Happy Winter Solstice! This day always brings to mind the ancient Irish site of Newgrange. From Wikipedia: “Newgrange is a prehistoric monument in County Meath, Ireland, located 8 kilometres (5.0 mi) west of Drogheda on the north side of the River Boyne. It is an exceptionally grand passage tomb built during the Neolithic period, around 3200 BC, making it older than Stonehenge and the Egyptian pyramids…. Its entrance is aligned with the rising sun on the winter solstice, when sunlight shines through a ‘roofbox’ located above the passage entrance and floods the inner chamber.” Unfortunately, the tour of the inner chamber has been closed since the start of COVID. However, I had the opportunity to visit Newgrange during my first trip to Ireland in 2007 and was wonderstruck by the experience.
In Ireland, the “booster” third dose of COVID-19 vaccines were opened to the 40-49 age cohort from Sunday 19 December. As soon as I heard, I started to search online for available appointments at pharmacies in the Dublin area, but all were booked out until January. First thing Monday morning, I called my doctor’s office to see if they would be administering boosters, but they were not. The rollout seems to be much more disorganized and frantic compared to the vaccination program earlier this year. Today I decided go to a walk-in vaccination centre at Croke Park, the headquarters of the Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA) and one of Ireland’s premier concert and events venue. It’s more infamously known as the site of the Bloody Sunday massacre of 1920 that I wrote about last year in this post. The vaccination centre would only be open today and tomorrow from 12:40pm – 6:45pm (although the exact times had been changed at the last minute, which added to the confusion). I headed out the door at 12:00 noon and took a taxi to Croke Park. There was already a fairly long queue of people lined up outside along the building, although many more people showed up after me, so I’m glad I arrived when I did. Once the vaccinations started, the line moved consistently forward and the process was fairly efficient. The vaccine I received for my third dose was Moderna, whereas my first two doses had been Pfizer. They gave me a small paper card to evidence my booster, although there are plans underway to update the EU Digital COVID-19 Certificate (aka “travel pass”) so that it reflects booster doses.
After I was done, I walked back to Temple Bar, arriving back home by 2:00pm, making it a 2 hour round trip…. not bad all things considered. I passed by Mountjoy Square park, around the Parnell monument, and back over the O’Connell Bridge. It has been chilly today, with highs only in the mid 40s / upper single digits C. There is still lots to get done at work this week before the university closes for the holidays. I’ll be off from the 24th of December until the 4th of January. I am very much looking forward to the break after a very busy and stressful past 5 months.
Until next time….
