So Matt and Hector just left a couple days ago and life goes on as usual here in Dublin. We had a great time....went to an insane amount of places for such a short trip. It was cool b/c I got to stay in Dublin a lot more than I usually would so it was almost like a vacation to the city I live in. I stayed in the most ghetto hostel (see picture of sign). It was up on the north side and I slept in a dorm with 15 other ppl...also I only showered once b/c it was FREEZING. I found it all very amusing b/c it was just so seedy, but I was pretty glad to go back to my house for a hot shower finally. And anyway, it was a place to crash after the late night pub crawling and Supermac's.

We hit up a lot of pubs, some famous ones in Temple Bar and also Mulligan's which apparently serves the best Guinness in Dublin...honestly, it tasted the same to me. We also went on a tour of the Guinness factory, which is surprisingly artsy and weird. At the end you get a complimentary pint up on top of the building at the Gravity Bar which has a great view of the city. But in case you think we just drank for five days, don't worry. The boys got to see pretty much ALL the sites in Dublin (with or without me), which frankly are not that many or far apart so it was a pretty easy task. We trekked around Phoenix Park (painfully) and St. Stephens Green, Grafton St., Temple Bar, Trinity College, my little town of Sandycove (HAVE YOU?!?!), and even a day trip outside Dublin to the sleepy little town of Avoca and St. Kevin's old monk colony, Glendalough...which was really beautiful even though we slept thru half the bus tour.

I don't know what else to put in here, you really had to be there for most of it. But suffice to say we saw a lot of things and it got me off my ass to go around Dublin more, though it was exhausting. I will put the pictures up soon.

PS...the Red Sox nation extends farther than you think. We wandered around in vain all Saturday night trying to find a place that played the Sox game, only to finally give up and head back towards my hostel and find a bar up there that was playing it. So we got to watch the last few innings (though they lost) with a crowd of fans who I believe were from the Boston area. Small world.

PS for (much) more pictures go to Matt's page http://www.ofoto.com/BrowsePhotos.jsp?&collid=83938310705 . I'm pretty sure he took a picture of everything he saw...from every angle possible ;)