A Night on the Town

I finally did a little roaming around the city last night. A guy I met at the hostel named Stephen has been a great companion during this week of craziness. I won't go into too much detail now as I plan to do a more thorough Stephen-exclusive post after he leaves for Galway on Monday. The most important thing to know is he is someone who enjoys exploring and getting lost and wandering.

So we went an played Blackjack for a while; I am down 5 euro, but came back from only having 5 euro so I feel pretty good about it. Then we walked westward past some pubs he'd visited earlier in the week and, ultimately, found Dublin's oldest seafood restaurant with a great little pub that was just my speed (and Steve's too). Lots of locals hanging out, nothing fancy or flashy.

After a leisurely pint, we made our way toward the Temple Bar district which I had not yet visited. It's definitely the more artsy-trendy part of town. (Lots of old buildings converted into hip restuarants, Bono of U2 owns a hotel there, clearly where the artists could afford to live in the not so distant past before it's hipness prevented them from being able to afford staying in the neighborhood.) We wandered past a guy doing fire dancing (not the most experienced, but decent) and then he was followed by two guys juggling fire (!!!). We stayed for a bit, mostly because I am a juggling enthusiast (as some of you know), but they were not good so we moved on fairly quickly. We then found a huge crowd following a brass band down the street. They stopped on a corner and started to play. They played some Grease tunes, Dusty Springfield, "I'm So Excited" and a few others. (They all wore suits and had some choreographed horn turning during songs. They're no Lord Loves, but it was a nice diversion.)

It was AWESOME! I am going to keep going back on Friday nights until I can find out if they have a CD or how to find them playing gigs.