Weekend thread 7th - 9th October, 2022

We have not had a weekend thread for a while. I just had a great day and want to share it with my friends, so here is a weekend thread.

Our current favourite restaurant, which has been current for many years, is a small French restaurant called Chez Max beside Dublin Castle. It is a little bit of France in the heart of Dublin and I recommend it strongly to anyone visiting Dublin. The restaurant claims to be vegetarian and vegan friendly but I suspect these options may be a little limited.

We recently received a voucher for Chez Max and today we took advantage of this thoughtful gift. In fact, we made a day in town of it.

While walking along the banks of The Liffey we spotted activity on the river.



It was a man rowing a curragh, an old Irish rowing boat. The oars of a curragh are long, slender blades with no paddle. This is because the curragh is designed for rowing in rough ocean waters where large paddles can get caught on the wave tops. The key to rowing with the curragh oars is to dig a good length of the oar into the water, perhaps 5 feet.



The Grattan Bridge was looking well in the noon-day sun. Some of you will remember I posted a picture of this bridge some years ago with palm trees on it. The palm trees appear to have been replaced, but we did find some palm trees not far away beside the Dublin City Hall. (The domed building in the background flying the tricolour is the Dublin City Hall.)



My wife is looking downstream along the river. The tallest building directly behind the lampost is The Clarence Hotel. It is owned by the Irish band, U2, which some of you may have heard of.



Here we have my wife about to enjoy her French Onion Soup in Chez Max. As you can imagine, being French, Chez Max's French Onion Soup is excellent. That is what my wife says and French Onion Soup is her favourite soup, so she should know.

My wife was sitting facing the door while I was facing into the restaurant. She insisted I took a picture of her view through the front door.



I am glad she insisted on that.

Now, yesterday, when we were planning to go into town to visit Chez Max, I consciously said to myself, "This is not a day for books. It is a day to spend with my wife and to enjoy a nice meal."

It was not my fault that there were two bookstalls just around the corner from Chez Max. My wife insisted that we visit them after we had eaten. She insisted for my benefit and how could I refuse such a generous offer.

One of the stalls was selling new books with Irish connections (Irish myths & legends; Irish history; Irish books for children; etc...), I suspect with an eye to the tourists.

The other stall was an-honest-to-god secondhand bookstall. The stall-holder used to have a secondhand bookshop, but most of those have disappeared.

Books on the secondhand bookstall were more interesting. There were several I was tempted to pick up, but I ended up buying two for myself and one for both my wife and myself. The books were:

The fourth printing of a 2003 edition of Ambrose Bierce's The Devil's Dictionary. I have seen this on-line and I believe I have a pdf version of it, but now I have a nice little hardback edition to leaf through and enjoy the humour within.



Umberto Eco's Kant and the platypus. This is one of his philosophy books, and is promised by the Sunday Times wording on the cover, to be "Full of jokes and startling insights...". Knowing Umberto Eco's work quite well, I can believe those words and am looking forward to into getting this volume.



The third book was a 1959 edition of Mont-Saint-Michel & Chartres by Henry Adams in surprisingly good condition. It was my wife who spotted this and tried to convince me that I wanted it. I admitted that I would find it very interesting, but it did not take long to get her to admit that she wanted it too. :-)



Mont Saint Michel is one of our favourite spots to visit when in France. This book is a history of the isle and promises to fill in a lacuna in our knowledge of this popular tourist spot and historical location. It is a good place to spend a day if you are in the region.

After the bookstalls we did a little shopping and headed home.

When we got home we did a little housework and then settled down to rewatch one of our favourite movies: The Birdcage.

We really enjoyed the day.

>1 pgmcc: That was lovely to read, and your illustrations make vicarious pleasure much more attainable.

All I want from this weekend is peace and quiet. I tackled a couple of tiresome chores, and now I'm ready for a don't-care supper and an entertaining movie on DVD.

I hope everyone with a more ambitious agenda than mine will enjoy a fine sense of accomplishment while I wallow in a small pool of indolence.

>1 pgmcc: Thanks for that, Peter. I miss Dublin. Looks like a spectacular day too.

Mrs H and I have been to Mont St Michel a couple of times, but always in winter. We decided it only looked right on a grey, threatening day. I don't think a return to it is an option, what with her mobility issues.

>2 Meredy: Some peace and quiet, and an entertaining movie on DVD sounds pretty good to me. I hope you found a suitable movie. We really enjoyed The Birdcage.

>3 haydninvienna: I am glad our visits to Mont Saint Michel were during the Summer, even if one of the visits was on a drizzly day. I was particularly pleased it was a nice summer's day when we went to the very top and looked out over the surrounding land and sea. It would not have been a good place to be in a high wind.

Lacuna. There's a word you don't read every day. Thanks.

>5 MrAndrew: I spotted a gap that needed filling.
;-)

I will be home reading Sophie Valroux's Paris Stars by Samantha Verant.
Love your pictures. Ireland is on my list of places to travel.

What a great day you had! And The Birdcage on top of it. Favorite here, too, because sometimes one does want a hint of color.

Am going off to play in the leaves and fall foliage. It won't last more than a couple more days up north and then it will be over.

>1 pgmcc: Oh, and bang on target with a bb for the Eco book. I already have a couple of copies of The Devil’s Dictionary. Favourite definition: “ Year, n. A succession of 365 disappointments.” Bierce also comments on Johnson’s quip that patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel: “ With all due respect to an enlightened but inferior lexicographer I beg to submit that it is the first.”. Incidentally, I see that your copy is apparently illustrated by Ralph Steadman, the “master of the chopped intestine”. Perfect.

I am finally getting over Covid - I tested negative yesterday for the first time in two weeks. Fortunately I am fully vaccinated so it was a relatively mild case; I hate to think how debilitating a full case would have been. My symptoms are gone except that I still tire easily, but I don't have to go back to work until Tuesday. Somehow my husband managed to avoid it - all of his tests have been negative and he has no symptoms. I guess he has more antibodies than I do.

The leaves are all changing color so I will attempt to at least get outside for awhile. It is chilly but clear, a lovely fall day.

>10 Darth-Heather:
Great to hear you are getting over the dreaded bug. Take it easy and look after yourself.

The monkeys have been excelling themselves banging on the roof; indeed this afternoon they sounded like baboons, which weigh five times as much.

>1 pgmcc: Thank you for the vicarious trip. Lovely day.

We are more on the indolent side, along with >2 Meredy:. Part of this is lack of ambition, part because it is still over 90°F here and that is just wrong in October. I have managed to cook some edible food anyway. Yesterday morning was a hash of sweet potatoes, onions, garlic and leftover pork roast. For dinner we warmed up some white beans with veg which I made back in July, and I roasted some cauliflower drizzled with olive oil, then added bacon bits, pumpkin seeds and some rosé balsamic vinegar.

Today's cooking adventure will be a pecan & date pie and beef shanks simmered with mushrooms served over a coconut rice.

I think part of my indolence is knowing that next weekend we will be hosting my son, his partner and their Great Dane. That weekend will involve antelope stew in a pumpkin. The weekend after that, I will be babysitting my grandson overnight for the first time his parents are away. It is their anniversary weekend, and I hope we are up to the challenge.

Now. I was trying to add the é to rose and hit control 130 instead of alt 130 and my font size went tiny. I have no clue how to reverse this. :/

Ah, Google to the rescue and now I can read it again.

>1 pgmcc: Lovely pictures from what sounds to me like a perfect day.

This is Thanksgiving weekend, but we aren't doing much. I have a big ham for Sunday dinner, which will provide lots of lovely leftovers. Other than that, Marcel is making pear pies to use up the last of this year's harvest, and I am gardening and reading.

>14 tardis: Happy Canadian Thanksgiving!

>4 pgmcc: I've just put The Birdcage at the top of my Netflix queue. Thanks. Of course, that was not a BB.

>13 MrsLee: Antelope stew in a pumpkin just boggles my mind.

I find that the easiest way to add an accent or diacritical mark is to Google the word (any word that has one) and then just copy and paste the character or the whole word.

Better than pumpkin stew in an antelope.

>12 hfglen: when you said monkeys banging on the roof, my mind went... elsewhere. At least that's what possums do in roofs here.

I set up a motion camera in the backyard yesterday, to see what was eating the loquats. It captured this guy.

>16 Meredy:
More of an MB?

:-)

>17 MrAndrew:
Great capture.

i can't decide if it's dancing, or going "rawr... i am kong".

>20 MrAndrew:
I see what you mean. It could be boogying or doing a Godzilla impersonation. Of course, how do we know that Godzilla was not just boogying?

>1 pgmcc: That sound like a perfect day Peter! Dublin looks beautiful in the autumn sun, and to have enjoyed great food, found new-to-you books, and shared the day with Catriona is wonderful. I'm glad you posted the photo of the curragh as when I've seen them referred to before I assumed they were more like a coracle. Now I can see that they are pretty much the opposite in every way!

I had a fairly lazy day on Saturday, just running errands and then going over to my mum's for the evening. The next day I met up with a friend from university who needed to escape from her son's all-day gymnastics training session. She came to church with me and then we went out for an Indian buffet lunch, over which we chatted and caught up with a year's worth of news. It was delightful.

>1 pgmcc: what a great day! Someday I’ll make it to Dublin.

>13 MrsLee: isn’t the weather crazy!? It’s been in the 80s here. We should be wearing sweaters, not tank tops.

I bought a Mediterranean diet cook book. I’m trying to get healthier meals into The Husband and myself. First one was a success: fakorizo. I think I’ve only had lentils one other time. And because The Husband can’t go completely vegetarian, I also made chicken thighs.

I didn’t do much else this weekend. Lots of college football. I did get in a bike ride on Sunday, 8 miles. My foot did ok (if you’ve read my reading thread, you know that I have a screw in my foot that needs replaced). Some pain, but it was bearable.

I'm enjoying seeing what happened this weekend around the world. If I get to all these places, I'll have to remember to try some of these. (Monkeys on the roof, however, been there done that.) Myself, this weekend was my birthday weekend so it included a mandatory high tea. So, a very nice weekend. This week, however, I should be doing a bit more exercise. It's on my to-do list ...

>23 catzteach: My husband is worse than yours with regards to going vegetarian. I had to introduce the concept of vegetables in a meal to him gradually. Of course it's a foreign idea to our teenage sons, too, now.