Dad's Visit!

Well, this was the best weekend I've had. DAD WAS HERE!

My Dad is currently in Hamburg for work so he popped over to Dublin to stay with Luke and I this past Saturday until Monday. Originally during last week Dad had mentioned that he may be able to pop in from Friday to Sunday but he did not confirm this by the end of my work day on Friday so I assumed he was not going to be able to make it. To my surprise I woke up to my mobile ringing on Saturday morning and Dad told me that he was flying in that night at 6:15! Unfortunately I was signed up to work on Sunday and Monday at a Marine Show (It was a long weekend in Europe) but I managed to get them to shorten my day on Sunday to 10-2 instead of 10-6. I was THRILLED!

So... Luke and I took a taxi to the airport to meet Dad. He said that he would meet us at the flat but there was no way I was going to miss seeing him come through the doors at arrivals. I was SO EXCITED to see him. We got to the airport about 45 minutes before his flight was due to arrive (We couldn't stand waiting around at home). When the doors opened and Dad came out, I almost burst! It was fantastic! Hugs and kisses all around. Originally Dad said he wanted to rent a car but I talked him out of it as we'd be in the city and we could either walk or take a taxi anywhere we wanted to go. There's no point in having a car when, let's face it, we'll be spending most of our time in the pubs.... We hopped into a taxi outside of the airport and started catching up.

When we arrived home (and this sucked) we noticed that the bedroom window was open all the way. We had left it open a crack for the last few days as we like the air movement but we hadn't left it open that much! Uh-oh. We all went inside and we found that our apartment door was unlocked. Double uh-oh. We walked in and saw that Luke's backpack was pulled from the closet, the cushions on the couch were out of place, and my wallet was dumped on the couch. Triple uh-oh. We had a closer look around, dug through the mess of my wallet and discovered that nothing was missing. All of my credit cards and my bank card were still there. The cash and passports we had hidden were still there. Our TV, DVD player, Playstation 2, Ipod, all still there. It seemed nothing was missing. I was relieved to know that everything was in-tact and Dad was, of course, cool as a cucumber but Luke, he was freaking out. Dad suggested that to calm down we all go to Pearse Tavern for a pint. So we did. We all walked down the street and we sat down at the bar and ordered three pints of Guinness. Ask Dad what he thought of the pints there. He thought they were dynamite. So.... we had about 3 or 4 pints and then decided to head out downtown to grab a bite to eat.

We walked around for about an hour trying to find something that wasn't jam packed. (It was Saturday night at about 9pm). We budded in the front of lines, lied and said that we had reservations, but to no avail. Finally we found somewhere off Grafton that said they could seat us in 10 minutes and offered to call my mobile at that time. We said sure and then continued the hunt. Ten minutes later we got the call, went back to the restaurant and had a great Italian meal and a bottle of red wine. Fabulous. From there we headed to the Molly Malone statue to meet Tom and Sarah. Figured they'd be interested in meeting Dad (which they were) and we all went to a pub for some pints. We had originally agreed (Tom and I) that this wouldn't be too late a night as he and I had to work the next day but that didn't work and we ended up leaving the pub at about 12:30 - 1:00. Dad, Luke and I walked home and stopped at Pearse Tavern to say hello to a few people and tried to have a pint but the pub was past serving time (which usually means nothing since we are locals) but cause the Garda were outside checking up there would be no lock in tonight (though, truthfully, none of us needed another pint by this time).
Oh! Many of the patrons at Pearse Tavern are local footballers that play in a local league and Luke and I are friends with the sponsor of the team (He even gave Luke his OWN team jacket, cause Luke wanted one, but you can't buy them. Mind you, you could fit 2 Lukes in it, but as Alex said "you'll grow into it")so Luke was invited for breakfast at his house and then invited to go out and watch the match on Sunday. The main reason for stopping at Pearse was to let them know that Dad was here. Of course they (Alex and Caroline) were pleased to have Dad join them. I figured this was a great idea as I had to work in the morning anyway so this would entertain the two of them. Anyway, we got home at about 2:00am, made Dad's bed, Dad lay down and fell asleep in an instant, Luke stayed up to watch the Sens game, and I went to bed. It was a great night.

Sunday morning I left the house at 8:30 to catch a bus to Malahide Marina where the boat show was being held. Unfortunately I couldn't find the bus stop so I ended up taking a cab. (Paid for by the company - not me). Luke and Dad were up at that time and headed to Alex and Caroline's where they had a fantastic fry-up (I wish I had been there for that) and then headed off to the match. When I was off work at 2pm I headed to Pearse to meet the two of them (Back for more pints after the match)for a pint and then we all headed home, changed and went to catch the DART to go out to Greystones to see Paddy and Joyce who were very pleased to know that Dad was in Dublin.

Oh... On the way we stopped in Bray to meet with Luke's uncle. He had just moved to Dublin 4 days beforehand and he and Luke had not seen eachother for about 23 years or something (So long ago that Luke didn't recognize him or have any memories of him). He met us at the DART station in Bray and we went out for, yet another, pint of Guinness. After a fun meeting (Luke's uncle doesn't speak a word of english so Dad and I mainly chatted to eachother and Luke and his uncle chatted amongst themselves) we were met at the DART station by Paddy. He took us all back to his place where we had some beers, wine and a fantastic dinner (c/o Joyce, of course!), desert and some very good craic. What a great evening. Joyce was in a particularily good mood (The wine helped to put her there...the wine, and more wine and then the whiskey came out...is she a Breslin or what?!) so there was some inventive and hilarious slagging going on betweeen everyone. It was great.

Next morning (Monday) I caught a taxi at 9:30 to head back to the boat show and Dad caught a taxi at 9:45 to the airport to go back to Hamburg. That was awful. We had such a great weekend together - one of the best I've had here - but I was very sad to see him go.

Ahhhhhh hell, I miss him too. Just in a manly way... (Luke)