What gorgeous weather we had today!! That's right folks: it was so sunny and warm that my excitement merits two exclamation points. Unfortunately I got a sunburn...In Ireland...In March. I regret nothing; soaking up that sunshine felt so good. We even bought ice cream cones. William was so happy. Nothing beats the childhood bliss of an ice cream cone on a hot day.

Christchurch Cathedral

a wall protesting sex abuse in the church

super cool clothes

Alley in Temple Bar area

Doors at Christchurch

Christ Church Cathedral

The River Liffey

"helping" make whipped cream

Sad-lova...can u see it?

We took the train into town today to wander around a little and see what it looks like in full sunshine. I took lots of photos of alleys in the Temple Bar area that were crying out for a little love and I changed some of them in Lightroom. We found a pet store, thank God! (only one exclamation point), as Maple's little doggy claws needed to be snipped and I left the dog toenail clipper at home. I went downstairs to see the fish and other animals while Craig paid for the dog manicure set. The goldfish were 4euro each. Seriously. The same goldfish are $1 back home. It must be really expensive to keep piranha or other large fish here since cheapy goldfish are usually the preferred method of feeding them. The store also had a very interesting assortment of leaf and stick insects and a tortoise. I've always wanted a tortoise but it seems like a silly pet to buy when you are living in a foreign country on a semi permanet basis. Maybe when we buy our little dream house one day.

Hubby and I have invited a co-worker of his over for a learn-to-cook dinner every once in a while.  This fella is newish to self sufficiency and needs a little help in the kitchen. For him a usual lunch is 2 chocolate bars from the vending machine...How I envy that. I was going to teach him to make Drunken Chicken last night but his work got in the way. Damn busy season. Honestly though it's just as well that he didn't come over as dinner was a disaster. I blame the tiny gas stove. I made pavlova for dessert and I baked...er, I meant burnt, the meringue the night before. There are no temperature gauges on the oven only numbers. I know that 7 is hotter than 6 but that's all the guideline I get. So the pavlova was a little sad and more like the meringue topping you'd put on a pie than the crispy, crunchy, chewy, marshmallowy goodness I was looking forward to. Anyways, the sad-lova was fine when I smothered it in strawberries, kiwi and liberal amounts of whipped cream. I had a few problems with the Drunken Chicken too. I didn't think about how much larger the beer cans are here and while they are a lot longer than they are back home the chickens are about the same size. Minor beer can surgery ensued so that it could fit inside the chicken cavity. The beer can had beer (obviously), rosemary, and garlic to steam the chicken from the inside out. Once the chicken had it's tasty basting going on I settled it onto the roasting pan in a very awkward position and started the cooking process. I went to turn the pan and realised that all my kitchen rags were dirty so I had to use socks to turn the pan. And to turn the pan one needs to remove the whole thing from the oven since the oven is so small. During this delicate procedure the rack the pan was resting on also slid out of the oven and the whole thing ended up on the floor. Thankfully the chicken landed in the pan and was popped back into the oven to finish cooking. Let me reiterate that Craig's coworker is lucky he didn't stop by for his cooking lesson...I think I still have a few things to learn.