Spider Anne!

I'm alone in the sitting room with a pint of beer....This is the moment I've been looking forward to for three days! Everyone has scattered since we finished the group this afternoon. I feel especially tired because of a little added stress. If anyone reading this doesn't know me very well, I tend to stress out about things that are not under my control until I go crazy! I've spoken about this already, but in September we will have four new volunteers in this house. And the management has no concept of how we are going to manage that many people in this house. At the same time, we don't have enough money to go out and do as many activities for the groups. During this past group, we only went out for one meal (which was a quick lunch) and went shopping for an hour. That is nothing compared to the usual routine of bowling, shopping, cinema, lunch and dinner out. I found myself counting the minutes until the group was over, which is terrible! The group we had was an older group...mostly people over 60. They were okay just being in the house and having fun here. But I can't imagine what it will be like when we have another kids group. I feel like bringing in so many new people to this house is going to make our budget problems even worse, and I just don't know how we can plan successful groups. So right now I'm going to try and forget about that and let the management worry about it. I only feel that the things that we did this week are things that the members can get at home, besides the constant company. These groups are few and far between for the members and they should be filled with special activities that they don't normally get to do. After all, that is part of the whole point isn't it?

Anyways, I suppose I can talk a little about the group. I was paired up with Anne. She is so amazing! Anne is such a sweetheart, and she never complains. She giggles all the time, and is always in good form. She also has a huge crush on Paddy Murray, the man who lives here and runs the CASA charity shops. (All of the members are obsessed with him!) Every time he stopped in to say hello she would shake with excitement and shout his name! When she woke this morning she told Kate she had dreams of him all night long and Kate followed with, "Don't tell me any more than that, Anne." :) The only tiring thing was that Anne likes to know what everyone is doing at what time, but she doesn't retain the information. So I found myself answering the same questions over and over again. That is a small price to pay for being with such a kind and sweet person. She also had a running inside joke where she would call people "Spider" (but pronounced "Spy-dah"). In a quite moment she would curl up her hand and shake it at me and say "Spider!" And then she would laugh and laugh. It was so funny! We starting singing the theme from "Spiderman" but use "Spider Anne" instead. Endless entertainment, let me tell you.

Gabriele was with a man named James. He is a 79 year old man with a big personality! He plays the harmonica, and has been playing for 50 years. This of course makes him about 52 years old. ;) He bought a CD when we went shopping and when Khadija guessed that it was an Irish music CD, he pulled out the latest from Beyonce! My absolute favorite moment from the weekend was dancing and singing along to "Single Ladies" with James.

Everyone left at two this afternoon with the exception of Michaelina (one of my favs!) and Mary. Their driver was 45 minutes late, which seemed like an eternity to all of us who were so exhausted and waiting to go clean our rooms and rest! It was Gabriele and Bohye's last group, so we are going to Gibney's tonight. Most of us are leaving tomorrow to begin our holidays. Gabriele is going to America to visit Johnny. Kate is going to the west coast of Ireland before starting her trip to Switzerland in a few days. Erin is going home to Connecticut. Jose is leaving tonight to go to his home in Spain. That leaves Bohye, May, and me. Bohye is leaving Monday morning for South Korea for good. :( May will be meeting up with Kate in Dingle before going a few other places during these two weeks. I will be picking up Katie from the airport on Monday morning! So excited! I am also happy to have a few days to unwind and enjoy the quiet. I need to pack and to do a little more planning for my trip.

Katie will be leaving on the 28th, and I will have a few days to rearrange my room to make room for Lisa. She will be my roommate until the after Christmas. I'm not too thrilled to share my room the size of a closet with another person, but everyone is making adjustments, and I will too. I hope to get along well with Lisa and maybe to learn a bit of German before I go there for my Christmas holidays! :)

Ok, well I guess I better say goodbye for a few weeks. When I come back I'll have lots of stories from my trip with Katie. I am going to take her to my favorite bar in Dublin, Oliver St. John Gogarty's!! I can't wait! There is bound to be a story or two from there alone!

Love,
Claire