Christmas Life Hack

I packed away the Christmas Tree yesterday.  It's tradition to leave it up til the 6th of Jan in Ireland but honestly if I didn't get it down on Sunday it could have been up until next weekend and that is bordering on ridiculous!!

Sadly the place where the tree was now looks all bare - it's the same every year!

So I have a life hack that I think is so useful when packing away the Christmas Stuff.

For storage convenience and ease of use next year, wrap your lights around a tube from wrapping paper.

The lights stay tangle free - you will be so happy you did this when you take them out next Christmas.

Whitefriar Place

Today we went to Pitt Bros on Georges Street.  We parked on Whitefriar place which has a few interesting old shops.

The furrier (est. 1892)  and Maison des Chapeaux (house of hats?) are now part of the hostel which takes up the whole corner of the street.  I think it is nice the way they left the shop fronts.

The Silver Swan is a hair stylist (what a naff pink colour!) but looks to be closed up now.

Art Framing and who knows what else?!!

The view from Avalon House back down the street.

And here is the large hostel Avalon House that seems to own half the buildings on the street behind it.

Flight Films

Here's what I watched on the flight home from Abu Dhabi

1.  "Tracks" - based on the true story of Robyn Davidson who walked for months through the Australian desert with 3 camels in the 1970's

2.  "If I stay" based on the book by Gayle Forman

3. "Love punch"  which was a silly slapstick comedy starring Pierce Brosnan. 

Looking on IMDB I found out that Pierce Brosnan adopted his first wife's children.  His wife was Cassandra Harris and she died of Ovarian Cancer in the 1990's.  Her daughter who was adopted by Brosnan was Charlotte and sadly she died in 2013 of the same disease that had killed her mother.  I knew Pierce Brosnan's wife had died but I missed hearing about his adopted daughter.  Very sad.

Dead Mall Dublin

My sister and I are obsessed with Dead Malls  - we particularly get a kick out of the long closed Latham Circle Mall's Facebook page.

Wikipedia says that a Dead Mall is a shopping mall with a high vacancy rate of a low consumer traffic level, or that is dated or deteriorating in some manner. 

I noticed that SWALK has closed down in the Swan Centre.  If you have a Dead Mall in your locality, make sure you continue to support it or else you may find it coming to it's end like poor Latham Circle Mall!  

New Year's Day 2015

We were up early today because of jet lag.  We set off for Starbucks in Leeson Street but it was still closed at 8am.  We then headed on to the 24hrs one in Stephens Green.  I went on the Yik Yak and mentioned something about it.  Later I noticed someone else had also Yik Yakked about being there too.  What are the odds of two Yik Yakkers being there at the same time?......possibly quite high as Dublin is very small and also I don't think there are many people on Yik Yak in Dublin at this time!  

After Starbucks we went to Brown Thomas to pick up some Nespresso Capsules and then made our way home.

I booked tickets for the cinema later that day and at 4pm we went to see "Big Eyes" in Rathmines Omniplex.  What an incredible story and a brilliant film.  It is directed by Tim Burton but is not his usual fantastical over the top theatrical make believe productions.  I highly recommend it - Christoph Waltz is quite the scene stealer in most of the movie.

After the film Ciaran played squash and once again we were in bed asleep early due to jet lag.  

It's back to work for me on Saturday so this is my last day off for the Christmas break.  In some ways I am looking forward to going back to the normality of work but in other ways I want to continue with my holidays!

Al Wahda Mall, Abu Dhabi

Al Wahda Mall Haul

When we visited Al Wahda Mall I was glad to see that they had a Gap and Banana Republic.  

Ciaran bought a shirt in Banana Republic (top right corner of pic - it is actually a soft denim but photographed badly).  

I didn't get anything in Banana but got three tops and a pair of trouser in Gap all from the Sale section as the prices in Abu Dhabi are a lot more expensive than I would pay at home.  Ciaran also got a pair of trousers too (bottom right of picture).

On our final night we visited Marina Mall.  At that point, serious Mall Fatigue had set in.  We didn't buy a single thing and we left as quickly as we could to get back and relax in our hotel room. 

What I read while on holidays

I only brought one book with me on holidays (why do I always do this?!) which was "Nora Webster" by Colm Toibin.  I read "Brooklyn" by the same author which I really loved so I had a feeling I would enjoy his latest book.  As an aside, Brooklyn is being made in to a film starring Irish Actress Saoirse Ronan and I am looking forward to seeing it when it comes out.

Nora Webster is written in a similar style as Brooklyn and is a nice readable tale of life in Ireland revolving around newly widowed Nora Webster and her family.  Perhaps it is a highly romanticised view of life in Ireland in the 1960's (my mother said that she didn't think Brooklyn was an authentic or accurate representation of Ireland in the time that it was set) and I do think in some ways it seemed like life for Nora Webster was perhaps too easy even in difficult times.  However, I liked it overall and found it to be an enjoyable easy read.

I believe that my mother has a book in her.  I love to hear her and my aunts talk about their childhood and what it was like to grow up in a family of thirteen children in Dublin.  My mother was born in the 1950's and the tales she tells are of an Ireland gone by.

An Ireland where the big treat at Christmas time was when my granddad set up his train and would put an open bag of crisps (chips) in a carriage.  When he stopped the train in front of a particular child they got to take a crisp.  How cute - small pleasures in life!

Or an Ireland where my mother as a young girl wished for a bike from Santa.  And finally one Christmas she heard the clink of metal and fell asleep happy in the knowledge that she was finally getting what she had desired for, only to wake up and find out that her sister had got a typewriter. 

Or as she got older and when going on dates, my mam and sisters would buy fabric and patterns and would make an outfit for the weekend.  Thinking of all of these stories that my mother tells me one would perhaps come to the assumption that life in Ireland has always been happy, joyful and pleasant - however as we all know that has not always been the case......  

I digress.....let's get back to what else I read.

In one of the malls we visited, I bought "The Racketeer" by John Grisham which was one of his typical novels that are perfect for a beach read.  Vaguely predictable it still kept me entertained til the end.  I also bought Malcom Gladwell's "What the dog saw". Having enjoyed "Outliers" and other books by Gladwell I was entertained by "What the dog saw" but only got through the first bit as I switched to Andre Agassi's biography on Kindle as Ciaran finished it on the second last day (he really enjoyed it - I've always compared his style of playing squash to Andre's tennis style).  So currently I am partly through both of these and who know's when I will finish them.  However, I am currently in Starbucks and I do have the Kindle with me so maybe I will dip in to Agassi's life again! (edit 1/1//2015. I finished the Agassi biography - wow I never knew is all I will say!!!)