Umbrellas Up, Umbrellas Down

On Monday Vincent drove us in to Dublin to pick up some clothes from Niall’s because Dale had his interview at the O’Briens near Dalkey. He felt that it went pretty well, and they told him they’d let him know on Thursday if he had the job or not. Later, we walked to a place in Dalkey that I had applied for online. It was down a tiny alley and up a flight of stairs, so altogether not very easy to find. I went in to give them my CV in person, and found a tiny office with a person crammed in each corner. I didn’t know who to address myself to, so I awkwardly told them I was there to apply for a “Junior…Marketing…position?” Instead of the “Junior Copywriter position,” but no one corrected me. I pulled my “resume,” not my CV, out of an envelope, and the guy was obviously surprised because he thought I was going to give him the whole package. Then I stood there even more awkwardly until he said “Thank you, Nicole,” and I smiled, thanked him, and walked out. He had to look at my resume to find my name. What an idiot I am. Hopefully I’m the only one who came all the way out to Dalkey to hand in a resume. CV, damn it! The deadline for applications is August 2nd, so I’ll have to keep applying for jobs in the meantime. That night there were seven badgers in the backyard when Vincent gave them their nightly feeding.

The next day Fionnuala drove us in to Dublin. Dale had another interview on Harcourt Street for a sales job. The street was crammed with buildings all attached to each other, and I waited outside for at least two hours. I had planned on going to the park and reading, but I realized I had forgotten my phone at home so Dale couldn’t call me and ask where I was when he was done. Thank God I had the book Fionnuala lent me. I stood leaning against the little black fence to get as far off the sidewalk as I could. Eventually my feet got sore and I sat on the step. I wasn’t as in the way as I expected to be because lunchtime had ended by then. When Dale came out hours later he was surprised to see me. My first question was, “What time is it?” since I didn’t have my phone to rely on. That was the worst. He then explained that he didn’t really want the job. After all that! It was on commission only. But he didn’t turn it down in case no other options come up. It starts at the end of this week. We took the DART back to Dalkey and eventually Niall came to visit Sennan and pick us up.

One day we went into the Rathmines area to see if we could talk to a realtor. The lady who owned the apartment near Niall and Leonie had never returned our calls. We ended up going from building to building because most realtors just deal in selling houses, not renting or letting. One realtor was actually helpful and directed us to a lettings agency, but when we walked in she told us most of their stuff is up on daft.ie anyways. She gave us a card and another website to try, but we found nothing new. We continued to apply for jobs and eat take away all the time. My skin was really bad at the start of this trip, probably because of all the changing foods, but if it gets bad again I’m sure it will be from eating pizza constantly. Good thing we’ve been walking so much too. We also took the DART back to Bray because there was an apartment right beside the sea that we wanted to look at. If Dale got the job near Dalkey, and I got the job in Dalkey, it would be perfect. But commuting to Dublin if not would be a complete hassle. We had a taste of rush hour on the way in, which required us to stand for the entire 45 minutes and occasionally get off the DART in order to let others out. Otherwise, the place was cute. Two small room, it’s own washer, a little paved back garden, and right beside the ocean. Plenty of spiders to clean up, mind you. It was quirky that to get to it, you go through a little door between two connected buildings and enter a long and skinny open-roofed hallway that turns right where it becomes sheltered by a low ceiling. When you come out the other side you go through the high gate into the back garden on the right. We seriously considered taking the place despite the creepy entrance.

We ate in an Indian shop along the coast while we mulled it over, but some hoodlums turned up with their hands down the front of their pants. When we told Niall about this later he said it was the latest trend amongst wanna-be gangsters. I was disgusted. Not only did they make some racist comments, a group of them ran out of the shop in a hurry and threw something in the garbage bins near where Dale and I were sitting outside. The store owner came out and told them to get lost, reaching into the garbage and pulling out a can of Redbull they had stolen. One of the thieves came back seconds later apologizing, only to grab a second can none of us knew he had thrown out. The owner didn’t see what he had done, and Dale and I were left feeling stupid and helpless for not noticing in the first place. Two days later, just as we were thinking we better take the apartment in Bray because housing doesn’t seem to be working out, the listing was taken down. It was already sold, just like that. Then on Thursday we found out Dale didn’t get the O’Briens job he wanted. We were both pretty disappointed, but he decided to continue to apply at their other locations. But on the plus side, one night we got to see a fox walk across the road towards us in the middle of Dublin! It had something in its mouth and looked kind of scrappy. It was the first fox I’ve ever seen “in the wild.”

From a bakery looking over the Liffey River—as central as you can get

On Friday we had three viewings to attend. We started by taking the bus into the city centre. But for whatever reason Dale didn’t have the phone number for the realtor and by the time we found the place we were 15 minutes late and no one was there. After trying a few numbers, the realtor’s office said they’d call us back to arrange another viewing, and they never did. So we visited the USIT office and discovered that Dale’s PPS number had arrived. The friendly girl in the computer section was not very enthusiastic about the sales job Dale might have, which surprised us. She didn’t say anything about sticking with it until he found something else. She did give us a little more information about the Monday socials, so we may have to get to socializing soon. We took the bus back home, then walked to the Rathmines district where we had more viewings. The walk took about 40 minutes. Oh, and it stormed. The sun changed very suddenly to lightning and thunder that crashed directly over our heads and deafened us. I had a personal-sized umbrella in my little purse, but we ended up drenched anyways. My dress looked black instead of blue from shoulder to hem and clung to me uncomfortably. We were allowed to look at the next apartment, even soaked. It was better than we had been expecting, with high ceilings and two rooms instead of a studio. The landlord said he could get a double bed put in there. But he wanted rent paid every week, the shower would take 10 minutes to heat up, there was no washer and dryer so we’d have to use a “laundrette” and he wanted work references. When we told Niall and Leonie later, they said not to worry about that part! We had another viewing in the storm, but the realtor said they’d call to confirm the time and address, but they never did. We waited under a hidden archway called Louis Lane, and tried to call them as the storm switched on and off. Eventually we had to give up and went to get pizza. By the time we got home, we were just about dry again.

Soaked and hiding from the storm in "Louis Lane"

On Saturday we went to the cinema and saw the film “Now You See Me” with Niall and two of his friends. We agreed it wasn’t all it was cracked up to be. Then we went out for drinks while Leonie was at a Bachelorette party. First we went to a pub in town and talked about playing music and hockey. One of the guys had been to Canada and done some physical testing for research with players in the NHL. Both friends were musical, one kindly offering to lend us his guitar at some point, temporarily. We talked about Irish TV because there is a show called “The Hit” that Niall’s other friend had been on back when it first started out. Basically, contestants come in with songs they have written, they sit in a port-o-cabin type box and play the song for two celebrities who decide which song they want to buy. We had just watched it the night before, and Niall explained how much the producers have already tried to fancy it up with sparkles and such since his friend had been there. Then with one member down, we went to the Temple Bar area, which was full of lights, cobblestones, and bachelorette parties. We found a pub just on the outskirts and stood talking near the bar for hours. With another member gone to rescue his sick girlfriend from the Bachelorette, Niall, Dale, and I wandered down the road to grab a chip butty, which turned out to be fries in a wrap with too much sauce, and then got a cab home. Leonie and her friend Jess arrived shortly afterwards and we stayed up until 4:00 in the morning. As expected, the next day was fairly unproductive. And full of pizza.