"No really! Where is grandpa?"

Hearing the question for the tenth time and finally my sister has had enough. "Do you think I was lying the other times? He's way ahead of us! He is probably driving into town already."

My nephew seems to made the drive his own personal competition and since the start of the half an hour journey he has been asking about the status on the racetrack. His younger brother is in the other car with his grandfather and mother and he can't stand the thought that he might loose. But he is silent now and finishes eating his icecream which has started to melt.

In my hand I study the chocolate that I have been longing for for months. They don't sell it in Denmark so my expectations were high. I dreamed of the milk chocolate and the soft creamy white center which can best be described as a melted marshmellow with a chocolate covering ...but a lot tastier, marshmellows aren't that good but the texture is similar. But it's not right, it's not as soft, I can't stretch it long before it breaks. I should have had icecream as well, it looks delicious.

This patch of road never has any radio signals so automatically I turn on the cd player. It's REM, one of my sister's favourite bands and we sing along ...badly "I'm pushing an elephant up the stairs, I'm tossing up punchlines that were never there, Over my shoulder a piano falls, Crashing to the groooooound..."

As we approach the town we drive into thick fog, I love fog when it's thick or low and crawling on the ground, wondering what it would be like to be up in the mountain in such weather, I probably wouldn't like that as much.

In the backseat we hear a sudden "80°! I have 80!" from my nephew, he is early enough that we all change our minds a few times before actually reaching the temperature meter, there is alot of steam coming out of the stream so we go for higher numbers than usual. "77! 79! 82! 81!" I settled for 79° this time and win.

Beside the gas station which signals the entrance into town the first things I see are reminders of what I missed. At 3pm there are still broken bottles by the side of the road, people are putting things together and getting ready to leave the camping area. The Irish flag is blowing on most poles as well as ribbons and plastic cups bearing the appropriate colours hanging on every other tree, some cars are even decorated. A girl crosses the road wearing pajamas and a strange looking orange hat, the party doesn't seem to be over for her as she joins a friend wearing a neckless with the signiture colours of orange, green and white.

My house looks painfully left out of the celebration. Not one speck of green, white or orange to be seen...

to be continued