Susie Cupcakes

Greetings from Dublin! Alex and I arrived early, very very early on Thursday morning after a flight from Boston. I am sorry to say that Aer Lingus no longer gives you free booze but they do have a tv monitor for each seat, so you can watch movies and tv and play games. Frankly, I prefer the booze but any port in a storm and all that. After we arrived at 4:45 am, we had to wait until 6 when our rental car place opened. During that time, Alex realized he had left his camera bag on the plane. After a series of phone calls, it appeared that maybe the camera had set off for a new Irish life. Luckily we still had 3 cameras on our person.

After picking up the car, we drove up to Newgrange, because when you're sleep-deprived and disoriented, I think it's best to drive very narrow roads on an unaccustomed side, and then visit a 5,000 year old monument. After I stopped cringing and tensing everytime we swept past some brush and nearly collided with trucks (sorry, lorries), I realized that Alex is AN AWESOME DRIVER. Which I already knew, of course, but he is totally set for a serious run on the Amazing Race.

Newgrange was as spooky and weird as I remembered and the weather was lovely and green. Seeing sheep and sunshine is quite a restorative. After our tour and some rest, we drove back down and through Dublin to Dun Laoghaire, where our b&b is. It took us so long to actually locate the house on the confusing, narrow streets that I started to sadly accept that we may have to live in the Ford Fiesta, possibly forever. Ah, but then it appeared! A hot cuppa and some raisin bread, followed by a three hour nap was as refreshing as splash in the cold Irish Sea. Alex and I voyaged into Dun Laoghaire town for some dinner and a Cork Dry Gin and Tonic.

(Jenna: CDG is as prominent as ever, and seems to be the standard rail pour for gin at most bars. Did they used to bring the glass with ice, gin, and lemon, and give you a miniature tonic water bottle to add it yourself? I don't remember that . . . but I don't remember a lot about Ireland 1999!)

After a good sleep we ate an absolutely enormous breakfast (a good Irish fry for Alex with 3 or 4 meats, a huge bowl of porridge for me, plus bread and fruit). We then went into Dublin for more adventures . . .

My internet time draws to a close, but more soon!

btw, "yer a harlot," is what I heard a man say to his lady friend as we were walking yesterday. Now my man friends says it to me quite a bit, with a special Irish lear . . . "Yer a harlot, I tell ya!"

Labels: Ireland, vacation

I feel wretched today (combination of work stuff and, uh, work stuff) so today I want to think about vacations. In the last year I flew someplace about once a month, including four trips to California, five trips to Minneapolis, and one amazing trip to Paris. There were also a lot of shorter trips to places like Baltimore, Charlottesville, New York, and Newport RI. Now that I've gotten in the habit of traveling semi-frequently, I want to do more of it.

Ten places on my list:

1) Hawaii: Wheel of Fortune is in Hawaii this week!
2) Greece: I've wanted to go to Greece for a long time, for reasons I'm not entirely sure about. It may have happened the first time I ate dolmades. Every time I see a sun-soaked photo of the Aegean coast, I wish I were there. I also enjoy the Greece scenes in Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants (shut up).
3) Italy: see Greece, plus pasta. Under the Tuscan Sun is like travel porn. If only I lived in a 14th century villa with vineyards and olive trees!
4) Argentina: just want to. Hilly, with interesting knitwear.
5) Australia: I loved In a Sunburned Country and I would love to visit. It seems super-weird.
6) New Zealand: Flight of the Conchords, duh!
7) South Africa: completely fascinating.
8) Morocco: I like mint tea.
9) India: Love the colors, food, history, architecture. Also, my BIL has relations there so maybe I could crash.
10) Scotland: Ewan McGregor! In a kilt?

Where do you want to vacay? And can you get me cheap tickets?

Labels: nablopomo, vacation

In real life, Day Seven occured immediately following Day Six, but in recap life it is occurring two weeks later. C'est la vie! Let's get started....

It was our last full day (sniff!). We finally got brave enough to take the Metro.

And you know what? It's very easy to use, just as easy as in New York or Boston. Thumbs up for the Metro. We took it south so we could visit the Catacombs.

Turns out everyone wants to visit the catacombs, but only 200 people are allowed in at a time, due to space reasons, and, I think, freak out-claustrophobia reasons. We happily waited an hour or so for our turn.

It was creepy in the extreme. You go down narrow, steep stairs, then walk for a number of minutes before coming upon this:
It's a reproduction of the isle of Elba or something that a miner made in his free time while down in the tunnel. Some of you know how I feel about certain dolls, puppets, and masks (people surrogates), and this is the building equivalent. Creepy! But not as creepy as, you know, 6 million dead people stacked decoratively.

Those are tibias and femurs. Behind that pile it goes back up to 80 feet deep with all the hip bones, fingers, ribs, etc. And it went on for miles (feet).

Passageway after passageway of bones, each section from a different church. It is a strange burial ground/freak show experience. Some people couldn't get enough of it, and wanted to take some of the magic home.

Busted! But seriously, how do you hide a skull on your person? Third boob?

When we re-emerged, the sun was shining and all was right. We decided to go where cheerful Amelie was filmed, Montmartre.

(Alex labeled that "Fake Train Smile" on Flickr. I normally look like I'm plotting something unpleasant.)

Montmartre is adorable and hilly, with beautiful views of Paris.

And I got to meet my first real French kitty!

This kitty lived on an adorable street, in an adorable house with an adorable garden. Is it possible to be jealous of a cat?

Then, I saw ANOTHER ONE!

It was watching birds! I realize that most people don't take pictures of strange cats when on vacation, but I can't help it. I was especially excited since there are so many kitties in artwork, posters, even grafitti, in Paris, but I had yet to see a live one until that day. Maybe I was starting to miss my own meows a bit.

We walked around the neighborhood, seeing where many artists had lived when they were poor and wild. It was charming. I mean, THIS is a door!


Unfortunatley, we had to leave, though, so we could meet up with our "landlord" and get our deposit back on the apartment. We got our moneys back and went to dinner!

We found a sweet little restaurant on the Ile St. Louis (the one with all the ice cream) and had a fabulous three course dinner.

Do you see that pillar on the far left hand side that looks like a table leg? It's a pepper mill! I thought I had the largest Peugeot pepper mill known to God and man (thanks to Jenna!) but apparently there is a bigger model. I don't think it would fit in a regular home. Maybe you could keep it by the bed to attack burglers in lieu of a baseball bat. Love me some pepper mills.

After dinner we went to take a final boat cruise on the Seine. We got to see the Eiffel Tour all dressed up for evening.


And that is the story of our trip to Paris. It was just about the most perfect honeymoon I could have imagined. Thanks, Alex, for a splendid time. Vive le mariage!

Labels: honeymoon, Paris, travel, vacation

It's been a busy few weeks at Casa Cupcakes. The agony and ecstasy of Reunion/Commencement weekend was capped by a visit from the Chosen One. It was pretty awesome, honestly.

And it was nice of him to take some time out of his busy schedule to pose with us. Ignore the cardboard crease at his waist-level. It was an exciting day in my library's history too--first time snipers took up positions on the library!


The next weekend Bethany and I had a nice little Sex and the City girlie afternoon. Alex came too, of course. He just loves that Miranda! The movie was fun but that Mr. Big....he needs a slap. Do you hear me, sisters?

After SATC we went back to Bethany's place to play Wii! Wheeee!


Don't judge. I'm going through a Sally Jessie Raphael phase.

Can I just say? Guitar Hero is AWESOME. We're did level 0, the one that infants do, and it's pretty damn hard. Is real guitar this hard? I have newfound respect for John Mayer. (Secret confession: I totally listen to his albums at work through the weird access I have to people's iTunes libraries at work. Alex won't let me listen at home; he says John Mayer songs sound like asthma attacks.) Anyway, I've had "Slow Ride" in my head for two weeks now.

Then last weekend we were at Sonja and Jonathan's gorgeous wedding in St. Paul. They are too adorable.
It was a lovely, happy, fun wedding with lots of great people who were joyously celebrating. This was only enhanced by the flowing champagne.

Plus, I got to hold a baby!

This is Molly and Kenny's seven-week-old baby Calvin. I totally caught baby fever from holding him! He was very sleepy. But I hear that sometimes babies are awake and cause a ruckus. Calvin seems like a pretty cool dude, though. No ruckus-having for him.

So all in all, it's been a pretty good few weeks. Next up: a wedding in 44 days. Not that I'm counting.


By the way, all pictures stolen from Alex. Better to ask for forgiveness than permission, right, sweetie? Right?

Labels: obama, vacation, wedding, wii

I have spent way more time on planes this year than normal, thanks to a couple of west coast conferences and wedding planning and friend visiting. All of which are delightful reasons to travel. But while I like the anticipation and excitement of travel, I dislike the gross food and tacky shoe shine stations in airports. And I especially dislike people who try to cheat the Southwest boarding system by lining up in NON-numerical order. Sorry, B23, you cannot line up behind A34 and expect to be seated. I do, however, like walking past those people and feeling like a superior rule-follower.

When I'm not smirking, I knit, listen to podcasts, and read. I sort of enjoy the forced "off-line"-ness of air travel. And I'm so glad you can't talk on your cell phone. Don't you hate that horrible period after you've landed, and everyone has unbuckled their seatbelts and is standing, hunched, in the aisles, and there's always some guy on his phone saying, loudly, like, "YEAH, I JUST LANDED. YEAH. YEAH. NO, PUT MOM ON THE PHONE. NO. YEAH. BRING A SANDWICH. [BLAH BLAH BLAH]." And everyone avoids eye contact and the rest of the plane is quiet. Awkward!

But reading is indeed a great part of travel. And in the spirit of Wordnerdy's book reviews, I think I should start putting up at least summaries of the books I read. This may be more for my documentation than your edification, but here goes. I'll start with a couple to try to prevent your (and my) eyes from glazing over.

Buster Midnight's Cafe by Sandra Dallas
This is a book I snagged from Mr. Cupcakes' parents house. It's about three friends from a mining town in Montana who grow up in the 1930s, and one of them becomes a movie star. It's narrated in a bit of a folksy first person style by one of the friends. It's an enjoyable story of how friends and relationships evolve as you age. It actually sounds like a real story you might hear someone tell you, which is not easy to do using period lingo and products.
Points: for educating the reader about the delightful depravity of Montana mining towns.

Red Harvest by Dashiell Hammett
I think I read The Maltese Falcon for a course I took in college called Legal Reelism (geddit?) but that was my only Hammett experience. This book is also about a Montana mining town and its horrifying depravity and criminal activity. I thoroughly enjoyed it, and the journalistic/detectivey descriptions of each person are stellar. For example: "He was a man of thirty-four or -five, fairly tall, broad, and heavy without fat. His eyes were large, brown, dull, and set far apart in a long, slightly sallow horse face. It was a humorless face, stolid but somehow not unpleasant." There's so much description packed into each sentence that you need to slow down to really put the image together in your mind. Hammett was created to write screenplays. Also, according to the biography in the back of the book, he was created to meet lots of ladies.
Points: for the narrator killing a couple dozen people without remorse. And they say violence in the media is a problem today!

Labels: books, picky, travel, vacation

Okay, so I'm running behind on Nanowrimo. However, in many cultures, November goes on for months (just . . . go with it), and I've decided that my culture is one of those cultures. Honestly, just getting into this project has been enormously fun and interesting, and being forced to write no matter what is the secret. What I'm writing now is incredibly strange and not at all the novel I intended. It seems to be heavily influenced by The Westing Game, which is a little weird. Although huge props to The Westing Game; I can only hope to be half that good.

Speaking of weird, for the past six months, I've been having incredibly vivid dreams every night. Not those kind of dreams, sillies. I should probably start writing them down, because they go something like, "I'm in China and I'm in college and then Paris Hilton is my roommate and then I'm an American Idol semi-finalist and then we get in this plane but then it's a submarine" etc. I'm not on anti-malarial pills or anything! I think I might be just naturally crazy.

Also, I've been knitting, but it's just the same old blanket. The wedding is T-minus 3.5 weeks. Think good thoughts for the completion of this blanket...and for the Cupcakes' Mexican travels. The resort lets you drink and jet ski all day long. It's gonna get interesting.

Labels: dreams, vacation, writing

Due to foreseen and unforeseen events (moving, domestic partner in hospital, domestic partner can't lift anything, vacation, Rare Book School) I have been a bad mommy to my blog. In my defense, I am a very good mommy to my new adopted pony daughter Oops. Oops is so special she deserves her own entry--which will be forthcoming, barring any unforeseen events (yet see above, so: hmmm).

Anyway, I am in Virginia at Rare Book School staying in a crazy room with a fireplace and no air conditioning. It's fab! I'm also getting used to a new weightiness in my left arm, because look!

The Cupcakes are gettin' hitched!

Labels: Cupcakes family, ponies, vacation

Since it's now past Memorial Day, I think we can officially declare it summer! I hope to spend less time at work and more time at home, with friends, with yarn, reading books, seeing movies, and traveling. Mr. Cupcakes and I have plans to visit Ocracoke Island in July, then go to Chapel Hill for a few days. Cross your fingers that hurricanes don't interrupt these plans. Like last time.

Angela came to visit this weekend and it was delightful. Rebecca and I gave her the whirlwind western New England tour. Angela even took my crazy neighbors and insane cat in stride. Now THAT is a friend.

Last night, Rebecca and I went up to Northampton to see the Yarn Harlot, who is too awesome for words. I'm too lame for words, and forgot to bring my camera and chickened out when I saw how long the line for book signing was. Nevertheless, the Harlot is so funny and whip-smart and generous, and managed, along with WEBS, to get all attendees free yarn and needles to make squares for Warm Up America, and to encourage us to donate food to a local food bank.

I showed tremendous restraint and only purchased two skeins of yarn from the discount warehouse, Regia's 6fadig Tweed in a nice blue gray. It's important to feed the stash regularly so it doesn't get angry. Same with cats.

Labels: Angela, Rebecca, vacation, yarn

The knitting cruise was a big success. There was laughter, tears, food, drink, slot machines, barf bags, buses, planes, mustaches, boats, yarn, Ico the waiter, and a salt-water swimming pool. And that's just what I can remember! Seriously, it was fantastic. Boats are crazy, especially such a big boat, the W(V)ision of the Seas. Twice as big as the Titanic! That's a mite terrifying. One can only imagine how many people were packed in steerage. I imagine they had a separate dining room, one without a constant flow of "savory bites."

And maybe not with nightly display of animals, sometimes horrifyingly displayed, made up of bathtowels.

My camera (read: I) kind of messed up and my pictures are pretty limited. But here's what the Golden Gate bridge looked when we passed under it at dawn.

And this picture is from the very first day, when we were waiting in the hotel in Los Angeles to let us check in.
Can you feel the stress leeeeeeaaaving?

After 7 wonderful days of vacation, it's back to olde Newe Englande. It's so beautiful right now, though, that it's a little easier to come back.


I'll write about all the knitting and yarn and socks next. But for now, it's just nice to be home with Mr. Cupcakes and the kits. And to feel confident about not finding an unexpected towel animal.

Labels: cruise, Sea Socks, vacation