The start of summer

Andrew and I have been living in the new apartment for about a month now...the time has gone so fast.  In that month so much has happened.  We took a trip up to Belfast to go to the new Titanic Museum with Ashley and then we stayed up there and visited the Giants Causeway!  It was a great starter to Andrew's time in Dublin.  Since then it has gotten progressively less exciting.  We have done some local touristy things here in Dublin and spent time with friends which has been relaxing.
On the subject of my dissertation....not much has progressed.  I began work on my original idea and quickly discovered that it was not going to work and that I was no longer really interested in the topic.  So I waited for about a week and a half to be able to meet with the head of my program about changing topics.  Finally, I was approved and have a new topic - Irish Women Writers of 20th century focusing on the role of the failed father started by Joyce.  In this new topic I get to tie in a bit of my passion for Joyce with a new found interest in the writers Elizabeth Bowen, Kate O'Brien, and Edna O'Brien.  My new supervisor pointed out that in my last course paper for her (where this idea originated) I wrote very well using a psychoanalytic reading of the text - especially the relationship between the fathers and daughters.  She suggested I focus on that rather than my original idea of a political reading - failed fathers as a result of colonization and a new State Constitution which made the family unit central in the running of the country.  I am struggling with exactly how to justify a psychoanalytic reading of these texts for my argument - it works well in terms of my analysis but psychoanalysis is a large black hole in so many ways that it is difficult not to get stuck in once you enter it.  And my arguments are not necessarily Freudian - so finding where exactly my ideas fit is the first task for the dissertation and I believe the most difficult task.  I am excited but it was rough going to get to this point.
As soon as I got approved, Andrew got sick...and then I got sick....and here we are with two weeks wasted from illness.  It makes me very upset and sad to have lost that time for adventures - but we will just have to make up for it next week!!  We are planning a possible trip to the Cliffs of Moher and the Aran Islands.  Although I hope that the weather clears up - it has been raining for about 48 hours straight - there are severe weather warnings all over the island.