The sacred nature of water was revered by our ancestors for its healing powers. It always amuses me when a phone call with someone on the East Coast includes the question: “How’s the weather in LA today?” Answer: “We don’t have weather. We have sun.” Precipitation is so rare in bone-dry Southern California that rainfall measured in quarter-inches is cause for rapture among … [Read more...] about Sláinte!: Holy Wells
Food & Drink
Sláinte!: A Charmed Life
My friend Michael says he has a charming mother. He hastens to add: “I know you think we all do, but my mother has charms other than the ones on her gold bracelet. She has the ability to stop bleeding and cure burns and headaches and sprains and styes in the eyes just by laying on her gentle hands and reciting words handed down through the centuries.” The concept doesn’t … [Read more...] about Sláinte!: A Charmed Life
Sláinte! Ireland Conquers The World
Pining for a pint of stout, an earful of blarney, and a toe-tapping fiddle tune but find yourself far removed from the Emerald Isle? Fret not. Edythe Preet has the answer. Be ye in an off-island bulwark of Hibernian society such as Boston, New York, Philadelphia or Chicago, or the more unlikely locales of Milan, Hamburg, Oslo, Paris, Johannesburg, Beijing, Dubai or Kabul, … [Read more...] about Sláinte! Ireland Conquers The World
Darina Allen: Simply Delicious
Irish chef, TV personality and founder of Ballymaloe Cookery School, Darina Allen’s enthusiasm for food has brought the Allen family to prominence and made her a true celebrity in Ireland. But it all started with her mother-in-law, Myrtle. Irish cuisine… Now there’s a thought. But is it an appetizing one? Traditionally, it conjures an image of the once ubiquitous bacon and … [Read more...] about Darina Allen: Simply Delicious
Sláinte!: Ballinasloe’s Great October Fair
An Irish adage advises: Go East for a woman; go West for a horse. When I was a girl I had a bicycle. I wanted a horse. That was not in the cards for this city child, so I named my bike Lightening and careened about the neighborhood, crouched racing-low over the handlebars, doing daring (so I thought) one-legged pedal stands, hair flying, pulse pounding, and imagining I was … [Read more...] about Sláinte!: Ballinasloe’s Great October Fair