One Wet Foot and Other Stories

There is only one thing worse than having two cold, wet feet, and it is having only one cold, wet foot. Unfortunately, I discovered that truth this weekend when I was in Dublin. I have this great, super-cheap, pair of brown boots, which I have used so much in the month since I bought them that I have worn a whole in one of them. Only one, not the other. This means that I can't wear them in the rain because the rain will soak through the hole and give me an uncomfortably wet foot. One wet foot is infinitely worse than two wet feet. I know, this sounds wrong. One dry foot should make me happy! At least they're not both wet. I should be counting my blessings instead of complaining. You might be thinking that right now. Well, you're wrong! One dry foot taunts you; it makes you want your wet foot to be just as happy as your dry foot. It makes things uneven. With two wet feet, you can walk anywhere you want and step in any amount of water, and it doesn't matter because both your feet are soaking anyway. But, if one is dry, you have to constantly be avoiding puddles so as to not wetten the dryness, while at the same time feeling (and hearing) your toes squish in your sock that is contained in your other boot. It's terribly distracting, and it keeps you (or at least me) from enjoying myself fully because I am constantly thinking, "I wish I had dry feet. This would be so much better with dry feet..."

Putting all that aside, I went to Dublin this weekend, and it was nice. It was nice to be in a big city, and it was nice to see people walking on the streets after seven o'clock, and it was nice to go into a cafe at nine at night and still be able to order coffee (and still have it be open). It was nice.

Some things that happened:

-The Guinness museum. Quite good. To be honest though, the architecture of the museum was more interesting than the museum itself (at least to me). I liked learning about Guinness, don't get me wrong. I just didn't need five floors of museum to learn about it. I was done learning after two floors (not counting the one that had the gift shop on it). By the third floor, I just wanted to get to the top so that I could retrieve my free pint of Guinness. Eventually I did, and it was excellent, but the bar was too cold to enjoy it as it deserved to be enjoyed.

-Walking. Lots of it. But in a good way.

-Fantastic bruschetta. I couldn't even believe how good it was. I didn't know that bruschetta could be so good.

-Getting carded. For the second time in my life (they didn't even card me on my birthday. Lame!). But they carded me in the the Three Crowns Alley Pub in Temple Bar. I also ordered brandy there. Just brandy. I'm not sure why I wanted to; probably because I was cold (I had this vision of a St. Bernard reviving an avalanche victim with the brandy that it had carried to the victim over a treacherously snowy mountain pass. So I figured that it must have the warming properties which I needed, due to my one wet foot). And the brandy was... strong. And sweet with a soapy aftertaste. I could drink about half, and then the aftertast got the better of me. I can't drink soap.