Ireland 43 - England 13

There are no words that can encapture or describe Saturday night. From the moment Mary McAleese stepped out onto Croke Park to the final whistle, it was a rollercoaster of emotion and national pride, the likes of which I haven't known in my lifetime. Fantastic match, amazing occasion and no trouble.
God Save the Queen was greeted with revered silence, and then we kicked their asses off the pitch. After a very emotional deliver of Amhran Na Bhfiann. Brilliant stuff. The dutch crowd who came over were well into it. At one stage, when the crowd at Croker broke into The fields of Athenry, the sister's boyf, J started joining and he knew all the words. I fear we have playing those pub song CDs too often when he's been home. Saturday was perfect antidote to Friday and Thursday night. I went through every emotion possible on Friday and was still quite exhausted on the Saturday but things had improved. To make a long story short, I had upset one of the best mates J. We sorted things out on Friday night thank god, but I was still very raw from all the crying. When the sister and her gang met us on Friday night, she was so worried the poor thing. Apparently, I looked dreadful, not her words of course, but I got the general gist.

Things are good now and I guess when its something that means to much to you, when you care about that person so much, its always going to hurt more when there is an argument and/or disagreement of any kind. That and conflict and myself aren't good friends.

The kid has made nearly a full recovery from her flu and chest infection. Thankfully also she hasn't got art today. The last thing we want is for her to start back and straight into a scrap. She announced last week that she was going off the pill. Luckily I was sitting down. Its been a while since she's done 'anything' and also she's turning 'lesbian' again. Or something. Whilst trying to keep my voice level and not reach the dizzying heights of the dogs hearing me, I explained to her that she should stay on it. If not for herself, then for my stress levels. She seemed to take this on board for a while and agreed. She went to a wrestling match on the Saturday with the mate K. She really seems to enjoy the wrestling. Or perhaps the attention of the wrestlers, who knows. At least she's doing something apart from hanging around the apartment annoucing she's bored or hanging with her mates. Although she really enjoyed Cavan with the mate A. Its good that's mixing more with her friends.

We're still trying to decide what to do for her 18th. Slayer are over on the day of her birthday, playing in Cork and she already assumes she's going. So that can't really be a present. Although Mammy2 insists that if we buy her tickets, book a hostel for her and her mate and get the train tickets, its enough. Aside from the family dinner to celebrate the previous weekend. Which is also the same weekend as Pride. Excellent stuff. Her birthday has always been around Pride but as this is the big one for her , Pride may have to take a back seat. I shall see what the team want to do if they want to do anything. I think everyone is still a bit tired from the birthday bash. We should be having another regular meet soon though, and hopefully if the weather holds, we can do something non-pub related. I've had a couple of things suggested to me, just depends on what the members want to do.

On Sunday, after the madness of Saturday, I offered to show two of the sister's mates around Dublin, showing them historical buildings and all that. One of the girls who travelled over didn't drink or smoke or like Rugby so the poor thing was probably bored out of her mind all Saturday. At 8 o'clock on Sunday morning, I was up doing some research and checking dates for them. Luckily for me, the farewell we had planned for one of the team was cancelled as the guy had something else to do so we will be rescheduling. 9.30 and we set off around Dublin taking in amongst other things, the four courts, 16 Moore Street, The GPO, the Custom House, the famine memorial, jeanine Johnston, The long stone, College Green, Trinity College, Molly Malone and then finishing up in Dublin Castle. One of the girls is quite funny, she hasn't got much english so I had to talk very slow, or as slow as I could manage. Which is quite difficult.

She knew nothing about our history, so I had to do the 'squeeze as much as you can into 2 hours'. I tried to explain the 1916 Rising, the whole issue with the british, the northern Ireland situation. But the funniest had to be the famine memorial. I was on the phone when we arrived and I guess, for me, the famine is the biggest thing historically and so I tend to assume everyone knows about. Stupid I know. But the girl L, was looking at the statues and I could hear her talking to H, the other girl and asking her questions. Eventually she comes up to me with the cutest curious expression on her face

"But why are they hungry?"

Naturally, any opportunity to talk about An Gorta Mor and educate people in something that ultimately shaped our country was welcomed by me. As luck would have it the Jeanie Johnston was in harbour so we paid a visit. They were both shocked and horrifed with all the facts that they learned whilst on board. One of the crew, was chatting to us and filling us in on more information about the ship and what it was about. She told us they were travelling on to the UK from Dublin and I asked what sort of reaction do they get in different areas. She told us a story about how the previous day, an eldery english lady got on and looked around, before turning to the crew lady and declaring
"Well, this is all wrong, this is obviously propaganda. There was no famine and your history books need to be re-written to reflect that"
What can you say to that kind of ignorance. I couldn't believe that anyone would even think that? The mind boggles.

Today I am off work :) Time worked up on that mad project, days off are great. Granted I may spend some of it working, but I will enjoy the day.A few hectic days coming up, I've to meet up with a good mate from my college days tomorrow, we lived together for 4 years and I haven't seen her in over 2 years. You'd swear she was living abroad, she's only in Meath! It will be good to catch up with her.