Dining out in Dublin

A brand new Dublin foodie-rag hits the streets this week and I have to say it is pretty nifty. The reviews are believable and the foodie-photos are not too shabby.

Check it out when you have a minute esp. towards the last few pages where you may see a few WiseWords - look for the page that says 'Munchies Anyone?'

WiseMóna

Open publication - Free publishing - More ba

I'm so lonely I could cry

Oh woe is me. I am only three days into the second semester and I want to run home crying. And stay there. I cannot say I have felt this way about 'being in college' since making the decision two years ago to get myself an education. So, maybe this was bound to happen sooner or later, I don't know.

This is a week of change for all students. Most classes are in different locations, at different times and with different teachers. No worries here. We are in college to learn for gawds sake - change is good, right?

Well, maybe it is, but here I find myself racing around the campus trying to find all these classes and feeling like a...well, feeling like a first year. I have umpteen 'class clashes' and now every department head knows full well who this 'WiseMóna' is because I have had to go cap-in-hand asking for special permissions to get into a new times slot or out of an existing one. 

To add to my level of insanity and to explain the title of this blog post, ALL my friends are off doing other subjects and other modules, so I have to sit in class with no-one to talk to. 

SAD.com, I know. But, in saying that, I am making no effort to recruit new friends either. I do not have time to nurture and grow a new gang of friends, especially since I cannot find time to maintain the relationships with the ones I already have! 

So, with all this doom and gloom (and I should mention it is bucketing down rain outside too) how can we find the silver lining on the cloud? Well, I have a little silver lining stashed away and it is all I need to motivate myself to keep plodding along and get through the next twelve weeks before I have my lovely long (four months worth) of summer holidays.

Silver Lining Project = 3rd year of College

Shocker, I know. Here I am complaining about being back in college but cannot WAIT to get started on 3rd year. Why, I hear you ask?

This creative writing degree course I am enrolled in is fairly new and fabulous. The classes are teeny tiny with only 15 students so we develop a great peer group to work within. Each of us have the option (September 2011) to 'Live the life of a Writer' and swan off into the sunset and write our novel.......editor provided and paid for by the university. It is a pass or fail class. 

You pass if you write your book, work professionally and proficiently within all the guidelines and deadlines your editor gives you and finish the book. 

You fail if you do not. 

NO PRESSURE HERE!

Of course, if you are just not ready to swan off into the sunset and write your novel, then you can enrole in a few film production and screen play writing classes right here on campus at NUIG and who would not want to take advantage of that?

Right before Christmas, if you were serious about the swanning off to write your book part, then you had to turf up a good 3,000 - 5,000 words of your book showing the outline and concept of said book in order to convince your teacher you 'had what it took' to go it ALONE for 3rd year. 

So there you have it guys n' dolls. I am going it alone. I have a decent chunk of the book already written and am bursting at the seams to get stuck in and just WRITE. OK, that might have been a slight exaggeration considering all I really have are a bunch of really cool food n' farm pictures and some recipes thrown together in a very cool PINK folder. 

I do not care. 

I AM VERY EXCITED. 

I am also terrified. 

Those are all the WiseWords I have for today,

WiseMóna

Nollaig shona duit

I think that when homes are filled with squealing kids and huge messes of wrapping paper and batteries it is easy to forget 'what' Christmas is all about. 

For us here at Chez Wise, Christmas is all about the kids. 

Santa Claus came last night and left a plethora of toys n' trinkets. The noise level has reached a new high around here.

The Chef and I had a few quiet hours fireside this morning drinking coffee and listening to Christmas carols while waiting for the kids to wake up and tear into all the gift wrap.

Once they finally joined us in the living room some of them did not even notice the stack of carefully wrapped presents under the tree. 

I am not all that wild about the gift-giving tradition at Christmas time. I know that as a child we got Christmas presents but my memories do not revolve around any particular item I wanted or got.  My memories of Christmas are of all the time spent in our living room playing board games, eating boxes of sweets and tayto's and watching movies like 'The sound of music' and 'Chitty Bang-Bang'. 

Our meal was always the exact same. An elephant-sized turkey -- that was home-grown by our neighbour Nora -- an enormous country ham and all the traditional side dishes like brussel sprouts (cooked in the ham juice) carrot and parsnip mash, roast potatoes and mashed potatoes too (we are Irish after all). Dessert was the traditional Christmas pudding with warm custard and of course Christmas cake if you were so inclined. Dinner was eaten early right after high noon and the rest of the day was spent in a total tryptophan tizzy on the couch drifting in and out of a food-coma.

The evening 'tea-time' was always my favourite. 'Make-yer-own' sandwiches with a large loaf of batch bread and some leftover turkey giving a Mum the well earned break from cooking. 

We are making and creating our own family-memories for our kids now and although I am living less than a half mile from where I grew up I am amazed at how different their lives are. The world has changed so much in the past twenty odd years and no matter how hard we try to raise them to be non-materialistic, kids want what other kids have. Stuff. 

Becoming foster-parents this year has taught us so much about how much excess 'stuff' we have and how little others have. The kids (including our own) have taught us how to be better parents. We want for less and we give more of our time and energy and our love. 

I hope you are all having a wonderful Christmas. I am so grateful to all of you for logging on and reading-laughing-crying-commenting on my crazy little stories. Adjusting to a new family-dynamic here at Chez Wise has been made all the easier knowing you are out there, tuned in and willing to share in the chaos!

So a great big THANK YOU to you all and Merry Christmas! 

Here's to a wonderful and prosperous New Year!

Those are all the WiseWords I have for today from a very sunny and frosty Galway where the house is quiet and toasty and all the squealing kids are outside with the Chef!

WiseMóna