Pros
We have our health.
As of last Wednesday we are no longer commuting hours to the city centre from the delightful but distant suburb where my parents-in-law kindly had us stay for 6 weeks (that would be four weeks longer than any of us thought it would be). On the way in there is a level crossing and for many years it has featured in traffic reports as a Dublin landmark and I always thought it was a poor and unremarkable landmark. That was before I realised that every commuter from South County Dublin spent an hour morning and evening crawling past it. Also I spent a number of hours before a scrolling sign on a hotel telling me that bookings were now “been” taken for Christmas. These things grate. Especially if you have to listen to Charlie and Lola on endless repeat while chugging along. Does anyone else thing that Lola needs something done about her adenoids?
The children all like school. Our worries about the Princess going to school in Irish were completely unnecessary. She is picking it up extraordinarily quickly. It is quite amazing to watch. Also, the structured, assigned seat, looking at the blackboard schooling we favour in Ireland seems to really suit her and she is happy. The boys have settled well into Montessori school and we love their teacher. They also seem fond of her.
Cons
Our house is tiny. We have far too much furniture and quite a lot of it is still in storage. Despite 6 weeks and 20,000 euros worth of work, it looks worse than it did before we started. For this, I blame Eamon the electrician who left the place looking like Swiss cheese.
No internet (this comes from an internet cafe), no telephone.
I started work today. I am not particularly enthusiastic about this job but it will pay some of the bills. My reception this morning has not made me more enthusiastic.
My bicycle was stolen over the weekend.
Stolen bicycles, so annoying. After having a quite nice and a not-so-nice bicycle stolen 6 months apart, I bought a clapped out bike for €50.00 at the quarterly Garda bike auction (which seems to have disappeared). That was about 3 years ago and it has remained unstolen.
This time of year it’s worth checking out the Belfield bike shop in UCD as they sell of their ex-rental bikes (Trek hybrids and the like).
boo indeed re stolen bicycles. Re smallness of house, perhaps a rather vigorous selling of lots of furniture and getting rid of stuff will make it seem larger? Also, on the Pollyanna side of positive, it should cost less to heat??
Stolen bicycles;
Why not register your new bike, that’s if you get one, on http://www.immobilise.com It is an international database where you can register any items of property free of charge including bicycles. It is connected to the police property database the National Mobile Property Register.
You can also buy a tag that is fitted inside the bike http://www.immobitag.com The tag details, the bike details and your details are registered on the Immobilise site which can be searched by the police when checking found property.
Hope the house renovation project improves. Having done one myself it can be quite depressing waking up eacvh morning to a building site. We finished ours after 6 years then the earthquake in February this year cracked the plaster on at least 2 walls in each room- had to start again and have just finished the plasteriung- now the decorating commences.
Good luck
Thank you for advice and sympathy. Both most welcome, will certainly check out suggestions. Regrettable about the earthquake. Suspect that we are more likely to suffer flooding so I will focus our decorating efforts on upstairs.