guess what. I left that too. It was a new trendy t-shirt that my parents bought me. I’m a little pissed about leaving that.

Moving on from that stupidity…I decided to get some junk food for dinner and maybe save a little money in the process. I went to a “New York” style pizza place. It was funny. Painted on the walls were stars and stripes with posters of Derek Jeter and New York license plates hanging everywhere. I got the “Liberty Pizza.” Let’s see if I can remember; it had pepperoni, ham, cheese, green and red peppers, mushrooms, maybe some bacon, pineapple, and sweet corn. Sweet sweet liberty. Saving money on dinner means me spending under 10 euro (about 14 dollars). I didn’t realize until after I ate there that it’s the 4th of July and that I’d found my way to the only American-themed place in the city. I just wandered around for a while and found myself walking into this place. The subconscious at work…or play, however you like to see it.

Right now, I’m in a great hostel I found in the middle of town, listening to this kid’s birthday party at a youth center next door. They have this dreadful cover band screeching loudly and atonally into the mic. Right now he’s trying (I emphasize “trying”) to sing American Idiot by Green Day…also fitting for the 4th of July? There are some old, smelly German or Austrian men in my room tonight. And a smelly Canadian. I showered while they were in the room just to try to give them an idea of what they should be doing. Didn’t work. Now the guy is trying to sing Smells Like Teen Spirit.

I had a fantastic pub experience last night. Remember that Aussie guy who was walking to all these pubs? Well, he recommended this one to me, so I figured I’d try it out. It was a really cute, well-decorated pub that didn’t quite have the sloppy traditional Irish style of random things everywhere. I hate to be sexist, but I think it’s because the owners of the pub are two sisters. The female touch is rare in Irish pubs. When I walked in, I got a few odd looks, but I sat down at the bar and ordered a Guinness. I started chatting a little to the two ladies behind the bar and realized quickly that every one of the ten or so people in the place knew each other well. 100% regulars. The two ladies turned out to be the sisters who own the pub. It’s been in their family for 110 years. So we had a good chat—they remembered the Aussie guy and his stuffed donkey he was carrying. I ordered another Guinness and hung around. They keep the young riffraff out of the place, so it’s good I look like an old man otherwise I may have never made it this far. Then this 60-year-old man who is friends with the sisters sits down next to me and joins the conversation. He’s a nice guy and recommends some places to me in the Dingle area where I’m going. He buys me two more Guinness while we’re talking. I tell him about my job and what I’m doing, etc. Then he gives me his cell phone number because he’s a fisherman and said he’d take me out for free around the coast where I’m ending my route. We’ll see if I get around to that. This other man comes up and shows us a picture he’s printed off the Internet. A few days ago, Irish police recovered the largest cocaine shipment in the country’s history. They found it off the shore when rescuing the couriers, whose boat has tipped over in the middle of the night, putting two in the hospital for hypothermia and one missing at sea. Anyway, the picture is of this young guy at a beach with a really long rolled up piece of paper—one end at his nose, the other near the ground. There’s a long line of white foamy surf down the stretch of the beach.