I know all about the busy, busy, busy thing. I get to go into my boss's office with piles of paper and then emerge from the office with bits of paper with things written on them. And then I create more piles of paper which I sometimes carry into other offices and sometimes I send electronically to people. I am currently trying to send as many emails as possible to people who are taking this week off so that they have a nice full email box to return to.
yes, my life is pathetic.
For St. Pat's I went and saw House of the Flying Daggers which disappointed me I think because I had such high expectations. It did not overwhelm in the same way that Crouching Tiger did (which I think is an amazing film) though the whole brothel was pretty amazing looking and the fight in the bamboo forest was something else.
Then I went off to Newbridge to spend an exciting weekend with physicists who are all giddy celebrating Einstein and Hamilton year. Did you know that DeValera was a math teach? There was a physics quiz with physics prizes and talks and a meal with a piper that piped in a cake (which I still think is a bit odd). Though I am bitter. Last autumn I called in every favour I could and arranged: a)tickets to the rugby in cardiff b)babysitting for the weekend c) a place to stay[free!] and d) sourced cheap plane tickets. As such, I am at a loss to explain why I spent the 19th of March in a posh hotel outside Dublin surrounded by unhappy Irish physicists when I could have been so drunk I would be talking welsh in cardiff. And I am holding this grudge until I die (it is going in the memory box with the time my parents shouted at me for digging for dinosaur bones in the flower beds at the front of the house--oh the injustice!)

Easter, alas is a distant memory. There were oysters in Donegal and bad chinese food in Coleraine but not a whole bunch of chocolate for me. The small child, of course, has a plethora of bunnies and not all of them chocolate. I think several are getting married. I suppose the abundance of bunnies makes up for the lack of teeth. Six gone and she isn't that much older than five. Her spelling is quite amusing too.
Best of all, there are already holes appearing in the wine rack. Lent did end early. In newbridge, with the rugby. Some people I work with now tell me I am damned to burn in hell (not the first time I have heard that, strangely enough) but they also claim they get to eat as much chocolate and crisps as they like on St. Pat's Day. and well it never got back on track. 31 days with out alcohol. more than enough.
Next year I am threatening to hold a seder. For a friend's child who wants to know how you meet people of other cultures and backgrounds.