Monday, May 14, 2007
Dublin holiday & cast removed
Hi... here's the rest of my "recent news update" as promised in my last post! Photos of the Dublin holiday, our boat race trip and other stuff from April are available now via the link on the left.
Firstly a bit of waffle about my recent holiday. We went in mid-April for a week to Dublin. We went via train/ferry, which is a better option than flying because a) cheaper, b) more convenient (less legs of the journey), c) less environmentally damaging, d) we like trains, and e) only an hour or two longer than flying when it all is added up. Anyhow, the journey went fine. A slight concern I had was the metal screw in my arm setting off the metal detector at the ferry port (Holyhead), but when I told the security guy and showed him my scar he laughed and waved me around. On the way back I did set it off, I was asked to empty my pockets which I did but I still set it off, then he just let me through. I do think they will be stricter at airports though, I wouldn't be suprised if I got body-searched or something...
The holiday itself was very nice & relaxing, which was just what was needed especially for my wife, who was quite worn out after looking after her invalid husband in the months since my operation. Our hotel room was HUGE and had a 4-poster bed, and wasn't that expensive (£65-£70 a night for B&B for us both). We didn't really do anything exciting. We went to a castle (but didn't go in it), walked around a beach just north of Dublin, went shopping (but didn't buy much), saw The Book of Kells, went on a bus tour and went to Belfast for a day. We had arranged to meet up with two friends in Belfast, but somehow we told them both Monday, but in our heads we had said Tuesday, even though clearly we DID tell them Monday (emails and such prove this)... so anyway net result was they both spent an hour waiting at the coach station for us on the Monday, and we spent an hour waiting for them on the Tuesday!! Doh. Nevertheless, we had a good time in Belfast, following the plan given to us by one of our friends. We went on the bus tour, had lunch in town, browsed some shops, went to the W5 and had food before heading back to Dublin. The W5 centre was an interactive sciencey kind of place, but there were very few kids around that are normally swarming around everything, so my wife & I ran around like little kids instead and had a really fun time in a slightly childish manner :)
The other highlight was seeing 2 Gaelic Football games at Croke Park. They were the two semi-finals of the league, the prestige of which could be roughly approximated to the Carling Cup in English football. There were about 26,000 people watching it in one of the biggest stadiums in Europe (85,000 I think) - but there was still a good astmosphere and the tickets were relatively cheap -especially when you consider we saw two games! It was very enjoyable and the teams we picked to win both won - Mayo (as they have a cool name) and Donegal (the team they were playing aginst had a stylised modern crest which we disapproved of).
After the holiday we had 3 days at home before going back to work, which was also nice and relaxing. One of those days was Game Day 2007, when we had some friends around and played board games all day long, which was fun as always.
*****
And now, the latest news about my arm. The cast was removed and I now have a removable splint - hurrah! I'm supposed to take it off 4 times a day and do some simple exercises to build up the non-existant stength in my wrist - I do this and sometimes take it off on other occasions, as it gets quite icky and sweaty in there. In August I will have another X-ray which will probably result in the splint coming off too, hurrah!
I have been left with an impressive scar, and for some reason accelerated hair growth in my wrist area - it's quite freaky actually. Rather than me explain it, you can see for yourselves.
Hi... here's the rest of my "recent news update" as promised in my last post! Photos of the Dublin holiday, our boat race trip and other stuff from April are available now via the link on the left.
Firstly a bit of waffle about my recent holiday. We went in mid-April for a week to Dublin. We went via train/ferry, which is a better option than flying because a) cheaper, b) more convenient (less legs of the journey), c) less environmentally damaging, d) we like trains, and e) only an hour or two longer than flying when it all is added up. Anyhow, the journey went fine. A slight concern I had was the metal screw in my arm setting off the metal detector at the ferry port (Holyhead), but when I told the security guy and showed him my scar he laughed and waved me around. On the way back I did set it off, I was asked to empty my pockets which I did but I still set it off, then he just let me through. I do think they will be stricter at airports though, I wouldn't be suprised if I got body-searched or something...
The holiday itself was very nice & relaxing, which was just what was needed especially for my wife, who was quite worn out after looking after her invalid husband in the months since my operation. Our hotel room was HUGE and had a 4-poster bed, and wasn't that expensive (£65-£70 a night for B&B for us both). We didn't really do anything exciting. We went to a castle (but didn't go in it), walked around a beach just north of Dublin, went shopping (but didn't buy much), saw The Book of Kells, went on a bus tour and went to Belfast for a day. We had arranged to meet up with two friends in Belfast, but somehow we told them both Monday, but in our heads we had said Tuesday, even though clearly we DID tell them Monday (emails and such prove this)... so anyway net result was they both spent an hour waiting at the coach station for us on the Monday, and we spent an hour waiting for them on the Tuesday!! Doh. Nevertheless, we had a good time in Belfast, following the plan given to us by one of our friends. We went on the bus tour, had lunch in town, browsed some shops, went to the W5 and had food before heading back to Dublin. The W5 centre was an interactive sciencey kind of place, but there were very few kids around that are normally swarming around everything, so my wife & I ran around like little kids instead and had a really fun time in a slightly childish manner :)
The other highlight was seeing 2 Gaelic Football games at Croke Park. They were the two semi-finals of the league, the prestige of which could be roughly approximated to the Carling Cup in English football. There were about 26,000 people watching it in one of the biggest stadiums in Europe (85,000 I think) - but there was still a good astmosphere and the tickets were relatively cheap -especially when you consider we saw two games! It was very enjoyable and the teams we picked to win both won - Mayo (as they have a cool name) and Donegal (the team they were playing aginst had a stylised modern crest which we disapproved of).
After the holiday we had 3 days at home before going back to work, which was also nice and relaxing. One of those days was Game Day 2007, when we had some friends around and played board games all day long, which was fun as always.
*****
And now, the latest news about my arm. The cast was removed and I now have a removable splint - hurrah! I'm supposed to take it off 4 times a day and do some simple exercises to build up the non-existant stength in my wrist - I do this and sometimes take it off on other occasions, as it gets quite icky and sweaty in there. In August I will have another X-ray which will probably result in the splint coming off too, hurrah!
I have been left with an impressive scar, and for some reason accelerated hair growth in my wrist area - it's quite freaky actually. Rather than me explain it, you can see for yourselves.
Labels: Belfast, cast, Croke Park, Dublin, ferry, holiday, operation, scar