another dublin perspective

[written around 2am on friday morning in the beautiful old cellar of our hostel] DUBLIN (AP) - Six American youths found trouble today in the form of the jet lag that had been chasing them for the last several days. They had successfully evaded it since landing in Europe using a combination of wits, willpower, and caffeine, but around 11am this morning, soon after checking in at their hostel, they made a major mistake by heading over to the Guiness Brewery, the largest brewery [ed- anywhere? fact check plz]. For a few euro they toured the Storehouse, which explains the process by which this famous stout is produced 24/7/52 and sent to all the world. A fascinating exhibit, it also explained transportation and famous advertising campaigns (of special interest to Mssr. Curtis) It ended at the top of this, the tallest building in the city, where we could survey this beautiful town and enjoy some complimentary pints (due to some friendly new acquaintances, some of us got more than one).

We also ran into some Penn State kids who had mutual friends and quickly befriended them, chilling for a while there. After all our running around and with a few new friends, relaxing there was one of the highlights of the trip so far (except for Comrade Bninski, who promptly fell asleep, to the amusement of the older Irish gentleman sitting next to him). Our new friends led us to a lunch spot which ended up being pretty mediocre, but we were all so exhausted by that time that we barely noticed. Finally, we met our old friend jet lag on the walk back to the hostel, where he showed us to our room where we engaged with him in excellent and gripping conversation for the next 7 odd hours.

Awaking from slumber around 10:30 (sans Jordan, who slept until 2am or so), our intrepid heroes made it down to the Temple Bar district, grabbed food at a late night burger joint, and wandered around until we stumbled upon The Stag Head, one of the more famous, and ostensibly the oldest pub in this part of the city. It seemed great, except that it had just closed for the night. Outside, a friendly local directed us down a side street to the Foggy Dew, a great pub that was open until 1, where we grabbed a round of drinks and enjoyed ourselves immensely. I also got the sports schedule for the weekend - apparently there is a rugby final on Saturday, hope we can find a good spot to watch that. We headed home to chill for a bit before (hopefully) sleeping until a reasonable time in the morning.

I feel kind of tired so we should be good. My body abandoned all efforts to establish a reference point on the local time a few hours after we landed in London and has been loudly complaining ever since, so I'm looking forward to some regularity.

-jc