The fallen

Lunch in Casper & Giumbini in Dún Laoghaire. The drive across town was full of frustration, due to (a) two instances of road works where the guys in manual control of the Stop/Go pole gave far too long time to traffic in one direction before switching to the other and (b) torrential rain for about half the trip. We were booked for 2:45. I phoned the restaurant and left a message to say I'd be late. They phoned back to say the kitchen closed at 3:00. I said I'd be happy to talk to Carl and make my menu choices over the phone. Further frustration followed when I eventually parked in the Pavilions car park and made several abortive attempts to find the pedestrian exit which I knew was just a few door away from the restaurant. I finally slip into my seat an hour and a quarter after leaving home. Despite the talk about the kitchen closing there was little sign of urgency about ordering. The food was fine. Not great. Fine.

We did a quick tour of the Meadows & Bryrne shop afterwards and were shocked to see Christmas crackers already on display. The fallen-leaves display was dramatic along Marine Road as we continued our stroll.

The evening was mainly devoted to watching An Cailín Ciúin (The Quiet Girl), the Irish film that's been making quite a stir, is the first Irish film to gross a million euro at the box office and is to be nominanted for best international film at the next Oscars. It was okay, though I felt it had been rather over-hyped.