Sunday Thoughts

Can you believe that it’s the last Sunday in June? The first part of the year might have dragged, but June flew by in the blink of an eye! I’ve had a great week, with lots of adventures, I love weeks like that, they don’t happen enough.

Me and Jono were over at Lucy’s house for a couple of days. It was lovely to spend time with Lucy, the poor thing had fallen the day before we arrived, so there was a trip to the injury unit in Roscommon, nothing broken thankfully, but she sprained her thumb/wrist and had to have it put in a splint. We were in and out in about an hour and a half. I think all hospitals should have injury units, but then I realised that Roscommon hospital doesn’t have an accident and emergency unit, and people have to travel to other hospitals, that’s really not good when you need to be seen urgently. It would be better if all hospitals had both services.

I spent some time in Castlerea. I had breakfast in Hell’s Kitchen, which is also a railway museum and even has a train in it! I’ll write a dedicated blog post for that. I walked around the demesne, I have written about that before, and you can read that here. This time I stood and watched the birds, I also walked up to the outdoor swimming pool, it looks great.

I called to Benny’s Deli, which is a must visit if you are in Castlerea, they even have a freezer dedicated to gluten-free bakes. I was served by Benny and even plucked up the courage to ask if I could take a photo of him. Read my dedicated post here.

I explored Ballaghaderreen, I will write a blog post about that too. I have a lot of posts to write! I love The Little Oak charity shop; I got a huge bag of clothes for a fiver! It’s great to see that not all charity shops rip people off. Some of them are way too expensive.

Speaking of clothes, I’m still searching for a mother of the bride outfit. I have a dress that might do, but I don’t want a might do outfit. I want something that I love and that I feel comfortable in. Lucy had ordered a dress for me, and I tried it on, but I looked like a cross between Barney the Dinosaur, and an eight-year-old going to a party. My friend said I look more like a fairy godmother than a mother of the bride! The photo is above (the dress was much darker in real life), anyway that’s not the one for me. I’ve ordered a couple more dresses, so we’ll see what they are like.

When I was in Ballaghaderreen I called to The Splash Pool, it reopened after years of being closed. I had a chat with Bríd Graham about the pool, and about being in business. You can listen on the podcast.

I have opened the blog up for sponsorship. I’ve done occasional sponsored posts, but I’ve never had a dedicated sponsor for the blog before, but it would be wonderful to get a bit of financial support, even if it just covered my petrol. Some of the blogs take hours to do, the podcasts especially are very time consuming. If I’m honest I’m not expecting anything from the call out. I probably shouldn’t say that, but that’s how I feel. I did have an offer from a betting outlet, but that’s not something that I would consider. The business/person/organisation who I team up with would have to be a good fit for the blog. Anyway, you can read more about that here.

I can’t remember if I told you about my latest blood tests results. I’ve now gone from having less than 150 B12 in my system to over 2000! Talk about one extreme to another! I don’t have any more energy for it! I’m also lacking in folic acid and Vitamin D (most of the country is lacking in Vitamin D), anyway I’m on meds for both. I’ve only been on the tablets for a week, and my skin has improved dramatically. I used to have a rash on one side of my face and that’s gone, the peeling skin on my nose has also gone. It’s nice not to be spotty!

I had a follow up eye appointment with Nuala at Cooke Opticians, I still have the blocked oil gland issue, but nothing as bad as it was. I got my eyes steamed this time. I didn’t know that was a thing, I’m totally rocking the steam glasses! It was very relaxing, or it would have been if I wasn’t worried about my parking ticket running out. I had the glasses on for ten minutes, and there was relaxing music playing, it was lovely. You can read about my eye issues here.

I called to Rathcormac Market yesterday, it’s lovely to see more stalls there. I had my camera and was going to ask the stallholders if I could take their photos, but my courage didn’t come with me, and my camera stayed in the bag. I did buy some lovely goodies though, including a vegetable curry from Stevo’s which I had for dinner. I also bought a Brazilian mousse, a cookie, a chutney from Pyne’s Preserves and a t-shirt from Wild Eire, check out their products above.

I think that’s all my news. I didn’t tell you about the community garden in Ballaghaderreen, or about ending up in a field of thistles covered in sheep s***e, but that’s for another blog post!

Wishing you all a lovely Sunday and thank you for reading.