First Holiday Away!

I have the house to myself with both my housemates away for wedding celebrations and several of the few friends I've made are also out of town for more wedding stuff. So what is a girl to do with all the free time?!
Why not sit down a make a much needed post. This post will probably be full of rambles, since the past few weeks haven't been very exciting. I haven't done much/any exploring and adventuring, just as if I was still living at home daily life sucks you in. Get up, work, gym, eat, sleep and repeat! But there are some minor differences that I've noticed between life here and life at home. Not sure if in the past posts I've mentioned much of anything about the house I live in or any of the things in it but that is where I'm going to start!

Disclaimer- I didn't go back and reread my other posts to make sure I'm not repeating myself, so I'm sorry if I re-share info!

So this is what my house looks like! Similar to what we'd call a townhouse duplex. I'm not really sure what the Irish would describe this as, but you can buy these rather than rent if you want and I've heard coworkers call their homes that are similar a house. In the states I'd think a house has to be totally detached and stands alone, something like this if you owned it in the states would be like a condo?! First thing you would notice or at least I did when going into the house, when locking or unlocking the house you have to turn the key in a full rotation (full circle) rather than just half a rotation. The first time I came in the house I went to close the door, but it didn't latch. So my first reaction was to close the door with more force, still didn't work. With all doors that lead to the outside of the house, once you've closed the door you have to lift the handle to make it latch. But the funny thing is all the doors inside the house, close and latch on in magical step! Silly!
Don't know if I've described the kitchen at all, but it is fully of mini appliances. The fridge is like if you took to U.S. mini fridges and stacked them, except that the bottom one is the freezer and the top is the fridge. The oven is also mini in size not sure it will be possible to fit a full size Thanksgiving turkey in the sad little thing. Oh stove top is gas stove, which doesn't have a working lighter button so you have to light it with a cigaret lighter. I don't know if I'm just extremely impatient or if its true, but it seemed like with the gas stove turned up as high as possible took for ever to get water to boil!! And when cooking my eggs or chicken its harder to find the sweet spot of the perfect temperature for cooking and not burning.
In this house all the power outlets have to be switched on, they aren't constantly receiving power. And there is no such thing as always available hot water! There is a switch for that up stairs, not just an on/off switch but also have to specify bath or sink. Once you've turned on the switch you should really give it at least 20min to warm up so you have enough water for washing dishes or showering. In the bathrooms, the hot and cold water come out of two totally separate faucets. Not sure how that is supposed to work, scald your hands in the hot water then quickly switch to the cold?!
Another thing that I particularly have had issues with is that fact that none of the windows in any of the houses have screens. Windows in the hospital and other public buildings do, but not in the house. My room gets particularly warm and stuffy, so I enjoy having the window open and getting a nice fresh breeze. However most of the time I spend in my room is after dark, which means all the bugs are out. I have never seen so many shapes and sizes of moths until I came here. They are probably one of the most annoying insects ever, they come in and smash themselves against anything solid. The light fixture, the wall, the window glass and even your face! I've spent multiple nights chasing down and exterminate moths before being able to sleep. Now I've just had to except the fact that I can't have the window open late at night.
My house not only attracts moths but seems to be the residence of many many spiders, most of the time my opinion on spiders is that if they stay away from me then I'll just leave them alone and let them kill off all those annoying moths! However the spiders here are spindly long legged useless bastards!

This particular spider lives in the corner of my bedroom. It seems that all these spiders do is create cobwebs all over, I have seen more dust in the webs than bugs. These spiders must have an eating disorder of some kind! They also have a strange obsession with making their home in my shower. Anyway, enough about the annoying bugs. One good thing is that Ireland doesn't have Mosquitoes!! YAY!! 

This is the back yard at my house, however it's actually called a garden. Even though nothing in this back yard is eatable or needs tending. I've noticed that here the landscaping here is very nice, many people have flowers and cute little paths. But the one thing I miss is a big tree in the yard...sorry, garden! Drive around in Washington and almost every house has a big tree in the front and the back yard. Here there are trees, but none of the ones planned in a yard are nearly as big as I'm used to seeing.

Since I've been here in Ireland I've been without a vehicle, except for the one time I rented a car I've had to walk myself around or get a lift from a housemate. I walk to work, then from work to the town center for the gym and all the way back home. Pretty sure one way, going to town is about 2 miles. So I walk quite allot! And many of the locals take regular walks, either with another person or their dog. The dogs are always so happy and seem to know the routine, not going all nuts and mauling you when you pass by. Half the time the dog doesn't even look in my direction they are so zoned in on their walk! It's awesome to see people with their pets out being active. However the one down side is that dogs crap when out for a walk and it seems like NO ONE here cleans up after them. With walking as my only way around I think I've seen more dog crap in the last 6 weeks than I ever did when taking my own dog for a walk in Washington. I've seen piles, Ive seen trails and I've seen it smeared into the pavement because some poor person didn't see it. I wonder if they think that the rain will just wash it away or something. Either way, if you ever go for a stroll watch your step!
Another that I've noticed when walking on my commute is that people do not give you room to pass by each other. Okey, I guess they do because I've never run into anyone. But brushing shoulders and bumping your bag against someone happens multiple times a day. Maybe its because they drive on such narrow roads and the cars are always so close that they walk just as close. Pretty sure I didn't enjoy the close quarters on the road and they aren't anymore pleasant when walking. It's like the ultimate game of chicken, they always wait until the last minute to just barely get out of the way. This isn't only on the narrow sidewalks, but also the extremely wide ones and in stores. I think part of it is I still walk on the wrong side, so I'm not very good at anticipating which way the other person intends to go around me. Normally it ends up with them cutting right in front of me. Other than being awkwardly close when passing by at least most everyone asks how you are when passing on the street. 
One of the things that made the transition here not so rough and gave me a little taste of home is that Ireland and probably a fare amount of Europe, show allot of American tv shows. From the ones that feed my nerd side, like Star Trek, Stargate SG1 and Big Bang Theory to the good old sitcoms, How I Met Your Mother, New Girl, Friends, Rules of Engagement and That 70s Show! Of course they have their own shows, but its nice to see something that I'm familiar with. 

I'll finish off this post with some more Irish verbage! When saying someone has got to be kidding or joking, they'd say you're having a laugh. When you've over eaten and have that uncomfortably full feeling, you'd say you're calving. When you want to go somewhere for just for the fun of it, you'd say that you're going for the crack. Or it could be used to ask whats going on/whats up = whats the crack? My coworkers that have kids, refer to the baby sitter as the child minder. A trimmer is a weed whacker.  They actually pronounce centrifugal force as centra-fugal rather than how I've always heard it, cen-trifi-cal force. Oh and cream cheese is soft cheese.

I know its the fifth of July now, but Happy Belated Fourth!! It was my first holiday away from home and here in Ireland it couldn't have felt more like a normal day if I'd wanted it too. Many of my coworkers commented on the fact that It was Americas independence day. And I got plenty of pictures and videos from home of the fire works and the food! My best friend even put my  name on a fire work and launched it for me. Even though I was included I didn't get to launch any fire works myself with the soggy chill weather, which also meant no BBQ. Sad day! Going to miss our holidays for sure, I feel like we have more of them than here in Ireland.

Well that's all I've got for ya, but next weekend I'm going out of town and should have a more exciting post with pictures after I get back.

Cheers!