This morning I went down for breakfast.  We were a couple of minutes early, so I saw an elderly woman by herself and said hello, and she started up a conversation.  Everybody else went to breakfast, but we were talking … Continue reading “Londonderry!”

The Long Coach comes up the coast, pulls in to the edge of town, but cannot navigate the narrow streets.  No matter.  The tourists scramble out, wearing backpacks, dragging wheeled suitcases, and in ones and twos spaced out and eyeing … Continue reading Irish Invaders

Get up early for breakfast.  Have some french press coffee, then a bowl of porridge–steel cut, nutty and rich, with a shot of Bailey’s Irish Cream over it.  Maybe a fresh scone with blueberries and raspberries.  Go on a tour … Continue reading How to Live in Kinsale

Anthropologists believe that one of the critical elements that make us human is our penchant for seeing stories everywhere.  Essentially, we seek patterns around us.  Originally it was seeing where game and gather-able foods were, and that certain activities would … Continue reading Stories on the Land

As a writer and professor, I live in a world of words.  I read them voraciously, proclaim them in class, grade them on papers, use them to argue points in committee meetings. In fact, we all live in worlds like … Continue reading My World of Words

In “The Hobbit,” J.R.R. Tolkien added a clever insight when Bilbo has just left with the dwarves for his adventure.  Wait, he calls, I forgot my pocket handkerchief–we”ll have to go back to get it!  The dwarves chuckle, throw him … Continue reading A Pocket Handkerchief