We enjoyed a lovely visit with our friends in Cork where I had the run of the house and their pretty garden. (They still have parsley growing.) B had some visiting to do so our sightseeing was brief but a highlight was our visit to the stunning Glucksman Gallery at University College Cork where we saw an exhibit on architecture called “Folly,” which, unbeknownst to us, featured three works by a friend.(I had just met him last month when he was in NYC for an installation of his new work. He knew Fiona quite well.)
En route to the west coast we stopped at Cong Abbey and I had a little run in the cloister. The town is sweetly maintained as the quaint Irish village depicted in the movie the Quiet Man that was filmed there. It was somewhat jarring to see the majestic ruins alongside this replica of John Wayne and Maureen O’Hara frolicking but I am not a snob about popular culture and especially admire Ms. O’Hara – a redhead like myself.