Thursday, September 2, 2010

Louisburgh Days and Westport Nights

Yesterday, we drove the back roads near the town of Louisburgh, then finished up in Westport with a drink outside The Clock pub and dinner at Sage, Westport's best restaurant. I had aubergine parmigiana; a homemade ravioli with spinach, ricotta, and marinara; and fogata, dessert with ice cream, espresso, and biscotti. T. countered with a chicken liver pate with crostini and a cherry preserve; sage ravioli with Italian sausage and a parmesan white sauce; and a dessert of vanilla ice cream, bananas, chopped toasted almonds, and whipping cream.












What's wrong (or right) with this last picture? Those are children playing at the water's edge, aged about 4-10. There isn't an adult in sight, whereas in America there would be a perimeter of grownups no further than ten feet away. Are Irish parents less alert or too blase? Or do they not participate in the fearfulness that characterizes so much of American child-rearing...

He's not worth it. No one is. You wonder how a sophisticated, educated person could come to this...

Nate Silver at FiveThirtyEight writes that Alaska's Lisa Murkowski is "between the fourth and eighth most liberal Republican in the Senate." Isn't that like saying that someone is between the fourth and eighth most tolerant member of the Ku Klux Klan? If you have any thoughts about what else being the fourth to eighth most liberal Republican is like, comment away!

6 comments:

Roy said...

Ah! Good old Irish cuisine! Heh, heh!

Re: the lack of adults on the beach. Yeah, I remember standing in the 50ยบ water at Ogunquit Beach in Maine as a camp counselor in the summer of 1972; we used to take 15 minute shifts (that's really the limit for standing still in water that cold!) forming a human chain around the youngest campers. I'm pretty sure the lifeguard on duty was laughing at us.

Darlene said...

That foolish woman. Wouldn't you think a woman with brains enough to graduate from medical school would have more sense than to climb into a chimney, for God's sake?

Murkowski certainly was not a liberal, but the one replacing her will be a disaster. God save us.

Foxessa said...

It's interesting to see how much the architecture and even parts of the landscape where you are look like where we are currently.

Except, sometimes, when you get down around a feeder crick into the Chester, that runs around the College campus, and you're in anything but manicured landscape, but rather a wild tangle that you need a machete to help you get through. Great place for fox (many a place here with 'fox' in the name) and other wild creatures.

Nor are we by the ocean right here, but on a river that runs right into the upper Chesapeake.

Well, as we determined, Lord Baltimore was a title based in Ireland, given to Calvert by King James.

Love, C.

K. said...

Foxessa:Most of the classic architecture in Ireland is Georgian, if that explains anything. The signature feature of Georgian architecture is a three-story building with windows that diminish in size as you go up. It's austere, with virtually no ornamentation.

The Victorians, whose architectural tastelessness knew no bounds or shame, often "improved" Georgian buildings by gussying them up with typically insipid vulgarities.

Darlene: Re the chimney doctor, you wonder how she made it 58.

Murkowski's opponent actually ran on a promise to not bring home the bacon. We'll see how well Alaskans take to that in practice, if actually does iy. Right now, thanks to Ted Stevens, Alaska gets back $1.84 for every dollar it pays in federal taxes -- a hefty return by any definition (and third best in the country). But they're rugged frontiersmen and women who detest the poor for accepting handouts.

Roy: My father gets out of South Texas in August and September in favor Friendship, which is in the Rockland-Camden area.

nursemyra said...

are those photos really taken 30 years apart? or are you joshing with me? Exactly the same furniture...?

K. said...

I'm playing with you! There's a great iPhone camera app called Hipstamatic that simulates the films and toy cameras of the 50s and 60s. It's by itself practically worth investing in an iPhone.