Family, but I'm not going into details because I prefer to preserve my family's privacy.
Friends who are not neighbours.... especially the horsey ones, you know who you are!
Our lovely vets. I am going to have to learn a whole pile of new veterinary terminology.
And then there's the food :
My newly discovered favourite potato crisp, O' Donnells. They taste like they're full of MSG but they're not, so I can eat them, yum!
Rashers, O' Flynn's sausages & Clonakilty black pudding. Boudin (a French blood sausage) is almost an acceptable substitute for black pudding, but not quite
Barry's Tea (future visitors take note, a box of Barry's is ALWAYS a welcome gift)
Chowder (that's an interjection from the LSH. I don't really like seafood)
My Giant Mushrooms (sniff)
Chinese TakeAway
Going into town on a Saturday morning (another interjection from the LSH. Hey, whose blog is this?)
Going to the rugby matches (but we might look into being French Munster supporters)
Having fresh eggs every day (I'm tempted to get chooks in Provence... )
My two favourite tack shops, O Brien's Saddlery & Country Clothing and Thoroughbred Remedies Ireland (the latter isn't in Cork, but I'll still miss it)
Going for lessons at Skevanish - I had hoped to get back there before I left, but that's not going to happen
Having just had major medical check-ups, inside and out, I am pretty certain I will miss dealing with medics in my own language. I kept thinking to myself "Imagine trying to fill this form out/answer all these questions in French." Gulp.
.... and I think that's about it. Thanks to the internet, I'll have daily access to Irish news, sports programs (ie rugby matches) and chat with my friends.
I don't think I'll miss the gloomy air of morose pessimism which pervades society at the moment, although I will miss the black sense of humour which helps us to cope with all the doom and gloom.
I don't think I'll miss our very creatively corrugated road surfaces, which have caused poor Jeepy to develop an interesting and varied array of squeaks and rattles.
And, finally, I don't think I'll miss the weather, although I have to confess that a certain 22 year old who was living in Los Angeles in 1984 got fed up with all the sunshine and craved a soft Irish day (just smack me if I ever say that again, ok?)
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| A soft day, thank god! |
I have no idea what have of the food items where that you were talking about! But I think pudding that you are talking about is different from the type of pudding that I am thinking about.
ReplyDelete9 more days. . .eek!! Exciting and scary all at one, but I am it will be a great new adventure for you, the LSH, and the horses :)
Hmmm, maybe I should get Google translate to translate from English English to American English too!
ReplyDeleteBlack pudding is a kind of sausage made with pigs blood. The Irish version is bulked out with barley and flavoured with various herbs & spices. It's got quite a sausage-like texture when it's cooked. The English (or possibly the Scots) do it too, but it has a mushier texture and the Provencal equivalent Boudin is quite mousse-y in texture.
Rasher is a very Irish word, think Canadian bacon but a bigger and thicker slice. Fried up with sausages, black pudding and eggs, it's now called an Irish Breakfast but we used to have it at tea-time (6pm) and it was called a "mixed grill" in hotel restaurants in the 60s and 70s.
Crisps are potato chips, but you probably guessed that one!
I have to say, your pudding does not sound very good to me, haha!
ReplyDeleteOur pudding is like a dessert, sweet and creamy, made with milk I guess. Kind of like a custard. So maybe it is just that I am not used to a pudding that is meat based!
Irish breakfast sounds good, minus the black pudding :)
Stupid question. . .is tea time dinner? Or is that a completely different meal time?
"Tea-time" is an old-fashioned concept now!
ReplyDeleteWhen I was growing up, we had "dinner" in the middle of the day - definitely the main meal, meat, potatoes & veg. Tea-time was at about 6pm and was a lighter meal - the mixed grill/Irish breakfast was accompanied by toast, but sometimes it was salad or beans on toast or even just a banana sandwich!
But that was in the days when Daddies came home on a one hour lunch-break and kids walked the ten minutes from school and back again in the same one hour lunch-break, to walk in the door at home and have dinner on the table ready for them.
Very few families have the main meal in the middle of the day now, you'll find it in the farming community but not anywhere else.
Does anyone you know in the US have "dinner" in the middle of the day now?
PS we have sweet puddings too!
ReplyDeleteWhen I was little, my dad worked afternoons at the auto plant, so we would have our big meal when I came home from school for lunch (it was only a block away). Oh my, I am referring to my life as back in the day! I am getting old! But most everyone I know has "dinner" around 8 or 9 pm now!
ReplyDeleteMy grandpa used to call the middle meal (what I call lunch) dinner, and the evening meal (what I call dinner) supper.
I used to walk home from school at lunch time for a cooked dinner, tea was sometimes only a pot of yoghurt so I could get out to the ponies as quickly as possible... Compare that to the amount my own children eat and it's a wonder I ever survived.
ReplyDeleteUsed to love black pudding when I was a kid until I realised what it was made from and I don't think I've ever eaten it since.
@HC, I think that's why the current generation is taller than our generation - they're better fed!
ReplyDeleteYou're going to France and you'll miss Irish food? Maybe you need to get some perspective :-)
ReplyDelete(and yes, I know what 21st century Irish food is like ..)
Oh c'mon, PS, rashers & Clonakilty black pudden? How could we NOT miss them ;)
ReplyDelete(and Barry's Tea of course)