Quarantine, Movies, and Velociraptors?!
Hi everyone! I’m back after another week in Ireland. As I mentioned in my previous blog, I tested positive for COVID last Friday and had to be quarantined for 7 days. That being said, I don’t have too much exciting stuff to talk about this week. The beginning of my week was mostly spent writing an essay about the factors of emigration in Ireland from 1845-1922 which had to be turned in by Wednesday evening. I still had to quarantine on Thursday and Friday so I basically just slept in, relaxed and watched a few movies on Netflix that I’ve wanted to watch forever. Since finishing my 7 days of quarantine on Friday, I’ve caught up on laundry, stocked up on snacks, gone on a fair share of nature walks, and played a bit of pick up basketball.
The quarantined COVID crew being extremely productive and working on essays over Zoom and not arguing about whether regularly drinking milk is weird or not. (Drinking milk is not weird)
Nature Strolls
After being cooped up in our rooms for several days, everyone that finished quarantining decided to get some fresh air and go on several nature walks.
The COVID crew fresh out of quarantine
We explored nearly all of the nature trails on campus, frequently stopping to play cards (lots of BS and Egyptian Ratscrew). Luckily, the weather this week has been phenomenal for our mini excursions around campus.
Some of the beautiful greenery showcased on the trails around UCD’s charming campus
On one of our walks, we discovered an empty pit surrounded by concrete walls and fencing. We honestly have no idea what the pit is used for, but we theorized that it was used to house Velociraptors in the early days of UCD.
Abandoned Velociraptor pit in the middle of the woods on UCD’s campus?!
Shortly after discovering the top secret Velociraptor pit, we were apprehended by the dinosaur authorities and thrown in a jungle prison. Okay not actually, but it would’ve been a lot cooler if that actually did happen.
Picture of me being held captive in the jungle prison that may or may not have just been some bars covering a drainage ditch next to the trail we were walking on.
In addition to our little expeditions on the trails around UCD, we also decided to walk down to the ocean and play more cards one night. The random beach that we found boasted a lovely view of Dublin Bay and was definitely worth the short hike from UCD. While we played cards on the beach, we were able to witness the tide swiftly creep up hundreds of feet before finally stopping a few yards away from where we were playing.
View of Dublin Bay at high tide from the beach that we found
Snacks
Being cooped up in my room for so long gave me plenty of time to contemplate what snacks I was going to snag as soon as I finished quarantining. I ended up splurging on two bags of brioche rolls with chocolate chips, a box of Frosted Chocotastic Pop-Tarts, six delicious chocolate chunk cookies, and two bags of bagels (with cream cheese of course) from the Centra on campus.
Moments before a bagel feeding frenzy
Basketball
Not playing basketball over the course of the past week as well as watching the NBA Finals definitely reignited my desire to get back out on the courts, so that's exactly what I ended up doing today. We played for several hours before finally calling it quits and ordering some Domino’s for dinner.
Movies
Being quarantined meant that I had tons of free time to watch whatever I wanted. Furthermore, since I’m in Ireland, I have access to some movies on Netflix that aren’t usually available in the US. On Thursday night, I watched Hustle, which is a basketball movie starring Adam Sandler. If you enjoy watching the NBA and Adam Sandler, you’ll definitely enjoy watching this movie. I ended up watching Inglourious Basterds on Friday which I thoroughly enjoyed , but it is a bit gory so it may not be for everyone. I spent Saturday night watching Fight Club which is another top tier movie in my opinion.
Anyways, that's it for this week's blog. Thank you all for reading. Until next time!
Dominick Thornton
Computer Science
Big 10 STEM and Irish Studies at UCD













