The Old Main Drag

We spent Day 4 in Dublin, utilizing a double decker bus tour to take us to the Guinness storehouse. There was much singing of Smiths: If a double decker bus crashes into us...

The Guinness plant manufactures an interesting liquid that invigorates and strengthens one's constitution, somewhat like an energy drink. We sample varieties of this concoction at every opportunity.

We finished the day with a Traditional Irish Music pub crawl, which was quite a bit of fun. We've since learned that only the native Irish get to call it "fiddely-ay-di-ay" music. A six foot tall bartendress with clear Viking roots nearly threw Mike across the bar for saying so.

The night before, we'd discovered Guinness 39, which was one of the boutique versions of Guinness that the brewery releases every six months. It was much smoother and creamier than standard Guinness. Everything I loved about Guinness, without the bitterness you'll sometimes find in the bottles or less caring pubs in Americay.

Round Round-Up, Part Feur:

• 1 at the Gravity Bar, eight stories above the streets of Dublin atop the Guinness Storehouse
• 1 at the Brewery Bar, two stories down from there. Here, Al and I sampled Guinness Foriegn Extra Stout which is Bizzaro Guiness 39 -- vile, bitter, and heavy on the alcohol content.
• 2 at O'Neill's, where we'd stopped on the Literary tour the night before. I say 2, but a barrister appropriated one of mine, while his friend clipped my chips.
• 1 at Oliver St. John Gogarty's, where the pub crawl began
• 1 at the Ha'penny Bridge Inn
• 2 at Isolde's Tower
• 1 at the Porter House Brew Pub
• 3 more back at Gogarty's.

For the sake of my parents and in-laws, I should note that the above occured over 14 hours, and none of us were in sorry shape at the end of the night.

The two fellows at O'Neill's were quite good company, even if their besottedness depended a little on our charity. We're due to meet them back at O'Neill's at 2pm on the Saturday after the Brewers win the World Series, whenever that may be.