Chimney Pots and Cloudy Skies

.

Dublin Rooftop, April 2010

(click to enlarge)

.

Visit Skywatch Friday for more skies from around the world.

.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
My photography is now available for purchase - visit Around the Island Photography and bring home something beautiful today!

.

If the photo you're wishing for is something you've seen here on the blog which isn't in my etsy shop yet just let me know and I'll happily list it for you.

.

Sea View

.
Window in the boundary fence of a very (VERY) nice looking property on the cliff edge in Howth, overlooking Ireland's Eye. I don't know who lives here, but they had a vintage gold Rolls Royce in the driveway.
.

Click to enlarge

.

More windows and doors can be seen here.

.

Bicycle Hire

.
Bicycle hire? There? Seriously?

.

If you say so...

.

.

Taken on the banks of the River Boyne, Newgrange, Ireland. Click to enlarge.

.

Visit Wordless Wednesday to see what other people aren't saying this week.

.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
My photography is now available for purchase - visit Around the Island Photography and bring home something beautiful today!

.

If the photo you're wishing for is something you've seen here on the blog which isn't in my etsy shop yet just let me know and I'll happily list it for you.

.

A wildflower bouquet

.
Israel is in its glory in winter and spring as the winter rains bring forth a riot of color from formerly brown dry fields. Hard to imagine that this field on a moshav not far from me was ever brown and dry, isn't it?
.
.

Looking at this kaleidoscope of nature's bounty I couldn't help but want to take it home, a wildflower bouquet* of my own.

.

Look here for more Ruby Tuesday shots from around the world.

.

* Listen to track 8. And then go listen to all the rest of them too. Better yet, download the whole album to have for your very own.

.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
My photography is now available for purchase - visit Around the Island Photography and bring home something beautiful today!

.

If the photo you're wishing for is something you've seen here on the blog which isn't in my etsy shop yet just let me know and I'll happily list it for you.

.

So tomorrow's not a work day...

.

Click to enlarge

.
So tomorrow, Sunday, starts a new work week here in Israel. For everyone except me that is. For me, it's my first day on the four week furlough they agreed to give me (small comfort, and that only after I called them out for really being shits about the whole 7 days notice no severance thing) to give me a bit of breathing space to get my life in some form of order before they cut me off - sort of a strange limbo - laid off, but still having to check my work e-mail for news and developments (questions about things I've transferred, responses from those who are helping me investigate the unlikely possibility of a lateral move, whatever...).
.
Whatever it is, it's not work. Well not unless you count having to update my resume, start making calls and getting meetings with all those people I need to talk to about finding a new job, catch up on those doctor's appointments I've been putting off, chauffeur the kids around, do that laundry, and kick the photography peddling into a higher gear.
.
Whatever this new reality turns out to be, it starts tomorrow morning.
.
Wish me luck.
.

Cloudy skies over Newgrange

.

Click photos to enlarge

It is an unbelievable feeling to stand at Newgrange in Ireland's Boyne Valley, knowing that what you are seeing has not changed since it was constructed over 5,000 years ago. This ancient temple, built by a stone age farming community to mark the coming of the winter solstice, is 500 years older than the Pyramids and 1,000 years older than Stonehenge - and in all that time, with all of Ireland's rain, pouring down on the day of our visit as well, the roof has never leaked.
.
Imagine, standing inside a room that was already ancient when the Egyptians first began building the Pyramids, that was already lost to antiquity before the first great Gothic cathedral pointed its spire to the heavens. It's almost too much to comprehend, too much to put into words.
. .
And right across from the ancient, the newest of the new. Lambs. Dozens of them, cavorting over some of the greenest fields I have ever seen.
.

.

What a day we had. Visit Skywatch Friday to see what others' days - and skies - were like.

.

-------------------------------------------------------------------
My photography is now available for purchase - visit Around the Island Photography and bring home something beautiful today!

.

If the photo you're wishing for is something you've seen here on the blog which isn't in my etsy shop yet just let me know and I'll happily list it for you.

.

Saturday Afternoon Walk, Jerusalem Hills

.
Israel is celebrating its 62nd Independence Day today (Tuesday) and we're off barbecuing and stuffing our faces on delicious salads celebrating with friends. While we do that enjoy this shot taken this past Saturday near Dina's home in the Jerusalem Hills.
.

Click to enlarge

.

Visit Wordless Wednesday to see what other people aren't saying this week.

.

Following in the footsteps of John the Baptist

.
After talking about it for half of forever, yesterday my family and I FINALLY had the pleasure of meeting up with the lovely Dina from Jerusalem Hills Daily Photo for an afternoon's ramble around her beautiful Jerusalem Hills. Dina graciously took time away from her computer vigil (she's waiting for some VERY special news!) to show us some wonderful local sights, including the fascinating and very picturesque Monastery of St. John in the Wilderness. We all had a great day and can't wait to do it again soon.
.
This Franciscan monastery is located on a cliff overlooking the Ein Kerem valley, where tradition says Elizabeth “felt life” when she met her kinswoman Mary, and where John the Baptist was born and raised. The monastery is built around the grotto where John and his mother are believed to have lived and the still-bubbling spring from which they drank.
.
This beautiful fountain sits peacefully in the center of a pool of brightly colored goldfish just outside the entrance to the grotto.
.

Click to enlarge

.
This image and many others are available for purchase as high quality photographic prints from my etsy shop. Please stop by for a look today - I may have just what you need for that empty space on your wall or that perfect Mother's Day gift you've been looking for.
.
Thank you too to everyone who has stopped by with words of comfort and encouragement the past few days. I appreciate you all more than words can say.
.

Another victim of the recession

Laid off.

After fifteen years in a variety of positions my road with my present company came to an abrupt end last night. So sorry Robin, we really respect you and what you do, your work has always been excellent and the quality top-notch, but we have to cut overhead and staffing and blah blah blah blah...

So.

Yeah, bite me.

I've been with this company ever since grad school. They haven't always been good to me, but over the last few years I'd developed a somewhat unorthodox position that really suited me, one with conditions I doubt very much I'll be able to replicate anywhere else.

Time for some stock-taking as I figure out what I want to be now. I've got a few directions to pursue, time will tell.

Anyone looking for a telecommuting business and marketing writer/editor ? Or have an easy way to become an internet millionaire? Or perhaps a winning lottery ticket they don't happen to need?

Onwards and upwards. It will all work out, eventually.

In the meantime though it pretty much sucks. Big time.
.

Samuel Beckett Bridge

.

Click to enlarge

.
The newest bridge over Dublin's River Liffey is the Samuel Beckett Bridge, designed by Santiago Calatrava to look like a harp lying on its side.
.
More skies can be found at Skywatch Friday.
.

Trinity College Windows

.
Just to the left of the Campanile I showed you yesterday is this delightful building (which thanks to Heckety I now know is called the Graduate Memorial Building), also part of Dublin's Trinity College. I think I'd literally feel smarter studying history in a building that looked like that, wouldn't you?
.

Click to enlarge

.

Look here for more doors and windows from around the world.

.

Trinity College, Dublin

.

Click to enlarge

.

Visit Wordless Wednesday to see what other people aren't saying this week.

.

All the colors of the rainbow

.

Click to enlarge

.
I found these brightly colored pussy willows at a Dublin flower stall and absolutely fell in love with them - their wonderful colors just seem to exude happiness and SPRING! (Hurray! It's spring! And you know what that means (especially here with Israel's blink and you miss it spring) - winter is finally over and it's nearly summertime again!)
.
I mean seriously, how can you look at this and not smile?
.
.
Like this? Visit Ruby Tuesday each week for more reds (and yellows and greens and purples and blues and violets and...) from around the world.
.

Never Forget

.
.

Cloudy Skies over Ireland's Eye

.

Click to enlarge photos

.
Just twenty minutes outside of Dublin (via a very undartlike DART - there were times when Jay could have biked faster than this commuter train was running) lies the delightful little village of Howth, and just a mile off the coast of Howth lies this, Ireland's Eye.
.
Back on this side of the water, Howth was our starting point for an absolutely glorious 10km cliff walk (the purple hiking trail) past stunning views (and a completely mindblowing (and shoe-wrecking) amount of mud), quaint old buildings, luxe estates (I was told that Bono has a home there as well) and oddly enough right through the middle of a golf course (walkers are to follow the white rocks please, speak quietly, and mind the flying golf balls).
.
.
The entire time the skies cycled rapidly and unpredictably through bright sunlight which set sapphire jewels dancing on the seas below to drizzle to rain to hail and back again, often before you'd even finished putting away your sunglasses and putting on your raincoat.
.
By the time we completed the circuit and returned to Howth, footsore and muddy from top to toe, the heavens finally opened up and it began to rain in earnest, at which point the lead item on the agenda quickly became "find the closest pub and settle in for the duration", which we did at the first possible opportunity. And after a very well-deserved mad dash to the ladies room (I had made it FIVE hours without a stop - only due to lack of opportunity and very possibly a world record for me) I also rekindled my deep and abiding love of Baileys coffee (two of my favorite things - together, what better?), which warmed up my cold,wet and muddy toes and fingers from the inside out. After that it was back on the DART and back to Dublin for a much needed shower, and equally needed nap, and a delicious dinner at a local Thai restaurant.
.
Ahhh, I love vacations...
.
Visit Skywatch Friday (once it's up a few hours from now) for more skies from around the islands (mine and otherwise) and around the world.
.

Back

.
Passover is over, a nearly didn't happen getaway trip to Dublin for Jay and I has come and gone again, we've said goodbye to my parents, the kids have returned to school, and I'm blogging catching up on work and on endless mountains of laundry and all the usual crap which piles up when you're not looking. There was a serious health issue underscoring everything we did which made this visit a lot more complex and challenging but at the end of the day we all enjoyed each other and treasured our time spent together all the more despite, or perhaps because of, the difficulties which nearly (and in all honesty should have) prevented its happening.
.
I'm not going to go into the details here, it still feels too raw for blog fodder, but keep those good thoughts heading towards my mother as she recuperates (we still don't know how much or how long) from a debilitating (and debilitatingly painful) injury.
.
I'll leave you instead with this picture from a very lovely but very chilly Dublin (waving to Mimi whom I had the pleasure of meeting last week), taken while Jay and I were away and my parents were fulfilling the promise to watch their grandchildren which my mother flatly refused to break.
.

Click to enlarge

.