Opportunities for Improvement


Advertisement
Ireland's flag
Europe » Ireland » County Dublin » Dublin
November 4th 2014
Published: November 4th 2014
Edit Blog Post

I hope my coworkers appreciate the name of this one. We never have failures or mistakes at work, only opportunities for improvement...Let's just say, I'll do better next time.

It's 3:00 on Tuesday afternoon (9:00am at home). I've been awake (with a few short uncomfortable naps on the overnight flight) for over 24 hours. I've learned several lessons in my menial 7 hours spent in Dublin so far:



Pre-order vegetarian meals for long flights.
I didn't know this was a thing. Being a vegetarian for 7 years now, I should know better. I've never heard "Chicken or Beef" more times in my life. I settled for a tiny salad and hunk of bread, then stuffed the pre-packaged brownie in my purse in case this is what my near future was going to look like. Thankfully, one of the flight attendants found "one extra" vegetarian meal. She firmly suggested I stop at the customer service gate after landing to make sure I ordered one for my return flight home, because "they often send us out of the states with extras, but they never do on the way back." Needless to say, I'll need to call the airline soon, since I conveniently forgot to stop at the customer service desk after an overnight flight filled with turbulence and lack of sleep. (Jason - hint-hint - order your vegetarian meal now.)

When someone asks if you want to pack Band-Aids, just grab one or two instead of saying "How likely am I to really need a Band-Aid? I'll just buy some if I need to."
Yeah, during my in-flight meal I was sawing through my rock hard hunk of bread with a deadly plastic butter knife. I was sawing so vigorously I sliced right into my thumb. When I got off the plane several hours later, I'd forgotten about my wound and it started bleeding all over the place when I was pulling my luggage. Bring your own Band-Aids.

Read instructions carefully.
I was confused in my sleep deprived state this morning as I was digging through my paperwork trying to figure out why oh why I got both a bus ticket into the city center from the airport, and also a rental car when the rental car place was at the airport. Well, for some reason my car rental didn't start until tomorrow, and it was at the city center location (not the airport location), so I just said screw it - I'll pay for an extra day.

Driving on the wrong side of the car and road isn't as scary as it might seem.
As long as you have a GPS of course. When you miss those roundabouts…boy oh boy. In the city it's pretty easy, most streets are one-way, so it's pretty hard to screw up. Getting here from the airport was a different story. Parking in the city is also a different story. I drove by my hotel at least 4 different times before I parked about a mile away in the only parking ramp I could navigate myself to.

If your flight gets in at 8am, and that's really 2am your time, you're going to be super tired. Don't hope for an early check-in at your hotel. Book the room for the previous night.
I've been walking around Dublin for 7 hours. I'm exhausted. And would love a shower. On the bright side, I've learned the area near my hotel fairly well (I'm in the Temple Bar area), and I made a visit to the National Leprechaun Museum today. Many of the rooms were quite dim, and I almost dozed off a few times during "story-time."

Double check your outlet converters.My laptop comes with a 3-prong plug. The converter set Jason so graciously lent me will only fit a standard 2-prong plug. Not sure what to do about that, but I'd better figure something out quick. Bright side: during all that walking around town today, I noticed several electronics stores. I'm sure I can find something.






Well, I hope this was somewhat entertaining. I sure feel that way about this day. Off to a hot shower and a nap.


Additional photos below
Photos: 7, Displayed: 7


Advertisement



5th November 2014

veggies
I wouldn't have thought of the food issue either. Hows the thumb? I'm glad you arrived and have a great time. Love mom
6th November 2014

Yay for arrival day adventures!

Tot: 0.167s; Tpl: 0.011s; cc: 14; qc: 59; dbt: 0.064s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1; ; mem: 1.2mb