Saturday catchup

On Saturday morning I was up early and on the train out to Bray to Kilruddery house to support 150+ Irish Life staff doing Hell & Back in aid of our Staff Charities

 

Later that evening Enid, Katie and I met up and went to Five Guys in George's Street - irony I know but we wanted to go check it out to compare to the US Five Guys after reading an horrific review of it in the Irish Times.  We enjoyed it/liked it bit thought it was terribly expensive for what it is.

 

And then we headed to Croke Park for Taylor Swift (Katie had won tickets).

It was a great show, and I really enjoyed it  but I cannot say that it is has turned me into a Taylor Swift fan.  (As good and clearly talented she is)

Let's get Quizzical!

The time has rolled around for our annual big huge company Quiz night - the Ultimate Irish Life Quiz - in aid of our Staff Charities

 

Here is me wearing my purple Staff Charities committee member polo shirt.  I just adore this shirt!

 

The night was a great success - as it always is.  Our quizmaster is a brilliant MC who runs through the questions and answers at a nice pace. And a huge part of the night is his brilliant method of awarding extra points!  If you get up on a chair and sing a song this gets you ten or so points. If you can get everyone singing along with you then this could be worth as much as twenty.  And if you get boo-ed well that might be worth twenty or so also!

 

New for this year we arranged for pizzas to be delivered  - extra large, and one for every table! The novelty of a big load of pizzas arriving was great.  Plus from an organisational perspective this worked so much better than any other food option we have done in the past: in terms of service and quantity of food for everyone. I think this is something we will be doing again in the future as everyone really seemed happy with it

Here's just 25% of our the total pizza delivery so you can imagine what the full order looked like!

 

Abseil 2017

 

Last week my company's staff charity's committee ran a massive fundraiser to raise money for our two staff charities for 2017 - MS Ireland and CMRF Crumlin.

119 Irish Life staff members (myself included) abseiled down the front of the Irish Life building - and it was a great success.  It looks like we will have raised in the region of €80k in total - the count is ongoing and we will have the final figure in next week. 

 

Go Irish Life Staff!

Christmas is coming...

Christmas is coming and that means one thing!

 

Two large cheques from the staff of Irish Life to our two chosen charities.

I am proud to work for this company and with people who are so generous. €172k raised by staff through all manners of events and fundraisers, and then matched by the company.

 

We just never stop!

Our last fundraising effort of 2016 - selling a Christmas CD produced by the work choir.

 

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Luna!

 

On Friday, Enid and I went to Luna for lunch - our usual Christmas get together (boozy lunch!)  and she was celebrating some good news too.  Go Enid!

 

Food was good - not the best I've had in Dublin but very enjoyable.  The ambiance and general setting of Luna is the real winner in my opinion.

 

Dessert arrived on a trolley which made us smile. When we were 17 we worked weekend jobs in the restaurant of the Gresham Hotel where they too used a trolley. We normally worked the breakfast shift (6am - 2pm) but on the rare occasions we worked dinner service we covered the dessert trolley.

 

 

Then that evening I hosted my two friends before heading into town. 

I made basil gimlets (gin, lime juice, sugar syrup, basil & ice) and we also had beer and pizza.

The party really got going,,,and very nearly ended when it emerged I had no shot glasses.  Quelle horreur! Luckily my espresso cups saved the day and we had a couple of Frangelico and Baileys which I thoroughly recommend.

 

We then headed around the corner and did a small crawl of The Shelbourne, 37 & Sam's Bar. 

 'Twas a fun night!

 

A fun night generally means a sore head the next day but thankfully I felt fine!  And even better after a lovely breakfast of fried avocado and rashers. 

Signs that Christmas is coming

Every year in the run up to Christmas things begin to happen, that just like that Slade song from the 70's scream out to me "It's CHRISTMaaaaaaaS"

 

 

My company's Staff Charities committee handed over cheques to our 2015 staff charities - St Francis Hospice and  Friends of Frank.

This year, staff in Irish Life raised €222,000 in total so they were mighty Big Cheques (€111k apiece) handed over

#proud

#awesome

 

There I am on the right hand side of the photograph. 

As you can see (from the clothes we are wearing) it is a particularly mild December right now.  The weather is not screaming Christmas to me I admit!

 

I watched The Family Stone which is one of my absolute favourite Christmas films.  Donabate library was showing it on their big screen so I got the train out to watch it last Wednesday after work. 

 

I bought a bottle of Baileys. It's not Christmas without a bottle of Baileys!

This is on special offer in Supervalu at the moment - reduced from €22 to €12, sure I'm practically making money at that price!

 

It's a work tradition that on a Friday evening close to Christmas we have Irish coffees. 

Delicious! And Christmassy!