I’ve been intentionally offline for the past few days, other than for brief scans of the news headlines and weather forecast. Some Christmas catch-ups….
On the 23rd of December, I invited my friend CJ over for a pre-Christmas dinner — prime rib roast, scalloped potatoes, creamed spinach, and cornbread muffins. The inspiration came from the Christmas Eve dinners out I had with my friend Adam at the House of Prime Rib in San Francisco.
On Christmas Eve, I took an early afternoon train to Dromod in County Leitrim. My friend S. had invited me to join him for Christmas, even though we had put a pause on dating a few weeks ago. He was hosting Christmas dinner at his place for his parents who live nearby plus his sister and young nephew who were visiting from the UK. It was a very relaxing few days spent over several bottles of wine, ample snacks, and lots and lots of TV. On Christmas Day, we sat down to a full dinner in the late afternoon — roasted turkey, potatoes roasted in goose fat, parsnips, brussels sprouts in cream sauce, and red cabbage with cranberries.
The day after Christmas, which is celebrated as St. Stephens Day in Ireland, S. and I drove out to a nature preserve around Lough Key that has many well developed walking trails. The weather has been wet but very mild, with high temperatures in the low 50s F / 10s C. We were fortunate that more and more patches of blue appeared between the clouds as the day progressed.
Later in the day, we drove through the village that is nearest to the farm where S. grew up, Cloondara, which is the inland terminal point of the Royal Canal that meanders all the way to Dublin. There’s another village nearby called Roosky on the River Shannon where three counties meet — Leitrim, Longford, and Roscommon. The name “Roosky” suggested there might be some sort of Russian connection to the place, but apparently that’s just the word for “bog” in Irish. We decided to go into Longford town to get some take-away for dinner since local pubs in Dromod had closed early. The landmark building in Longford is St. Mel’s Cathedral, which is one of the largest in terms of absolute size in Ireland. Built in the 1840s-50s, the cathedral is dedicated to Saint Mél (died 488), who came to Ireland with Saint Patrick and who was ordained bishop in County Longford. On Christmas Day 2009, the cathedral’s interior was destroyed by a fire in the early hours of the morning. The restored cathedral re-opened in December 2014.
I took the train back to Dublin today (Monday), and it was fairly full but not completely packed. I’m getting used to the fact that on Irish trains passengers do not always sit in their assigned seats. Regardless of whether or not you book train tickets online in advance or buy them at the station, you have to print them at a self-serve ticket kiosk. There is usually a train conductor who checks tickets when new passengers board and punches their tickets, although no one bothered today, and even when they do they don’t seem to care what seat you are occupying. The network coverage is spotty between stations, so I passed the time listening to music and playing games on my phone.
In COVID news, Ireland has seen a record of new daily cases topping 10,000, roughly double the number a week ago. So far no new restrictions have been announced. The early 8:00pm closing time for pubs and restaurants will remain in effect through late January.
Until next time….
