the things you said and did to me seemed to come so easily

If yesterday was fun but hectic, today was quiet but relaxing. I accidentally slept until 1:30, which was entirely my fault since I also accidentally read until three a.m. I took a quick shower and then walked downtown. The walk was punctuated by occasional bursts of rain, followed by all-too-brief stretches of calm. But, I discovered that I can walk to the main shopping area around Grafton St. in around fifteen or twenty minutes, which is great--it seems entirely reasonable to get some exercise by walking to Grafton St. and then taking a taxi back when I'm laden with packages. Clearly, I could get more exercise by doing this in the opposite manner, or foregoing taxis altogether, but I didn't particularly feel like walking home in the rain with a bunch of shopping bags.

Anyway, Grafton St. is an area where Matt and I were yesterday, and I really like it. Actually, everywhere that Matt and I were yesterday was within five minutes of each other; Temple Bar, Grafton St., Dame St., Trinity College, and the other important areas of old Dublin are very compact and completely walkable, which is totally different from, say, Hyderabad. Grafton St. itself has been closed to motorized vehicles and turned into a street-long mall of sorts, as if Stanford Shopping Center had been stretched along one street and been forced to changes its upscale American stores for upscale Irish/European stores. Oh, and of course Dublin doesn't try to grow palm trees in an unsuitable climate, but I think this is eminently preferable; Stanford's palm trees, while lovely, are something of a joke when you find out that the school spends $30,000 per tree, an amount that comes close to a student's yearly tuition.

So, Stanford aside, Grafton St. is lovely. They even had the foresight to put a Body Shop next to a Nine West, which will probably help to part me from my hard-earned cash several times over the next few months. I didn't do much shopping because I got there late (everything closes by six on Sundays, just like at home), it was a bit rainy for shopping, and I was more interested in looking around, but I could easily while away an entire day around Grafton St. I did manage to pick up some necessities at Boots (the upscale British equivalent to Longs, transplanted to Ireland), including a hair dryer, and I bought a couple of books at Waterstone's. I checked out the Marks and Spencer, which is an old-school department store with, of all things, a food section in the basement. According to what I remember reading about the business at some point, they actually make a lot of their money off of their food offerings now, and it's little wonder--the place is a dream for people who don't really want to cook. They have all sorts of refrigerated, reheatable, single-serving meals, which is perfect for me since I don't like buying ingredients when I know that half of it will go to waste before I can use it, and I'm not in the mood for cooking when I've been at the office for twelve hours. So, I picked up enough random meals to last the week.

This all left me feeling very self-satisfied, even though self-satisfaction was perhaps not deserved since I, in essence, spent the afternoon buying overpriced toiletries, unnecessary books, and ready-to-eat meals to support my laziness. Despite that, I was feeling pretty satisfied, and after I had dropped my groceries off at home, I decided to forego the newly-purchased meals and have dinner at the nearby pub instead. Kitty O'Shea's is the nearest pub to the office, and so gets a lot of business from us when people leave work (apparently there's a group that goes every Monday and Wednesday, and most Fridays too). They also serve extremely tasty fish 'n' chips, which I washed down with some Guinness. If you read my blog and notice that I start to have Guinness more than four times a week, I suggest that you start sending me well-meaning emails with links to Alcoholics Anonymous. I spent a very pleasant couple of hours there, sipping my Guinness and reading a book that I picked up this afternoon. Then, I called my parents, came home, read a bit more, and am now more than ready for bed.

I've been in Dublin one week, but I already feel really settled. Maybe I'll start to feel claustrophobic once I've been working longer, but right now I'm really satisfied. Of course, I suppose it would be better if it didn't rain so much, but I'm not going to push my luck by wishing for that :)