Public Gets Irate, But Forget The Vote Date

Being an up-my-own-snot liberal leftie, I read the Irish Times. Never the Independent. "Nothing but a broadsheet tabloid" I sniff, preferring instead to read the Metro. At least they occasionally publish cute photos of cats. But the Jaffa Cake is job hunting and for reasons unfathomable, secondary schools throughout the land insist on publishing their vacancies in the Sindo.

I know I should bin all but the Business section. I know I shouldn't read LIFE magazine features over breakfast. Or at all. But like a bad blog, like a bad dog and a puddle of scutter, I can't resist a good nose. And what a stinker they had for me this week! Skip the pointless feature on the plus-size model who got an arse-lift and head straight to Donal Lynch's look into "the surreal world of Gaeilge" on page 22. It's stirring stuff.

LIP SERVICE says the bit that's not the headline in the corner. A clever pun! The pun fun continues with the headline COULDN'T GIVE A FOCAIL [sic] - a very witty pun on the word "focal" which, amusingly, sounds quite like like the word "fuck" in English. Richie Kavanagh would be proud.

De puns even dribble down to the sub-headline where Irish is referred to as "our 'first notional language'" ("notional" instead of "national"! Hilarious, right?) "It sounded like some kind of joke" begins his article. It reads like one, Donal. He goes on to resurrect as many bigoted clichés as his editor will allow, including (but not limited to) lambasting Padraig Ferriter (and presumably misspelling his name - maybe Donal Doodle's computer doesn't have fadas...) because he "blatantly" speaks perfect English and comparing Eamon O Cuiv (no pesky fada on his name either!) to Hitler. The piece is accompanied by a photo of Peig Sayers, postergirl for Gaeilge and "grist to the gravy train that is the Irish language". "Peig Sayers, witty feminist" wouldn't really be Donal's style.

The piece is full of dúirt bean liom go ndúirt bean leí - so and so says that... that Irish children can't read good or learn to do other stuff good because they're too busy living DeV's wet dream, that Irish is a preserve of the urban middle class elite (thank you, David McWilliams), that the Gaeltacht is populated by béal bocht chancers and that "it's just jobs for the boys", that though the European Union have recognised Irish as an official language, Gaeilgeoirí don't have the linguistic expertise to make it viable, that TG4's presenters speak a "strange American-Irish hybrid that Europe turned its nose up at", that Irish was mainly spoken in the North "among IRA men trying to confuse British soldiers"and that "French and German are being slowly swamped and eroded by anglicisations" so "we may as well enjoy the huge advantage that native English gives us in the world". And not sit at home reading Foinse and watching Ros na Rún, presumably.

A completist in his rehashing of every other tedious feature ever written about Irish, Donal mentions that almost a million and a half people claim to be able to speak fluent or near-fluent Irish and that most people overestimate their ability to speak the language. Disappointingly, he doesn't venture to discuss why those million and a half people would be motivated to tell boastful, purposeless lies.

The high point for me is when Donal suggests a Gaeilgeoir tax. "With the boom well and truly over, Irish is a pointless little luxury that the State should let people pay for, if they want to."

Grand, so. Who should I make the cheque out to?

Review: Synecdoche

I think I'll see Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen next. I hear it's a dull, incoherent mess too.

On The 16A

The driver turned the last two in the queue away as the people who'd barrelled up the stairs in search of seats all came barrelling straight back down again and sardined themselves into the corridor. The doors closed and I sucked in my breath, afraid to sigh with relief in case I burst the bus at its seams.

A girl in her twenties came running up Dame Street, Our Lady Of Self-Entitlement in skinny jeans. She stopped at the door, fixed her hair, lacquered her smile and then knocked and pointed pointedly. The driver shrugged apologetically and mimed a polite PFO. Really sorry, but we're full. "Fuck you!" she roared, and gave him the finger. I blushed for her and the little old lady beside me shook her head.

"What a cunt" she muttered, then seeing my blushes she added "sorry, love".

An Important Lesson Learned On A Wet Wednesday

Don't pick your nose if you've been chopping chillis.

A Truly Terrible Joke, Remembered In The Aftermath Of An Ambuscade

Three Legionnaires went walking through the desert under a baking sun. Why? Who cares. They just did. They really shouldn't have though, as they were pasty, gingery specimens (like me) and between sunburn, sandflies and heat rash, the desert played havoc with their addled branes. Mirages appeared on the horizon, swimming pools shimmered in and out of view, the distant tinkle of an ice-cream van teased their blistering ears.

But the Legionnaires kept marching solidly on. Very well-trained, so they were. And starving - for the dirty eejits had neglected to bring any rations. They had no choice but to press on, in the hope that they might find food and shelter. They trudged to the top of another dune, weak and weary, and bleakly scanned the horizon. Suddenly one of them froze (metaphorically speaking). "Psst," he said. His companions halted and strained their eyes to where the first Legionnaire was pointing.

"Le voila!" he said, "Regardez, mes amis, isn't zat a bacon tree on ze 'orizon?"

And sure enough, there it was in the middle of the desert, a bacon tree. Dripping with rashers, sizzling in the scorching desert sun. Slowly they crept forward, inch by inch centimetre by centimetre (they're French) until they were within a stone's throw of the bacon tree. Suddenly a shot rang out, stopping one of the Legionnaires in his tracks. The others hit the ground as bullets thudded into the sand around them.

They struggled back down the dune to relative safety, and set about tending to their fallen comrade. They bandaged him carefully and poured the last of their meagre water rations over his face. His voice was faint. "Zat was no bacon tree," he gasped, "Zat was an 'am bush!"

Felis Catus

The batteries had run low for the light in the pantry, so I pilfered four from my Rabbit and thought my, how times have changed!

Just Like That Wan Offof Big Brother

The Talk of the Bike Shop stopped by this morning for a coffee. With his bike. There aren't many coffee shops cater for that kind of thing. Asked to move his bicycle so that they might paint the gate, he assumed offence on behalf of cyclists everywhere in much the same way as I do for Gaeilgeoirí when prats refer patronisingly to them as "your people". "Sorry, we're going somewhere else" I muttered to the waitress, my hand outstretched to retrieve my twenty and my cheeks reddening with morto.

And so to Moda. As I waited for the double espresso (for his jitters) and the hot chocolate (for my nerves) I watched a young mother wrestle her newly bipedal son into his unwieldy buggy. She knocked a table. Dropped her coat. The waiter picked it up for her, and I scooped her straw hat from the floor. She made for the door like Moses parting the waters while the other patrons scraped their chairs in bellycreasingly close to the tables, knees tucked into their teeth. The waiter followed in her wake, reached around her to open the door. What a hassle. I remembered Billy Whizz waiting outside, minding his own bepedalled babby and seething at the injustice of it all, and I smiled a little wider in the hope that the barista would hurry the fuck up.

We took our takeaways to the low wall outside my office and sat amongst the builders, me in my freckles, him in his clickety clackety bikety shoes and them in their visi-vests, eating sambos from their hard hats. "Did you shave your legs?" I asked him, imagining him with painted toenails and a lather of Immac. "I'd have shaved my eyebrows if it'd make me faster."