Hello, Ireland

31-July-14

*

My first impression of Dublin was that it was an unfriendly city.  I blame this less on the city itself and more on the RECLINER I sat behind for a few thousand miles across the Atlantic.  Because of her I arrived in the city tired and annoyed. 

My family was no more cheery and  equally unrested, so we grumpy-cabbed to our place of lodging: the Ariel House.  Though we were a mere five hours before our scheduled check-in time,  for some reason the soon-to-be previous guests were still asleep in our beds. My impression of Dublin started to shift when the hotel people let us get in on the breakfast anyway. It gave us enough wind in our sails to bicker and argue our way into the city to about a block shy of where Shelley wanted to go. We then bickered and argued our way back to the Ariel House where our room still wasn't ready. Luckily they had a longe area with a sofa where I quickly fell asleep.  Around 1:30ish someone woke me up to tell me our room was ready. 

I was woken up 1 blink and four hours later. Apparently it was time to walk back into the city.  Sleep had not only started to transform us into our vacation selves, but it also transformed Dublin into a sunny and enchanting city. We went past a place called Captain America Restaurant Bar and found a pub more disappointingly called The Duke. Ironically, despite its bland name, it was popular with Irish literary heroes of the past. My first son and I got stew, my first daughter got a cheeseburger and Shelley got some kind of salad. No wait! She actually got a curry. My first bride and I each also got our first pints of Guinness. And just like that, we were better and so was the city. Welcome to Dublin. 

* I have no idea what Ultras Dublin is, but how I could not include it?