Tag: beer

A lot of things are hard right now. But I appreciate that Spring has come and I can enjoy a cheese & pickle sandwich and a fake beer for lunch in the sun. All to the sounds of the birds singing... and, somewhere behind me, the dog excitedly demolishing a pile of pine cones.

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Dan, a white man with a goatee beard and long hair, sits at a wooden picnic bench in front of a sandwich, crisp packet, and can of Lucky Saint.

It could be worse, right?

Sometimes the kids need to leave your pub dinner before you finish your drink, and you need to take a "to-go" pint.

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Dan, grinning, holding a quarter pint of beer in few rear passenger seat of a moving car.

I'm leaving Ireland a day late, from the wrong airport, and with one fewer functioning arm than I anticipated. It's been quite the ride. I'll be glad to get home.

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Dan sits in an airport bar drinking a beer held in his right hand. His left arm is in a sling.

(for those that are concerned: I've damaged my shoulder, possibly while slipping down a hill in search of a geocache or geohashpoint; so, y'know, the usual reason I get injured... but I've got some physio instructions I'm supposed to follow, and I'll be okay)

Sooo... I'm in Dublin.

I missed me flight at Knock airport, which turns out to have been the only plane leaving that tiny airport today. So I arranged a flight from Dublin tomorrow, extended my car rental and arranged to drop it off in the capital's airport instead, and zipped over here.

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Two pints of Guinness on a candlelit table.

Now I'm in an underlit bar sipping a Guinness and waiting for a pizza.

It's been a long day of driving around Ireland, scrambling through forests, navigating to a hashpoint, exploring a medieval castle, dodging the rain, finding a series of geocaches, getting lost up a hill in the dark, and generally having a kickass time with one of my very favourite people on this earth: my mum.

And now it's time for a long soak in a hot bath with a pint of the black stuff and my RSS reader for company. A perfect finish.

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A pint of Guinness alongside a can, on a tiled bathroom shelf.

Made it through a day and a half of theme park fun with the kids. Time for a much-needed beer, then as long a sleep as circumstance will allow.

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Three glasses of beer held by adult hands clink together against a glass of water and a bottle of Fanta held 6 by cold hands.

Parenting is about sacrifices.

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Dan drinks a beer, a children's football match is being played in the background.

Here, I'm making the noble sacrifice of forcing myself to drink a delicious beer so my 10-year-old can use the customer-only bathroom at a beachside amateur football club. Such a sacrifice.

This evening, I'm reduced to re-alcoholising my alcohol-free beer. Unfortunately the cleanest-tasting vodka I have is "only" 40% ABV, so by adding enough of it to bring the beer back to its correct ABV... I'm technically watering-down the beer.

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Pint glass having been filled with a carefully measured mixture of 0%ABV Guinness and vodka, with measuring spoons alongside.

This might be the strangest cocktail I've ever made.