It's finally here. The wheels are in motion and Robert will head to San Antonio this evening. He is officially going to start the first leg of an extensive travelling bout. I think he is too excited to be nervous, so that makes me feel better. I am not a fan of flying. I love how time flies.......:0)......... when you fly, but I don't like taking off, landing, or the general idea that nothing is under my feet. Having my loved ones in the air makes my stomach quiver. It will be multiplied by.......oh, say-- a zillion when my dear little ones are in the air. Thank goodness someone provided me with some prescription relieve for that time. No worries, I think I was born without the addiction gene, so bring it on.

I was a bit jaded today. I have been away from home for a long time and six weeks of practically living out of a suitcase is getting lame. I am so sorry to be a downer lately, but I think I need a little TX here in Dublin. I walked up to the school this morning without really paying attention to anything--other than traffic. Colum has taken a well deserved extended weekend, so I was sitting in his office alone--no surprise there.  I did get to stretch my creative legs out today as Colum has given me free reign to redecorate the notice boards around the school. That would be bulletin boards to us Americans. Poor Colum had to repeat himself twelve times because I had no idea what he was saying. Now, I work from a lap top and do not have a printer, so I had to do much the decorating by hand. Needless to say, I only got one board in today. It has a Dream theme. Colum has described some random, and I'm not going to lie, some bizarre dreams that he has had in the last few weeks. Therefore, his dreams were my muse for the board....and I watched Alice in Wonderland recently, so I had some inspiration for such a project. I worked five hours today (well in between saving pictures from FB for the study abroad students' end of term slide show--which is time consuming). Five hours of : cutting, drawing, brainstorming, starting over...the whole bit. Yes, arts and crafts is another guilty pleasure of mine.

On the way back to the apartment, I did get a chance to remain alert for much of my walk. I kept hearing someone on the other side of the street talking followed by a slapping sound. The person was a little bit behind me, so I didn't know what was going on. A block or so later, this guy is pounding down the street talking to himself and slapping his own face. Like hard. I loathe it when people stare at me, so I try to return the courtesy and not stare either...this is where peripheral vision comes in. When I discovered we would meet at the same intersection to cross to a street that leads to the Sean O'Casey bridge. I was--thrilled. I mean, he was slapping himself hard. I kept my peripheral vision locked on him. I'm no psychiatrist and I hesitate putting labels on someone, but I have had enough graduate level counseling psych courses to know that this guy was a few notches from what I would call sane. To my relief, he was in much more of a hurry than I was, so while he kicked it into high gear, I did the opposite. He was aware of other people, because two girls that passed him started laughing and he subsequently stared them down. I was not going to get caught in the cross fire. So, crisis diverted. My powers of blending in and avoiding people remain fully intact. I now will apologize to you for having to read to dullest Dublin story ever written.

Tomorrow, Connemara and Galway Bay. It will be a long day, but a gorgeous one I am sure. By the end of this nine week experience, I will have visited the four corners of Ireland. I will be on the West side tomorrow. By the time the tour bus reaches Dublin tomorrow evening, Robert will be descending into Chicago. The kids get to go with Gran and three of their cousins to the river for a long weekend of fun in the sun. I am longing for the hot sun and a cold beer-particularly on the Devil's River. It won't be long now. XOXO