So Spring sprang in Toronto between the hours of 11AM and 4PM last Thursday, while we were en route to Dublin. Spring was an actual season, not a blink of an eye, when I moved here 20 years ago but after the endless, endless winter we just experienced, it’s pretty hard to complain about the [...]

Depressing news from a recent poll by Britain’s The Independent:
The Independent’s survey of more than 35 leading Aids scientists in Britain and the United States found that just two were now more optimistic about the prospects for an HIV vaccine than they were a year ago; only four said they were more optimistic now than [...]

From Associated Press:
Rocky Twyman says nothing else has worked, so he’s urging motorists to pray for lower gasoline prices when they fuel up.
Twyman says he and his fellow volunteers at a church soup kitchen launched “Pray at the Pump” today at a gas station in Washington D.C.
After fueling up their cars, Twyman says they bowed [...]

Bet you thought there’d be some Emerald Isle tie-in this week, didn’t you? Well you were wrong. I’d like to see what Christian Siriano could do with this fabric. Hot mess, indeed.
The whole neighborhood will be starting fires. No, really, that’s what the ad copy says. These men are here to spray you down:

Eastern Sky, Toronto, 7:00AM, 23 April 2007

In Ryan’s Pub (with Q & Terry (20 April 2008))

Everything I Loved was Part of You (Spanish School (20 April 2008))
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HELP (Dublin Castle (19 April 2008))

So we strolled through St. Stephen’s Green on Friday — three hours after arriving in Dublin on four hours’ sleep — and, since I was a Bad Tourist and hadn’t read my guidebook, Q surprised us mightily by casually steering us toward the Oscar Wilde statue (a.k.a. “the fag on the crag”) in the gorgeous [...]

A Slow and Painful Death (courtesy Marlboro menthols)

Rabhadh! (ineffectual Dublin dog-poop warning)

Dalkey Castle Poster (Detail)

Danger of Death! (along Dublin’s Luas tram line)

Nothing, but nothing says “your Dublin vacation is so very, very over” like spending an hour or eleventy in Newark airport. (21 April 2008)

Dalkey, Ireland, 20 April 2008

So we took the Dart train out to Dalkey and it was wet and bitterly cold but we had a blast anyway and the servers at the cafe where we had pancakes and coffee and tea and scones were superfriendly (and two were especially attractive) so we warmed up nicely for [...]

Dublin, 20 April 2008

So Q forced us — forced us! — out to The Furry Glen last night, a once-monthly Bear Night at Dublin’s slightly-swanky Pantibar and, needless to say, a more-than-reasonable number of Guinness were consumed. It was jammed with all manner of skinheads, musclebears, blokes, geezers, beefaronis, regular guys and more than a handful of very [...]

Admiring Prince Albert, Dublin Castle, 19 April 2008

In case you were wondering, my Mom was one of those lower-middle-class white women who clung to the term “Negress” far longer than was, well, sensible, though she angrily defended its use as “respectful”, even as her sons begged her to cut it out. I’m totally not the hugest fan of camp, but when it [...]

Guinness Brewery, Dublin, 18 April 2008