On Tuesday evening, after spending the majority of the day in bed, we decided to go out. I had mentioned that I wanted to do the literary pub crawl at some point, so Max and I went to that. It starts at The Duke Pub, and makes stops at a few others in the neighbourhood (it varies from night to night), all while the two actors who guide the group along, are quoting from well-known Irish authors such as Joyce, Beckett, and Yeats, among others.
I like to think my alcohol tolerance is pretty damn good, but I'd be lying if I said I didn't get a pretty fabulous buzz going, despite pacing myself, and carb-loading at dinner, but damn if I didn't make it through the whole thing (although having a bottle of water in my purse also helped).
On Wednesday, he took me to see St. Patrick's Cathedral, and (because my liver hasn't already been 'abused' enough this trip--haha), we finally made it to the Jameson Distillery, and the Guinness Brewery. We did Jameson first, because, you know, "liquor before beer...."
Our first stop was St. Patrick's Cathedral. Once again, I felt like I might burst into flames just walking in (you know,the whole not-Catholic thing....). We opted to skip the guided tour and just look around on our own.
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I know I keep using this word to describe some of the places Max has taken me, but it's the best I can come up with: beautiful. St. Patrick's is absolutely beautiful. I think they might have a bit more stained glass than Galway Cathedral, but either way, it's the most stained glass I've ever seen in one place in my entire life.
After St. Patrick's, we moved on to Jameson. We did the tour here, which gives you a brief rundown of the distilling process. If you've ever seen the show, M*A*S*H, you'll remember the still that Hawkeye and Trapper (and later BJ) had, that they made gin with. Now imagine that set-up, only about a thousand times larger,and you're making whiskey instead of gin.
Not only do you get to see the whiskey-making process,but you also get to sample it, at various stages of the aging process. This was the day I learned to sip whiskey, as opposed to just shooting it, and let me tell you, it does get smoother with age.
I think the tour at the Guinness brewery might have been my favorite 'touristy' thing we've done so far. You're basically in the world's largest pint glass, which gives a brief rundown of the brewing process, working your way to the top-- to the Gravity Bar, for, you guessed it, a pint.
I remember the first time I ever tried Guinness (my dad had gotten a six-pack of it, and let me have a sip). It tasted like really strong black coffee (but not quite like espresso), with a slight chocolatey- and oakey-undertone. And there's something to be said about sipping a pint of it in the motherland: anywhere else, it's just a pint of stout. In Dublin, it's something special.
After doing the tours at Jameson and Guinness, I was good and tipsy by the time we got home that evening.
We were lounging on the couch-- I was sitting on the chaise-end, and Max was stretched out, with his head in my lap, and I would occasionally run my fingers through his hair-- watching crap TV (turns out there's plenty of that in Ireland as well. Thankfully though, there wasn't a single episode of the Kardashians to be had, and it was kinda nice), when Thomas texted Max, wanting to know if he and I would be down for a dinner party at their place tomorrow evening. He asked me my thoughts, and I said, "Sure. Do they want us to bring anything?"
