Dad's Birthday

We were over in Dublin for the weekend for my dad's 75th birthday.
It was a bit of a laugh.
We flew in late on Friday night, dropped Ciaran at my mum's while Fiona and I stayed in the Travelodge in Swords. The hotel was a direct response to the decision a few years ago to replace the sofa bed with a normal sofa. It also reduced the pressure on the bathrooms...
It was  a bit of an eye opener as the Travelodge seemed to be the party night out meeting point for all the young people. When we headed for breakfast on saturday morning there were abandoned people sleeping in reception, very drunk people staggering through the corridors, a couple of very shaky girls arriving by taxi, still in last nights finest, though no longer that fine.
Saturday night the family headed out for a Chinese meal. The restaurant has changed hands a few times over the years but the food is amazing, and now they have Malaysian food also. The service was a bit less so. I don't think they had ever had to cater for a large group and seemed to struggle.
When we arrived Fiona and I jockeyed for position - she wanted to be near the overhead heater and I wanted to be as far away from it as as she could managed. We found a good compromise until later in the evening the circuit breaker on the heating tripped and the staff had no idea what happened.  All we noticed was that it progressively got colder. Eventually they realised and had Phil stand on his chair to poke the switch with a broom handle to get the heating back. Poor James and William were shattered though. After quickly eating their dinner they put their hoods up and slept for the rest of the night.
After dinner it was back to the house for nightcaps and to be told that our memories of collecting wood for the Halloween bonfires were simply shared delusions because thats not what my dad thought.
Sunday morning had more recovering people at the hotel before we headed back up to my mums.
Another family dinner with mum's lasagna and applesauce cake before Doreen and her boys flew back followed a few hours later by us three.