Eva's Belfast Birthday! Pt 1

"Age is a case of mind over matter. If you don't mind, it don't matter."

Satchel Paige

You may remember last Halloween I had a weekend stay in Belfast, at the Titanic Quarter Premier Inn, with my sister, Eva. I wrote all about it here and here. Well, since we had such a good time last time we decided to do it all over again. However, this time we went for Eva's birthday and the first Belfast Giants home game because the two coincided. It was another awesome weekend, despite the many hiccups, and I figured it deserved posts of it's own rather than being included in My Week In Words. If you want to read about what I got up to the days before my mini getaway you can check it out here. I've decided to do it in two parts as it was quite a big weekend. This first part is Friday 11th of September and tomorrow's post will be Saturday and the morning of Sunday before we left to go home. Enjoy!


Friday was Eva's birthday! Yes, her birthday is September the 11th. It was her 20th. Not exactly recognised as a landmark birthday but I think it is. My little sis is no longer a teen. It's almost as if she's a proper adult now. Whatever that means. By the time I got up my parents had left for work and it was just Eva and I. We had breakfast and then set about getting things sorted for taking with us. We were spared the chore of packing as my mum was lending us her case and hadn't emptied it. She said if we left everything on her bed that she'd pack it for us. To save us having to lug all our luggage on the train, like last time, my dad said he'd bring it up in the car in the evening. We had everything sorted and were ready in time to catch the 2:30pm train. By the time we'd made the ten minute walk to the train stop it became apparent my wheelchair battery wasn't charged properly. While at the Color Run it had run down faster than usual so I was pretty sure this wasn't human error but a fault. Which didn't bode well for the weekend and I felt awful that my wheelchair would impact on our plans, especially with it being Eva's birthday.

We got off at the Titanic Quarter so we could stop by the SSE Arena box office to pick up our Belfast Giants season tickets. It meant we had a little bit of a walk into Belfast but because it was my first time picking up season tickets and I wasn't sure what I needed in way of ID etc, I wanted to be sure we got them on Friday in case there were any problems. I paid for them on my dad's card as mine expired before the last payment and I didn't have his card with me, which for regular tickets they ask for. Thankfully all they needed was my photo ID and we were on our merry way with these babies.

I can't believe after all these years I'm a season ticket holder again. It feels a bit surreal. Now I just have to make sure I can hold on to them for the rest of the season and they don't disappear into the black hole in our house. After picking up the tickets it became obvious we weren't going to be able to walk all the way to the restaurant Eva had hoped to go to for dim sum so we went to YO! Sushi instead. Again, I felt awful because Eva had really been looking forward to dim sum but I think she enjoyed the sushi nonetheless. 

I don't like sushi so I opted for a chicken curry and a plate of the little pancakes I'd had the last time we'd been to YO! Sushi. They were as good as I remembered. Once we'd finished up in YO! Sushi we started our shopping expedition. I've decided to keep everything I bought over the course of the weekend for haul posts. That doesn't mean I can't tell you which shops we hit and give you a couple of action photos. We went to Topshop first. As much as I think Topshop has lovely clothes I very rarely see something I'm willing to splash out on. I'm the same with River Island (unless it's the boys t-shirts). However, we seen this jumper and we both wished we were the type to be frivolous when it came to one item of clothing... 

We didn't stay in Topshop long and I'm pretty sure I almost bumped into one of the new Belfast Giants players, Desmarais, on the way out. He must be on a good salary if he shops in Topman. Okay okay... it's not that expensive. We then went into Build A Bear, picked our bears and then proceeded to walk about the shop looking at clothing for about half an hour. But gosh, we're just so indecisive. I felt guilty but we decided to put our bears back and mull it over. I'm sure I'm not the only one that feels irrationally guilty when they pick up a toy and then put it back. Like maybe it thought, 'Finally! I've been chosen! Somebody loves me!' and then it gets all sad when it gets left behind... Anyway, we then hit Forbidden Planet and the Disney Store. I may be stingy when it comes to clothes but not so much when it comes to toys and collectables. Those two stores alone put a bit of a dent in my bank account and I can't wait to show you what I bought in my haul post. Here's a hint of one thing I bought... I didn't take this photo with the intention of it being a hint but Merida was just giving me total creeper face. And no, I didn't buy Merida. I haven't actually seen Brave. 

I love the Disney Store. I think I love it more and more each time I go in. I never liked it much as a child because I used to get bummed out that it was all too expensive for me to buy. I love going in and seeing parents treat their kids. I'm not saying my parents didn't completely spoil me, I just don't have any memories of being spoiled in the Disney Store. So now I spoil myself! We then made our way to Primark. By this stage I had been rocking one bar on my battery for quite a while so I was really hoping we'd make it all around Primark and back to the Premier Inn. It felt like a miracle it had lasted as long as it had. Eva really went to town in Primark. I was a tad more reserved than during previous visits. That didn't mean I wasn't loaded up with a lot of loot.

Well, until Eva got a basket at least. I always enjoy the bemused look on peoples faces when they see me driving around like this. I did get a few lovely things and they'll also be in a haul post along with some things I picked up from Lush. 

As the girl at the till packed the bags she kept apologising to Eva every time she had to start with a new bag. I don't know why. It wasn't her fault we bought so much! Thankfully it was a nice day and not raining like the last time we stayed in Belfast. FYI, paper bags and rain do not go well... Despite having a lot to carry we did eventually make it back safely to the Premier Inn, no torn bags or broken down wheelchairs. We even seen another new Belfast Giant, Johan Edjepalm, on the way! At least I think it was him. Things basically went down hill once we got checked into the Premier Inn. It was as lovely as I remembered it. Friendly staff, spacious room. Actually, it was exactly the same room we were in last time. The problem was one of my Belfast headaches came on. I don't know why but 9 times out of 10 I end up with a headache when I'm in the city. It's probably something to do with science but all I know it's the headache from hell. I would have liked to have a lie down to try and rest it off a bit before heading for dinner but I had no BiPAP and my parents ended up leaving our stuff up to us a lot later than we anticipated. By the time they did I felt really ill and I had no time for a lie down as there wasn't much time to have dinner before the restaurant closed. I didn't feel like I could stomach much because of the nausea so I ordered chips. However, we hadn't long ordered when I felt like I needed to go back to the room. When I feel sick I tend to panic because I'm afraid of throwing up at the best of times and also because I'm scared of being sick in public. So it just makes things worse. Eva was able to bring her pizza to the room but I felt awful because she didn't have a chance to get a nice dessert. She was very understanding though. We ended up getting into bed and watching First Dates. I felt a lot better once I was on my BiPAP and lying down. So yeah, I pretty much ruined most of Eva's birthday but I hoped Saturday would make up for it.

TBC;