The Road to Kilkenny

 This morning, after another free breakfast (at which I absconded with 4 bottles of water--booyeah) we picked up our rental car, and Lizzie bravely drove us on the wrong (oh, did you expect me to say left?  NO, WRONG) side of the road to Kilkenny, which is an hour and a half south of Dublin.  The Irish roads are treacherous, and when Lizzie asked the cabbie taking us to the rental place if he had some driving advice for her, he said "yeah, don't do it."

Driving on the left in a car with the steering on the right is challenging, but Lizzie is up to it, and we have so far only banged into the curb twice, but we've got rental insurance, so, as Lizzie said to the rental clerk when he was showing us previous damage "anything we add is covered, right?" I had to add "she's not going to [intentionally] wreck the car." 

We made it to Kilkenny, parked Potato McMaude, and made our way to the parade.  As we were strolling, a little old lady behind us said "excuse me," and when we turned around she said "get out," as in "get the fuck out out of my way," which was entertaining, so we did.

So why do the Irish drive on the left side of the road?  It began in medieval England, where you'd want people passing on the right, so you could STAB THEM WITH YOUR FREE SWORD HAND if they proved less than friendly. (Note--this only works for right handed people.  Sorry, Danielle.)  The Pope was also down with this, and passed a bull that said all pilgrims needed to keep left.  However, in the late 18th century, in the US (and also France) we decided bigger was better, and had huge teams of horses pulling stuff.  These wagons didn't have a drivers seat, so the driver would sit on the left-most horse so he could lash the horses, and you wanted other wagons to pass you on the left so you could make sure their wheels didn't clash with yours Ben Hur style meaning you kept to the right. (Our first keep right law was put on the books in 1792 in Pennsylvania).  Since England is not as awesome and gigantic as we are, they had wagons with seats on the right, so the driver could lash the horses without the flogger getting caught on the payload.  The drive-on-the-right style won out in most countries, except for places like Ireland, England, and some of their former colonies (excluding us and Canada.  Canada, you rebel.).  Anyway, now you know, and USA USA USA.