As the month of ill-gust draws to a close

... good bloody riddance to it. 1 single day in day care for Aibhe at the start of the month and thus began the series of illnesses that we've still not managed to shake. First for poor Aibhe came the common cold, with associated snotty nose and general lethargy. As that appeared to ease, Alissa finally fell victim to a combination of sinus & chest infections in addition to a dodgy bug which did the insides no good at all. Of course she only discovered the extent of her own sickness as she brought Aibhe to the doc to be checked out for hers. Its the mother martyr thing. So, as Alissa finally began to recover on those horse tablets she was prescribed, Aibhe decided to get the vomits. Now, the only thing we can say is that she may have been planning for such an event given the amount of storage she had been packing away in her arms, legs and cheeks in the last few months. She wasn't going to fade away too quickly bless her. As she began to recover from that one...... there was I thinking of myself as bullet proof and that the Guinness infused Irish blood was keeping me healthy. Till of course I got floored by a virus last week, on the eve of our first weekend trip away (to Sydney - more of that anon) without Aibhe. This was not aided by my slamming into a clear glass panel at the entrance to the local pharmacy when looking to get some Lemsip, which cut my nose (thats easy I hear you say) and left a nice swelling at the top of my honker and in both eyes for the weekend. Am sure I looked a picture of health on the plane to Sydney. Then I recovered a bit, so Aibhe progressed to anti-biotics stage with this bloody ever lasting chest infection. They didn't do her any good at all, so we took her off them and now she's away to have a chest X-ray today. Unfortunately, she may also be stuck with Asthma but we will see.

They say once you enter your child in day care, expect sickness for a year. Thats 1 month down. 11 to go. Woo-fricken-hoo.

In amongst all of the above, you will have deduced that Aibhe beginning day care, signalled the recommencement of work for Alissa. 2 days a week at Cottee Parker. Gets the brain ticking over again and adds some welcome income into the pot for Aibhe to devour.

So taking all of the above into account, August was a relatively quiet month. Though we did have the inaugral Virgin Blue Charity ball at the start of the month which we attended, in the company of Mr Branson amongst a few politicians, local celebs and high rollers. One paid $100,000 to name our latest plane - Lady Rebecca which co-incidentally we flew back in from Sydney. However, the organisers didn't quite get a couple of things right, namely transport to and from the airport hangar which was pretty brutal (especially on a chilly winter night when the ladies are bedecked in dresses and high heel shoes), as was the number of female toilets (as usual at these events). Us thoughtful considerate men gave up the use of our toilets to the ladies by pee-ing along the runway fence, always allowing at least 2 yards gap per bloke for cross-winds. They should plant a few lemon trees out there now and they'd certainly flourish. We even managed to get into the pictures of the evening...... see if you can find us..... http://seq.thejuice.com.au/juicypics/showevent.asp?eventID=736. Just a shame the main band was an Australian version of Westlife. Almost like Heathrow airport for me.

Then of course there was our Sydney weekend - just passed. During which I pretty much felt like kangaroo -shit, until of course the morning we were leaving when I began to feel almost human again. Sydney harbour still is absolutely stunning, and the city..... just so fricken big compared to here.... but then, overall I think I'm happy not to be living there and just able to visit basically as often as we like. Anyway, we wouldn't be able to afford to live the equivalent life there to what we live here. The house prices are up there with Dublin's - not too many spectacular harbour views in Ringsend though.

Ahh Dublin. The Dubs. The silly ole Dubs. Falling again just shy of the finishing line with Kerry in their sight. And to Mayo? Lads lads. We could almost have relived the 70's and early 80's football finals. Them were the days. Despite my childlike (I was a child) inane hatred of the Spillanes, Liston, Sheehy, Nelligan, O'Shea... etc, the extent of my mantra back then was "Up the Dubs, down Kerry" - repeated ad nauseum. Vicious eh?