Maria spent the morning phoning England. She’s got a bear fair at Patchings on Easter monday and that’s only 3 days after we get back. So she had to organise the advertising in the local papers. This is where the time differenece is a problem, however communication is so good these days you can do anything from anywhere.
Then around lunchtime we walked up along the Hudson to the Winter Gardens at the World Financial Centre. They hold free concerts etc among the palms and today with it being St Patricks day tomorrow they were having a concert of Irish music and dance with opportunities for people to learn some of the dances. I was looking forward to it although I did feel there was no chance of Maria actually taking part.
The music was excellent with a band lead by brother and sister Marie and Martin Reilly who are Americans born of Irish immigrant parents, they have made a couple of CDs and were excellent, they still had strong Irish accents, despite being born in Queens.
The dancing was provided by Niall O’Leary, who was amazingly lively despite having flown in from Dublin this morning.
He is apparently a former all Ireland and world champion, and you could tell. His feet moved like lightning.
There was an opportunity to go up and learn some of the easier dances, but Maria wouldn’t let me go up, she was worried about me getting trampled or something.
It was all very enjoyable and I’m really looking forward to tomorrow. We’re going to the Metropolitan Museum of Art and watching the Parade, I gather it’s a real big deal.