Dumbstruck

The day only got worse. We finally left home at 10:30 and then had to turn around because Malcolm had left the camera battery plugged into the charger behind. I was sort of good humoured about that, after all i did want to get pictures from the weekend.

Then we were off again, Molly nestling in her cradle ready to tell us the best way to go but because Malcolm is a MAN and Molly (my sat nav) a WOMAN he gagged her and chose to negotiate the streets of Dublin on his own. Of COURSE he went the VERY long way round and as he cannot gag me I finally convinced him to turn Molly on.

From then things went more swimmingly but I have to admit to enormous frustration because the sat nav was giving our arrival time for the Giants Causeway: 14h20. This was very bad news because Rose had bought tickets to a comedy show and we needed to be in Belfast by 17h00. My time hopping around the rocks had dwindled tremendously, especially as we would have to squeeze a lunch in too.

Visions of a fun road trip with our friends had also gone up in smoke - they did not get lost and were WAY ahead of us which meant finding a wonderful pub for a decent lunch was out of the question.

We finally stopped for lunch in Antrim, I was hungry and moody, not a very pretty picture and to make matters worse the pub I chose was a bit dingy and the food was below mediocre. Oh...and by now it was 15h30 and we were still 40 minutes from Giant's Causeway AND it was raining. I decided that seems the tickets for the comedy show were only a fiver we could always skip the show, but the weather was so lousy so I suggested to Malcolm that we go back to Belfast and look at doing Giants Causeway and rope bridge on Sunday. He liked the idea so some texting between ourselves and our friends ensued and we all headed BACK to Belfast.

We got to the hotel ahead of D & R and checked in. Rose had told me the hotel had a special and it was €70 but I noticed that the receipt was €160, I asked Malcolm to speak to them at reception and he said no, we would first chat to Rose and see what the story was. Of course I thought this was a bad idea but decided not to voice my opinion as I was already grumpy. A glass of wine in the bar helped and then D&R arrived and we sat in the bar a bit longer and I finally started to relax. the day really had been one mistake after the next but my humour was slowly returning.

At 18h00 we all went up and got ready to go out. I had decided to wear my new dress, a black dress with buttons the whole way down, casual enough for a comedy show, but it was cold so I wore a pair of footless tights and a cute pair of slip slops. When D&R came in to wait for Malcolm (yep, he was holding us all up) Derrick asked if my shoes were going to be comfortable for walking to the comedy show. The only other pair of shoes with me were runners so I told him it would have to be okay because it was all I had!

Malcolm gave me my ticket for the comedy show, it was from Ticketmaster and I thought, how weird to have got comedy show tickets for a fiver from Ticketmaster and then I saw...Def Leppard on the ticket. They were not planning on telling me until we got to the stadium but my choice of clothing, well SHOES had prompted them to fess up. And I thought romance was dead...

Yep, the whole trip to Belfast had been organised in February, read all about it here: http://threenewirish.blogspot.com/2008/06/lets-get-lets-get-lets-get-rocked.html the impromptu stay at the cheap hotel...quick thinking from Rose because I had started looking into B&B's for us when it was first suggested that we stay in Belfast, she knew that I would never find something THAT cheap!!!

They all thought that I suspected, especially when I posted about the Def Leppard concert last week but I honestly had NO clue, I was totally and utterly in the dark until the name on the ticket registered in my brain. Of course there were loads of rocker types staying in our hotel for the concert and they had all been at the bar with us earlier in the day, D&R and Malcolm were wincing waiting for me to ask about all the long haired people but I just sat happily sipping my wine.... oblivious. I also realised while listening to the opening act - White Snake that I am NOT a fan of rock, I love Def Leppard but they are more of a pop rock methinks.