Alas, Poor Plant!

In my office, we have a plant that is crippled by its incomprehensible addiction to coffee. It is a fern, with bright green leafy fronds, but every morning when we get into the office, the poor plant greets us with drooping, shadowed leaves that look haggard and tired. Since my entrance to my office is typically accompanied by a strong cup of coffee from the Science Gallery (and Lord only knows what THEY are putting into the coffee...), the plant perks up as soon as I get to my desk.

Such behavior is already a bit suspect, coming as is does from a fern, but as soon as my coffee comes within 3 feet of this plant, the plant starts getting cranky, tapping its fronds quickly on the pot and snapping at people who try to water it. Most of the time, the plant won't even drink the water it is given, and thus, we have been forced to sustain it by actually giving it coffee. Yes, it's true: our little fern is a right Audrey Two, demanding caffeine and promising to behave like a proper plant when satiated.

And when we have poured a good liter of coffee into the plant's pot, the leaves perk up, and the fronds wave energetically in the non-existent breeze. The fern becomes quite efficient, converting CO2 to Oxygen at a brisk rate, filling the office with pure clean air. This productivity only lasts until about noon, however, and then the fern crashes. Again, it becomes moody and irritable, tossing dirt onto the desk and falling over whenever a person comes too close to it. By one o'clock, the whole fern is shaking madly and begging the office for another cup of joe. It has gotten to the point where we can't leave half-filled cups of coffee unsupervised, or the plant will drink them and try to pretend like it can't move. Don't be fooled- our fern possesses at least 500 times the mobility of normal plants.

We are thinking of scheduling an intervention, but with little hope of success. We tried to give it decaf once, but I swear, all the liquid just ended up in the dish below the pot. Poor, addicted plant.

My New House!

Finally, after months of searching, I have found and paid for a place of my own. I'm relieved, because as I previously related, most of the living available in Dublin is either outrageously expensive or 'styish'. You will be happy to see then, this picture of my new house:


Or perhaps not. As you can probably tell, that is not actually my house, it is the residence of the American Ambassador to Ireland, as you can clearly see by this sign:


My house looks like this:

Don't be alarmed by the square foot of front garden, the house is actually in a great location. And by great location, I mean it is next door to the off license, which is Irish for 'liquor store.' On the other side of the off license is Farrell and Sons, a stonework shop which makes primarily grave markers. I feel like it is a subtle warning, placing these mementi mori next to the liquor store...

Despite the size of the garden and the facade of the house, my room is actually quite... roomy... It is cheery orange, and already a mess, thanks to my current paper filing-laundry combination scheme. However, the color of the walls is pretty much the only warm thing about my room. There is a window in my room (yay!), but it doesn't close (boo!). This makes my room more like a happy orange igloo than anything else. I do have a radiator in my room, but the presence of this heating device is pretty much negated by my roommate Matt, who must have heavily invested in Ireland's sweater industry, because he keeps turning off the heat in the whole house. I see him sitting in our front room wearing three or four jumpers (Irish code for 'sweater'), thermal long johns, and wool socks. Somtimes I join him, dressed in all of my clothing, including my winter coat and two pairs of boots, with the duvet from my bed as a cape/hat. If Sinead and Laura are in, Matt lets us build a fire in the front room using newspapers and peat, which we dig from the front garden. No wonder it is so small.

Styish City Living

Since my first (and to date, only) payday on October 20th, my number one goal has been to find a place to live. Currently, I am relying on the kindness of friends, but I need a place of my own to cover with my laundry and impressive shoe collection. To that end, I have been spending my evenings viewing rooms all over Dublin. I had thought that Italian landlords were leagues beyond their international counterparts in terms of wiliness and creative advertising, but I have to give proper recognition to the Irish landlords, who are making the most of mankind's need for shelter.

The vast majority of the rooms I have seen are approximately the size of a broom closet, or if they are advertised as "spacious," roughly 4 x 6 feet. These are typical decorated in the same (obviously popular) style that I like to call "bomb shelter:" peeling paint in some shade of formerly-white, a window too small for a cat to squeeze through in a frame constructed during the Famine, and a bed like a plank, suspended only 2 feet above the dirt floor. And all this, for 500 Euro a month! Somewhere along my search for the right place, I found a billboard that really conveys the Irish building style:


I wonder if they actually meant "stylish," or if these are the most honest landlords in Dublin.

Exercising my Trans-Atlantic Constitutional Rights

I voted today! Well, actually, I voted last week so that my vote could be counted today, but nonetheless, I voted!

Note the excessive number of stamps...

Bond, James Bond

Last night, I went to the cinema (or as I like to call it, the movie theater) to see the new Bond movie. I am what you might call a "Bond Fan," if that is what you call people who have spent a solid month watching each of the Bond films in order, and can wax poetic on the pros and cons of each Bond Girl (Dr. Christmas Jones? You must be joking...). In my nearly professional opinion, there will never be a Bond that surpasses Sean Connery's portrayal of the man, but I find it hard to have a solid opinion of Daniel Craig. He is a departure from the tall, dark, and handsome actors who have recently been Bond, and thank Fleming, is not 1/145784379 as campy as Roger Moore. Still, I can't decide whether I like him or not.

I certainly like the movies, and this one was better than Casino Royale. Still, it seems like the producers are trying to make Bond in Jason Bourne, which is somewhat too bad. I like the Bourne films, and I can't say that the gadgets have always been the best of Bond (that invisible car was laughable, at best). But Bond without Q? And while we're at it, where is Moneypenny?! In this age of technology, of iPhones and Segways and robotic limbs, I'm sure some movie mind could come up with something suitable. Hey, a return of Oddjob's deadly bowler hat wouldn't be amiss...

Both of the Bond girls in this film failed to impress, as well. Both were pretty, and I particularly liked Fields and her Goldfinger-esque demise, but there was no sizzle, and no hint of Bond's famous libido. Craig's Bond is far too serious. I liked Vesper Lynd a lot, but she was not THAT great... I am hoping that once his revenge is complete, Bond will remeber the finer things in life. (ONE martini in Quantum of Solace?! And not even a shaken one, at that.)

For all that criticism, however, I really enjoyed watching the film, so I can't speak too harshly of it. After leaving the cinema, I did my best not to beat up any badguys, and got into my Cleopatra costume for the Halloween celebrations.