Xmas Lights in Dublin

Dublin's name in Gaelic

A couple of weeks ago Dublin started to put up Christmas lights. The ones on Grafton street were turned on by Michel Buble, while those on Henry street came alive a week earlier by Irish Rugby star Gordon D’Arcy. Tonight, the mayor of Dublin, Andrew Montague, will switch on the lights on O’Connell street. I had dinner with Kostas and went early to take some pictures. You can see more of them on my Picasa album.

Above is OConnell street which should be decorated even more today. I was going to add another complaint about the Dublin buses to this blog entry because I stood around for 20 minutes yesterday waiting for the bus I had looked up to go into town. According to my research the 37 bus was either 15 minutes late or 20 minutes early. Unfortunately, this turns out to be a minor mistake on my part. The bus that goes by my apartment is the 38, not the 37. And the 38 was right on time.
But, they do move around the bus stations! I had to walk to the next one last night going home because the old one wasn't there anymore. I sort of new that because I had this problem once before. Back then there was a sign there telling people where they had hidden the new stop. Last night that sign was long gone since they expected their ridership to have learned the new route by now; except I couldn't remember where it was from last time. Must be old age or the extra beer I had at the pub.

I liked the lights on Henry street better than those on Grafton. Both are popular pedestrian areas for shopping: one South and one North of the Liffey.

I took the above picture on my way to Grafton street because I wanted to show the Ha'penny bridge with the Christmas decoration above it. The pircture didn't turn out the way I had hoped since I had to rush. I set up my tripod in front of a parked car that shielded me from traffic, but just as I was about ready to shoot, the car drove away and left me unprotected in the middle of a busy street.

Grafton street was very busy and setting up a tripod in this mass of people wasn't that easy. I went back after dinner, when there were fewer people, to take some pictures of the Brown Thomas window displays. Like many fancy department stores, they put up elaborate pieces of art on some holidays.

The Nespresso store is in a corner on the top floor of Brown Thomas. That means I have to make my way through the perfume clouds and diamond necklace displays on the ground floor, pass the occasional fashion show on the floor above, where my jeans and the holes in my shirt sleeves don't quite live up to the elegance of the shoppers and models there, to the top floor where they have a nice kitchen department with cool gadgets and utensils that are unaffordable. (We're talking $40 cheese graters! I bought a designer one for $6 at Target last time I was in Albuquerque ;-)
The Nespresso store people are always nice and impeccably dressed. By the time I get there, the heat in the store has usually turned me into a sweaty blob with hair sticking out in all directions. The perfume girls downstairs usually look away or down, while the security guards always seem to debate whether to let me proceed or throw me out.
When I pay for my coffee, the Nespresso people used to ask me whether I had a Brown Thomas card. When I answered No, they would give me this knowing look: what in the world, other than coffee, would I buy in this store? Lately, they don't even ask anymore whether I had that frequent shopper card ;-)

This is were Kostas and I had dinner.