Dun Laoghaire-Rathdown Council take an intolerant stance on dog shit in Dun Laoghaire itself,  pooper scooper signs are common with warnings about fines and cleaning up after your dog.  Yet, over the hill on Vico Road linking Dalkey and  Killiney, there is an absence of such signs.  This stretch of road is a very popular walking place, for many reasons, its views to Bray, its access to the back of Killiney Hill and its slightly more strenuous because its hilly walks.  It is a favourite walk.   I often walk from Killiney Dart station to Sorrento Terrace and back.  SK jokes that the security cameras outside Bono’s house must have picked me up so often that they probably wonder am I stalking the house.  I walked the walk this evening.  The pavements were littered with dog shit. Worse than usual, perhaps because of everyone walking off the Christmas excesses.  I tried to avoid all the dog shit, but avoiding one pile I inadvertently stepped in another pile.  In other places, its smell filled my nostrils in more than once and on arrival home, I had the nice job of scrubbing the soles of my runners with a scrubbing brush (normally reserved for bleach and the bathroom grout) and jif.   I can’t understand the abbhorence of dog shit on the sea front from Sandycove to Monkstown but no abbhorence on the sea front from Sorrento Terrace to Killiney Dart Station.  All it would take is a few signs and a few bins and we could be spared the hassle of removing dog shit from our shoes.   Course, dog owners should also hang their heads in shame.  It’s pretty unlikely that this dog shit ended up on the pavement because dog owners left their dogs off their leashes and they ran away and evacuated their bowels before returning to their owners.    Ironic that I have never seen a dog off its lead on this stretch of road.  Which makes me wonder, did the dog owners pause, watch their doogs poop, pat them on the head, say good dog Bingo and keep walking on, leaving the steaming pile for someone to walk on.  Sigh.

this christmas was the christmas i discovered hyacinths.  not that i didn’t know about hyacinths, but this year was the first year i bought any.  i bought four in separate pots. they weren’t flowering when i bought them on december 23rd, but they are now and their perfume fills the house.  not bad value for six euro. two weeks of pleasure at watching them bloom and a great perfume.  i bought white ones, white being a christmas colour.

a neighbour also gave me some blue ones which i put in a jug to try to support the weight of the stems.  unfortunately, the stems are too tall even for the jug.  but, their root structure is phemonenal.  it’s probably not a good idea to have the roots exposed to daylight, but i like looking at them.

the christmas break officially ends today. back to work tomorrow.

on christmas day i went for a forty foot plunge. which was fine. aside from the fact that at the particular moment that i went in, no one else was going in and i had the water to myself and a large gallery cheering me on.  the onlookers terrified me more than the idea of diving in.  so, in i dived, it wasn’t so cold really. not much colder than it is in the summer.

we went for a small christmas tree this year. it came ready decorated.

sometimes you find beauty where you least expect it.

i had no idea that quail egg shells were like limoges porcelain on the inside.

is it an egg, or a piece of porcelain?