Satisfaction, frustration and apartment sitting

Hey there,

on Thursday I continued with my taske at hand and finally also sorted out all the iPad screens. These took me a while since they were kinda all over the place and it's harder to tell them apart. So that led to some satisfaction when it was actually done. After sorting them out I started putting my counts into the web-application (repairshopr) they use for keeping track on everything.
Also on Thursday I started looking up car hires since I want to go some places by car and some class mates who are in Dublin would like to come with me. Turns out that since last time I was here the car hires changed their terms regarding age requirements to 25. This frustrated me to no end because when I was here in 2014 the required age was 21 and I was 20. It felt to me like history repeating itself. But after a lot of searching, going down to the Europcar place in Galway and some live chatting I finale found two car hires who do rent their cars to people aged 23, one even doing 21, I think. Only downside is that they only have counters in Dublin Airport and Shannon Airport. So hiring a car to go somewhere won't happen as easy as I would have liked.
But that wasn't even the most frustrating/angering/cheesing me the hell off thing on Thursday. No that was still about to come and the bus not showing up probably was a sign for that. So here it comes: The girls all left at noon for a trip to Edinburgh so I knew that I would be all alone. I already had vague plans for the weekend and was really looking forward seeing more of Ireland. But all these plans were blown up on arrival at the apartment. I came in just to see a big puddle on the kitchen floor. When I moved closer I saw that water was still dripping out of the kitchen lamp. First thing for me was to try and get a hold of the girls to ask them if they know anything about it and if so if Oliver, our landlord, already knows about it. But that wasn't the case here. So I called Oliver and afterwards started to mop up the floor. At 18:30 I gave up on Oliver coming by and because I didn't know what to do for dinner since cooking was out of question I ordered myself some pizza. Before my pizza arrived Oliver finally came by asking if it was still dripping because there is nothing wrong in the apartment above ours. Unfortunately it was. So he said that he would go and have a look at the apartment next to the one above us and then get back at me about it. So a bit later I moped everything up again, emptied out the bowl I put under it and went to bed knowing there was water dripping in the kitchen.
Friday morning I did the same thing and went to work thinking that Oliver would call me if he wanted to get into the apartment. Also I noticed some water stains on the ceiling on Friday morning. At work I started the stockcount on the other iPhone parts such as charging ports, home buttons, home button flexes, back cameras and such. At around noon I buried my weekend plans for good and realised that I would spend another weekend in town and with going back to the apartment regularly because I hadn't heard from Oliver at all.
On a positive note I met Darragh who owns the shop but isn't there very often since hea lso owns at least one pub in Galway. He invited me fore pizza and pints next Friday which I happily agreed to.
I also got to learn that they use a German product for cleaning the board and the phones. It's the Kontakt LR spray.
And to actually make one thing right: The other guys name is Shane not Shawn. So sorry Shane for getting your name wrong in the other post.
After finishing work I still hadn't heard from Oliver so I decided to stock up on kitchen paper, bread, ham and cider. I also got myself a sandwich and had a sandwich dinner at home after finishing up the moping and emptying out ritual. I also called Oliver again and he told me that he couldn't figure out where the water is coming from and that he is trying to get hold of a plumber. Naturally I spent the rest of the evening home opting to watch Irish Netflix to get at least some English in.
When I woke up today the first thing was to empty out the bowl of water which was filled to the prim and almost spilling over just standing there. I also noticed that it was dripping more frequently now. Like every other second or so and that there were new stains on the ceiling as well. I hand't heard from Oliver nor where there any messages. So after getting ready, moping the kitchen floor and emptying out the bowl again I went out and just walked around in Galway enjoying the nice weather and feeling happy to be here. That's when I dscovered the Latin Quater which has really small and cute houses of which some of them have very colorfuldoors.

houses in the Latin Quarter of Galway

After a quick stop back home for my kitchen ritual I found a small market with local food and jewelery. I got myself a claddagh ring which has hands, a heart and a crown. They stand for firendship, love and loyalty. It is most commonley said to be invented in the known form by a silversmith named Richard Joyce around 1700 while being an Algerian slave. But there are earlier mentions of similar looking rings. Also, depending on which way and on which hand it is worn tells anybody about the wearers current relationship status.

claddagh ring

After purchasing the ring I just walked Shop street towards the Eyre Square. On my way there I came by a statue of Oscar Wilde and Eduard Vilde. The former is pretty popular for being an Irish writer. The latter is not as popular but he was an Estonian writer.

Oscar Wilde (left) and Eduard Vilde (right)

Next to the statue two young buskers where playing some songs. I listen to them for quite a while and when I asked them for permission to post one of my pictures on here they introduced themselves as Jack and Philippe. They also said they would check this blog out. So shoutout to them. They were really good.

Jack (guitar) and Philippe (fiddle)

For dinner I wanted to go to a café I saw earlier in the day whose name captured my attention as it was "The sitting Duck" but theywere closed already. I went to Blake's Corner bar for a pint and then on recommendation of Maxin I went to Dough Bros. This is a former pop-up restaurant which serves wood fired pizza. It was simply delicious. There is no other word for it. When I was about to leave the line went on forever which I do get having eaten this pizza.

pizza at Dough Bro's Wood Fired Pizza

After that I went back to the apartment since I'm on apartment sitting/kitchen ritual duty and I'm just about to have a lazy night in.

Stay tuned. Cheers!

Juliane