"My conscience hates me for this. (But I like to ignore it)."

I don't even know where to begin. Lots to talk about. LOTS. Should have done this sooner but now I will play catch-up. It's going to be really long; you may just want to skim for things that catch your eye. I really need to try and update day by day so my entries stop being pages long. Sorry guys.

Friday Night, 1-29-10:
Decided we wanted pizza & wings for dinner. Scoped out the various pizza joints in town (there are a few) before deciding on Mazonni's (I think that's how it's spelled?). Got their special; pizza with 3 toppings (pepperoni, peppers, and sausage), chicken wings (kind-of), garlic bread (amazing), and a 2 litre. It tasted good and I didn't have any complaints (except for the fact they played 90s rap music the entire time we were in there. That's not a joke. Puff Daddy, LL Cool J, and others. Weird.) Overall, good experience for a good price.

After that we decided to go out to a new bar for us, TH Doolans (Google it, yo). It had a more traditional Irish band playing and we were wicked apt to check it out. Apparently it's the oldest running tavern in Waterford.

Upon arrival, we were immediately preyed upon by male cougars. Within five minutes one declared he was married but this did not stop him from getting all up in Kate's business the entire night. They were entertaining for the most part, definitely had no filters on what they'd say to us. We indulged them to a certain extent, but it's really not my thing so I'd find ways to slip away and hang out with Garrett a lot (which apparently led them to think we were dating, something that is now a common theme amongst strangers but more on that later).

When they were getting ready to leave, one of them pulled me in for a hug and to kiss him on the cheek. Fine, whatever. Well, let's just say homeskillet definitely had other plans and had me in a head-lock sort of move and turned it more in to a full kiss. Um, what?? WTF?? I couldn't get out of it until he released me. Everyone just stood there and watched. (After the fact, Garrett & Kate claimed it happened too fast to jump in and it was kind of like a train wreck, you just had to watch. Thanks guys.)

It was not awesome. I am not pleased. I do not like to talk about it. I'm only documenting it becuase it happened and that is what this blog is for; to chronicle our Irish adventures. And that was an adventure. Ugh. I definitely was not drunk enough for that one.

Also, that same guy his friends kept saying was 'the best dancer' and Kate was definitely pulled in to dancing across the bar with him. Hilarious. He was throwing her around like nobody's business. And at one point, he definitely dropped it like it was hot. Awkward. But so funny.

Sometimes ya just gotta laugh I guess.

Two highlights of the night:
Free drinks via male cougars. Yes, we didn't pay for any of them. No, I don't have any shame either. For the way he kissed me, he OWED me drinks.

Second highlight: The band definitely played 'Green Fields of France'. Definitely got to sing along. That was probably the best moment thus far for me on this excursion. Too cool to sing an Irish song I love in an actual Irish pub played by an actual Irish band. I still get dopey thinking about it.

Elizabeth ended up crashing in my room that night because she's convinced she has a ghost in her room. There are sounds of doors opening when no one's around (this place is virtually empty on the weekends). He did turn on the heater for her so I think he's a sweetheart but she's not amused.

At about 5AM, barely asleep, I woke up pretty much convulsing due to too much acid in my stomach/throat (it sounds scary, and it was, but it wasn't that bad). For those that don't know, I have really bad acid reflux (I take a pill each day, my saving grace). The pizza apparently had not settled well, along with the couple beers (and I do mean only a couple) and thus my body was revolting. I had to down a couple pills immediately. I woke up again at about 9AM feeling anything but awesome and took another pill, along with curling in the fetal position and wanting to cry. By about 1PM I was feeling human again but my stomach was still warning me to not try anything.

Really fed up with my body's apparent decision to revolt against anything Irish I ingest. Not funny, body, not funny.

Saturday, 1-30-10:
Originally we had planned to go to a hurling match at 2PM but it was definitely too far away to get to via walking so that got nixed. Instead, Kate found us an alternative: dog races. To pass the time we until it started we did some light shopping during the day. Got more minutes for our phones. Hit up a couple stores to just look around.

Had lunch at Gino's, a great pizza place. Seeing as I hadn't been feeling so hot from the night before's dinner I was more than hesitant to try it. But in the end, I was so glad I did. I had a vanilla milkshake (which was KILLER), some cheese pizza, and then a Death by Chocolate sundae (omg, my tastebuds did cartwheels). We will definitely be back at that place again. And considering my organs did not pull a coup afterwards, I guess they approve as well.

While shopping we definitely stopped at a butcher's and got some steaks. Garrett has been DYING to cook up some meat, as in every butcher shop we passed the first few days we were in town he'd go in and just gawk. We've been teasing him about it ever since so he finally got his wish. Not a bad price either, 4 euro for a decent cut. He was more than thrilled to carry them home.

Grocery shopping turned in to planning meals. We decided that night we'd just do grilled cheese with soup again and make Sunday our big dinner (homemade mac&cheese, steak, and broccoli).

Came back and made dinner and kicked it before heading out to the dog races. It was a bit of a walk through Tramore to get to the stadium but we eventually found it. Got settled in at a table along the windows and watched. There were six dogs in each race, and we all picked which ones we thought would win. (I kept picking trifectas though. What can I say, my horse racing background shined through.) We each went and watched an actual race from outside too, just to see it in person. We stayed for about six races and it was pretty enjoyable, if only because we all know how to laugh together.

I will now get on my soap box.
I do not condone dog racing. My conscience hated me the moment I agreed to go. I am very much against animal cruelty for entertainment. I know all about Greyhound rescue organizations and what these dogs endure just to be kicked to the curb at a whim. It's not cool at all. That being said, I did pay admission (which did support them) but I did not bet. It was a once-in-a-lifetime experience and I am glad I did it but I have no plans to ever do it again.
I am now off my soap box.

After the races, we came back to the rooms to get ready to go out again. Everyone else pregammed a bit. I was pretty tired after not getting solid sleep, and had no plans to drink, but wanted to go out anyways to see everyone. So after who knows how long we finally left the rooms to go back to Doolan's and meet up with our American & Irish friends.

I don't know if I've mentioned it previously, but there are other Americans staying in our building and we met them our first night out. One guy, a few girls. Then there's the Irish guy they knew that we now know. Pretty cool to have people to hang out with from here and there.

Anyways, we go to Doolans and found them quickly. The band was still playing and we got to talk with everyone a bit. A cool thing they do is when the band wraps up, the last song they play is the Irish National Anthem, which is in Gaelic. The night before when they had done that I just thought I was too drunk to understand, but it turns out it definitely is a different language. The whole bar stands up and everyone sings along; it's a really cool moment.

Another cool thing about Doolans is that if you come from another country you can sign a dollar bill and pin it up on the rafters. We had noticed this the night before and even found ones from Rochester and Buffalo. The one from Rochester definitely said 'It's Huge!' a la Billy Fuccillio, and that made us laugh. Anyways, Kate had a dollar on her so we signed it, putting it as Brockport Jan 2010 and pinned it up right above the bar. So cool that it's gonna stay there for other people to see.

So they were closing for the night and we waited for the rest of the group to get together. They had no idea where they were heading so we just walked. I was wicked tired and wicked sober (surrounded by people ready to party) so I decided to head back for the night, just not feeling it. Turns out this may or may not have been the best decision I ever made.

Sunday, 1-31-10:
Had a lazy day in bed. Was really nice to sleep in. I totally back Ireland and their 'Sunday is a day of rest' deal. We can be friends on this one.

Eventually headed up to Kate's room for dinner a bit after 5:30PM. And then story time commenced.

Turns out they got hammered. There may or may not have been peeing on small trains meant for children to play on. Everyone may or may not have gotten randomly separated and went off on their own adventures. People may or may not have gathered in Elizabeth's room (without Elizabeth) and thrown various glass bottles (including a mayonnaise jar) out of the window to shatter on the street below. One of the other girls may or may not have accused Elizabeth of telling her to back off of Garrett because they're sleeping together (this might have made me laugh more than any of the other stories).

All in all, things got bananas on Saturday night. We are now known as 'those crazy Brockport kids'. Kinda happy I didn't lead to the creation of this title. But kinda can't wait to be in that category as well (for far less illegal reasons of course).

Dinner was fantastic. Steaks and mac&cheese. The mac&cheese was good, not fantastic but it satisfied our craving for it. The steaks were phenomenal. I totally love the whole real-butcher-shop deal here.


I think I'll stop here and continue the rest of the weeks' stories in another post.

Love you guys!