Beer with subtitles

It seemed a huge oversight that the Wordpress editor couldn’t create thumbnailed links to pictures.

A few moments of googling indicated that the GD module was needed; it allows PHP scripts manipulate images.

Now, I can do this:

Actually, you need to do a little more if you, like me, you prefer large thumbnails – pretty posts with the full-size image available if you wish.

To do so, edit wp-admin/inline-uploading.php and search for “imagedata“. Around those lines, the 128 is the width of thumbnails and 96 is their height; I change this to 400 and 300, respectively.

Following on from yesterday’s post, I see a similar sign to Killiney’s outside Lansdowne Road DART station.

So perhaps I’m being a bit harsh on Killiney….it’s still funny though.

A very brief trip to Killiney Beach yesterday evening; two acquaintances had spent the previous scorching weekend there so it seemed like the place to be.

It’s a very nice beach with impressive foreboding cliffs but it was cold and dark (quite unexpectedly, given the week’s record so far) so we didn’t spend too long there.

The village – unlike the other south-side stops – is quite far from the village and I like to joke that Killiney is so exclusive they don’t even want the DART; well, it’s nice to see how they’ve addressed the signposting issue.

Howth has rhodedendrons; I don’t know how they rank amongst Howth’s most famous features, but being the first bunch of flowers with their very own signpost I’ve ever seen makes me think they must be up there with the golf courses, fish shops and other delights of Howth.

Last year I just missed the full bloom of the flowers so with the recent spell of good weather and the bank holiday weekend it was an easy decision. That’s not of true of course, there are no easy decisions for me: it was between this and a spin on the Jeanie Johnston (yesterday’s docklands fun).

The €80 fee swung it; the rhodedendrons charged practically nothing.

It turned out to the right move anyway, however, as the bay was very foggy until about 4pm when the ship was due to return to the docks.

Splendid views of the bay were had by all. Notice how the sea is completely obscured by a mysterious mist. It was tempting to think that if it turned out to be a poisonous fog that turns people inside out how we would be the last go.

Next on the non-existant agenda were the cliffs. This is a great walk and highly recommended. Every bit of the coast is photogenic. Here’s a small sample…

There’s even a little “hidden” beach down a 100ft cliff. Somebody thoughtfully provided a staircase which even I felt comfortable descending.

Here’s the cliff itself, with optional waterfall:

After emerging from the cliff face, we worked out (from the map of Howth that has no scale) that we must have walked about 12 miles – add another 2 afterwards searching for a decent restaurant that would take two sweaty guys in t-shirts.

Thinking, perhaps, that he’d just taken a chance on two hopeful unknowns we got a hearty “fair play to yis, lads!” when we actually tried to pay for our meal.

This weekend saw the Docklands Festival return to the Liffey.

For reasons unknown I missed this last year and, since it had been voted one of the best festivals of 2005, I made sure to attend this time.

There were lots of artists out peddling their canvasses; a bit like Merrion Square on a weekend morning only on the river. They should do that every week, it was great. A big mix of stuff, from standard sketches of Dublin streets to moody atmospheric watercolours of Dublin streets to abstract pink sunsets and stuff (which we almost considered getting for the flat).

Our stomachs propelled us towards the food stalls, of which there were a huge variety. I couldn’t resist garlic bread (from a garlic-shaped stand) and later one of the group bought some orange – from a bright spherical orange-coloured stall.

Along the way we encountered music; samba, ska and, er, miscellaneous.

Of course, there were ships too. The Jeanie Johnston was probably the most impressive. We agonised over booking for a sailing around the bay the following morning but decided it was just too risky booking something for 10am on a bank holiday Monday morning.

My only regret was missing the duck race on the Saturday. 150,000 bright yellow rubber ducks launched from O’Connell Bridge and “raced” down to the O’Casey Bridge. There were a number of stragglers still around on Sunday, though.