Socially Distanced Coffee & a Chat

The Bank Holiday has just passed leaving us with one glorious day of sunshine today before it changes and reverts to form becoming cold and a little wet here in Ireland.

We had such a lovely weekend, with an invite to a 4 person bbq in friends around the corner. Just so so nice and a lot of fun.

And then on Monday we did our own little bit of socially distanced entertaining have 2 friends over for "coffee and a chat" and then sure I threw another "C" into the mix and made a few little canapes along with a little fruit, meat & cheese mix on a board with croissants too!

We set up on the little courtyard out the back of the house and I put a small side table and a little bar cart together to serve the food on.  Instead of covering with a table cloth I covered the tables with two Paul Costelloe tea towels with gorgeous pics of ladies in pretty sun dresses on them. Very cute!

It was a perfect morning, sunny weather & good company and a relaxed atmosphere because in reality all of us had possibility nothing else to do that day!

Life in lockdown is strange.......but rather good at times.

Let's hold on to the good things!

Life is going on, we are learning to live with Covid.

The weather has been very good in Ireland which means that we can spend lots of time outside - and that's what we have been doing!
The parks are packed, swimming spots are full and people are doing lots of cycling.

I cycled to Ranelagh about 7pm to buy dinner and the place was packed with pedestrians and cyclists. 
I hope we hold on to this and continue with the outdoor socialising, walking and cycling. 

And the other good thing I hope we hold on to is virtual meetings. Yes amazingly enough I do think they have a place in this world even thought they sometimes can be difficult to participate in at times.

I participated in the most incredible meeting the other night - an online book club! It was my first time being part of a book club and I loved it and I even loved the online aspect too.
How great is it to switch on your computer and zoom meetup with lots of like minded people and talk about a book that you have all read.

        Check out the text from my younger sister after I reported what I had just been up to!

And then today after work my twin sister had a great variation of an online meeting. 
What we did was we both started watching the same video at the same time - Amy in Florida and me here in Dublin.
And what a great video it was - Margaret Atwood and Judy Blume in conversation. Two wonderful writers and superb conversationalists. I enjoyed listening to both but quite honestly Judy Blume is my hero. She is the most genuine, gracious, sensible but sassy and bright lady. And sharp and smart.......and just all round awesome!

Whenever I see Judy being interviewed, it brings me right back to the time that Amy and I met her in her bookstore in Key West. To say we were charmed was an understatement. We were enthralled by her and she had us in the palm of her hands. She was incredibly gracious and generous and spoke to us for about 30 minutes. I know they say you should never meet your heroes but when it comes to Judy Blume that is not the case!

If you want to watch the video it's is up on Youtube - click here to watch it.

Bike Boom 2020

All over Ireland Bike Shops are experiencing massive demands for their services and goods. I am seeing reports on twitter of bike shops selling out of bikes, large queues outside for parts or repairs and also bike mechanics working 6 day weeks and up to 10 hour days. It's all quite incredible!

I am noticing a lot more cyclists on the streets and they are coming in all forms. Older cyclists, younger cyclists, families, groups of boys, groups of girls - but children particularly.

Today when walking back from Ranelagh I saw a mother and her two children. One child looked about 7 and the other about 9 and they cycled up main street stopping at red lights with their mother behind them. It was a brilliant sight!

Currently people are cycling as it is safer than using public transport and additionally the streets are so much safer with less car traffic on the road. Here in Dublin the council are also upgrading cycling facilities like making a large safe cycle way along the river Liffey and putting in bollards to protect cycle lanes. All of these improvements will go along way to keeping people safe and encouraging people to continue cycling.

Long may it continue as the more people who get out and cycle the safer cyclists are. 

Here's a pic of my Dutch Bike which I sold back in February - I'm sure it's getting lots of use now in this Bike Boom!

Masks: just one other thing in the new reality

As usual Wednesday was my day in the office. It was a beautiful day and I enjoyed the cycle down to the train station (I mixed it up and got on at Landsdowne for a change) and then had my cup of coffee while I waited for the train.

The train heading to Howth passed while I waited for my train. There was very few people on the train and even fewer wearing masks - I reckon about 10%.  

After I had my coffee, I slipped on a disposable mask and continued waiting for my train.

When I got on to the train, there was again very few people in the carriage (less than 5) and I think only one of them was wearing a mask.  

I certainly did not enjoy wearing the mask and I don't envy hospital workers who have to wear one for the whole day. It was hot and uncomfortable to say the least.

Later in the day I called to a dressmakers and bought a pack of five washable cloths. What a difference! 
They are soft and were much more comfortable to wear. I presume they are much better for the environment and I feel that I supported a small local business so I was glad to get them. 

I know wearing a mask would have been very commonplace in Asia before the Coronavirus pandemic and it is now being done worldwide, it seems like it may take Irish people a little longer to start wearing them than in other countries....let's watch this space.

Ups & Downs: Good Days & Bad Days

Today was a bad day.  
For no reason at all I was down. And that's ok.

I did all the right things, I was awake before my alarm and we got out for a walk in the park with the dog. I ooohed and aaahed at wildlife and made light conversation. But I felt down.

The weight of the pandemic got to me.

 

I got straight in to working when I got home but still felt bad at lunchtime. 

We didn't really have time for a walk as we were both busy with work but we said we would go for a quick one.  It cheered me up - the weather was nice, the traffic was quiet and we had a nice chat as we walked and Bones mosied along beside us.

Later I saw the numbers of new cases here in Ireland, announced by the CMO Dr Tony Holohan.

16 deaths (RIP) and 51 additional cases

We are doing well, the numbers are reducing. 

We are testing and tracing. 

Presumably there will be 51 phone calls made by the tracing team to the 51 people who tested Covid positive. They will give details of everyone they were in contact with (hopefully less than 5 in each case) and then the team will continue on and make a further 250 odd phone calls to all who were in contact with the patient and will ask them to self isolate. In addition those in contact with the covid positive person will be tested twice.  

This is how Covid 19 will be beaten in Ireland.

And even though today was a bad day for me, I am hopeful.

 

Blast from the Past

I was going through old photos yesterday, getting them organized in to albums. 

I'm sharing some of them now with you and giving you the background to the photos.

Just before we got married we bought our first home which was a two bedroom apartment that faced on to the Phoenix Park. It was a great location and just 3 miles from the city centre and close to my work in Blanchardstown at the time. 

The apartment looked like it had not been done up since it was first built in the early 1970's.

When we moved in there was dodgy tiles in the kitchen and bathroom and there was actually no real fitted kitchen. There was an old free standing oven with a few cabinets.

Here's the before picture and then the after picture when we put in a blue(!) kitchen with an additional peninsula counter.

The before picture was taken during a party we were hosting - it was a Eurovision themed party and we were all dressed as Eurovision acts. This photo was in May 2001.

Unfortunately this picture is in black in white, but for your viewing pleasure I do have a colour pic of the funky tiles in the background along with the free standing cooker.

We got in to the refurbishment very quickly and within a few months our kitchen designed by Ciaran (but I asked for it to be blue) looked like this! 
I can date this picture as being about July/Aug 2001 as it was at my hen party about a month before we got married.

I adored the blue kitchen but not long after we were on the move again to our next house which was a 4 bedroom house that we stayed in for 10 years.

I found another fun photo which I am happy to share with you.

It's my twin sister Amy and I with our older sister and our now 90 year old Nana.  This photo was about 38 years ago.

Click here to see another fun pic of when Amy turned up to my parent's house wearing the same clothes as Nana!!

Relaxations in Ireland - on our way to reopening

We are moving to a new phase in Ireland. From Monday, there is a slight relaxation on restrictions with people allowed to meet up to 4 others outside and of course 2 meters apart. Additionally outdoor workers can go back to work and also hardware stores will open.  Homeware stores are not allowed open at this time so Ikea will not open.

Ireland is on it's way to reopening but it will be on a slow phased basis. We have a Summer ahead of gradual cautious relaxation of restrictions and reopenings. Hopefully this slow steady approach will serve us well and will keep the curve flattened and won't bring a second wave.

An additional change that has been advised by the Government is that a mask should be worn in indoor spaces (shops) and on public transport. I have disposable masks but am on the hunt for a reusable mask. Drop me a line if you know of anyone selling them locally in Ranelagh.

This is the type of mask I'd like - it's my sister with her mask she got in Florida.  I probably could have made my own but I had given all my fabrics to the local charity shop and my sewing machine to my mother, just before the lock down, when I was clearing out my house. I know there is a place selling them in Dun Laoghaire, so I can buy one on Wednesday when I am back there for my day in the office.

Schitts Creek is back!!!
Final series is now up on Netflix. Last night we watched the last episode of the previous season and then moved on to the new season. It was as good as ever!!  We would have liked to watch more but we stopped after 3 episodes and will watch more tonight. It was the highlight of our week to hear about the new series!

We were asleep by 11pm and then awake at 7.30am and up early to walk the dog before Ciaran started a work meeting. While he was doing his meeting I hoped on the bike and dropped Gerry a little gift of Take the Cake cupcakes and a card for his birthday. I found the most perfect card as he has been doing his garden all this time in lockdown and he dug up his garden and reseeded his lawn and now has a gleaming lawn of perfect green grass.

And now it's only 11am on Saturday (time to have a cup of coffee while I blog) so we still have the whole weekend ahead of us - enjoy your weekend and til my next blog, Byeeeee!