valeriesbookofme

Last week's activities centered around obtaining our smaller car. We went to Carlow on Tuesday with every expectation of picking up a 2009 white Fiat. Arrived there and were sitting in our usual pub/breakfast place when David-the-car-guy arrived. Usual pleasantries exchanged I said, "Well, are we ready?" Actually, no. Turns out David had looked at the car the afternoon before and he knew it just wouldn't pass the Ackroyd test. Too many dents in it. Ummm, so why did we drive all this way, couldn't you have called us? "Well, you know, when these cars come up, I (David) need to have the money right there to put on it so it was good that you brought it because I know of a great Fiat 500 that will be coming to auction tomorrow or the next day and I will have to snap it up." Umm, okay, gulping slightly and handing over the wad of cash in an envelope as if we were doing some kind of clandestine deal. Off he went. Luckily, though, the trip wasn't a complet

Rereading my last entry on February 2nd, I feel "right, you've gone through another week of this and now try to sound as upbeat." Well, as I sit here in the lounge/living room with a sweater and wooly scarf, my feet in warm socks crammed into slippers and still cold, I have to admit, Ireland in February is tough for even the most optimistic former Arizonan. There is no insulation in the cottage and the radiators throw out only the barest of warmth. The "solid fuel stove" doesn't "warm the whole house" as our letting agent had said. And as I scurry out with my coal scuttle to the bin in the back (the stove eats coal like some Lord of the Rings type monster) I think of Daisy the maid in Downton Abbey. We visited some friends in Tramore the other night and their fireplace sent out lovely streams of warmth right across the room. Ours doesn't but then ours is a glass-enclosed stove and theirs is a fireplace. And they may have some insulation; seve

As was predicted, we've had a lot of "weather" this week. There was just one sunny day--Tuesday. But the rest of the the time it has been very windy and rainy. Sometimes the rain has been soft and I haven't minded walking Mitzi in it at all. But at night it drums on the skylight in my bathroom and I can see the waves crashing over the breakwater in the harbor from my bedroom window. Wild but I love it. The figure in the photo--a woman in a bathrobe--had actually just come out of the water. She and three others took quick (very quick!) dips in the sea. If you look at the roof of the middle house, you will see where the wind on Sunday night blew off the thatch. My friend Dominic said that I wouldn't see a wind like that, the sou-easter, for awhile but he was wrong. Thursday night's wind was just as strong. I haven't looked to see if any more thatch is off the house. Richard, Mitzi and I walked down to O'Shea's fish and chip shop