I've just returned from 5 days in Italy to a miserable rain sodden Dublin. What the fuck is up with the weather at the moment? Granted it makes for a wonderful conversation opener with the city's taxi drivers, but it's putting everyone in awful bad humour. My good self in particular, as I had to pay one of the city's finest to ferry me home from work today. I'm not usually a lazy shite, preferring to stroll the leafy-with-love banks of the Grand Canal (even in the rain!) or to dice with death and pedestrians on my bicycle, but I had to fork out a tenner today to listen to some bollix's patter all through the traffic home. My trip to Italy was wonderful in all respects but one; I got another mosquito bite. Just the one, but yet again the cunt went for my ankle and almost immediately it ballooned into a discoloured and horribly unattractive swankle. I haven't been able to get into a pair of shoes since last Thursday, and though the flip-flops served me well in Italy, they're not so suited to Dublin's monsoon rains.
Of course, a four mile round trip isn't the best idea on a swankle anyway. Neither my finances nor my patience will stretch to daily taxi rides though, so I've my foot on ice and a face full of antihistamines (they're smashing right before bedtime!) in the hope that I'll have ankles again by the morning. A nice brisk pace in and out to the office will go some way towards counteracting all the eleventy course meals I ate while away. So will not eating for the next week.
The trip had a purpose other than gluttony for pasta and veal; a treasured friend was biting the bullet and marrying his seven year sweetheart. I just had to go to see it for myself, as did the other 109 guests. The wedding was in Italy as they wanted to keep it small and minimise the pomp and ceremony, so one can only imagine what it might have been like were it in Mullingar as per the original plan. I wasn't expecting to enjoy it to be honest, feeling a little under pressure to look lovely and charm strangers (only the latter would be a forté of mine...) not to mention behave myself in the company of both my parents and copious amounts of free booze, but I had an absolute ball.
And behaved myself to boot. I even met a nice boy (a teacher! how horribly respectable!) and didn't kiss him; a sure sign that I've a genuine interest. Judging by the sly winks and unsubtle nudges I was getting from the assembled company on my last night there, he may have been exhibiting some signs of interest himself. He's still there (being of a respectable profession with a ridiculous amount of holidays) but I've made some preliminary enquiries, so let's sit back and hope like fuck that he takes the bait when he gets home.
Someone has to.
Anyway, back to the wedding. At the risk of sounding like a big girl's blouse, it was a genuinely moving occasion. There was a series of misfortunes and a comedy of errors in the run up to it; the groom's sister took ill and didn't make it over, the groom left his suit in the airport, the choirboy got wankered and smashed his head off a pool table (needing 8 stitches and a good slagging), one of the groomsmen had his clothes and cash delivered by the cops having woken up in his knickers in the piazza in the wee small hours, one of the pretty ladies stood on a sea urchin, that kind of thing. But the day itself went without a hitch. (Or it didn't... pardon the disgustingly obvious pun). She looked beautiful, he looked proud, they both looked happy and grateful for their good fortune. I got to wear my big sunglasses and a bigger hat, and someone told me I looked like Buffy in that dirty teen chick flick adaptation of Les Liasons Dangereuses (untrue, but very flattering). There was no Come on Eileen, no Birdy Song, no Cliff Richard, just some ancient local boys who looked like they'd been embalmed and then reanimated for the occasion, belting out the tunes in the corner as we ate our way into the early hours of Saturday morning. My brother -the best man- gave a speech that was both sweet and utterly mortifying, and carried it off with eloquence he didn't know he had. My parents reminisced about their own wedding (at 22 years of age, it seems unimaginable now) and my faith in romance felt magically restored.
So here's to optimism. I hope a few more of my mates decide to tie the knot soon, because in spite of the rain and the swankles, it's put me in a good mood.
Of course, a four mile round trip isn't the best idea on a swankle anyway. Neither my finances nor my patience will stretch to daily taxi rides though, so I've my foot on ice and a face full of antihistamines (they're smashing right before bedtime!) in the hope that I'll have ankles again by the morning. A nice brisk pace in and out to the office will go some way towards counteracting all the eleventy course meals I ate while away. So will not eating for the next week.
The trip had a purpose other than gluttony for pasta and veal; a treasured friend was biting the bullet and marrying his seven year sweetheart. I just had to go to see it for myself, as did the other 109 guests. The wedding was in Italy as they wanted to keep it small and minimise the pomp and ceremony, so one can only imagine what it might have been like were it in Mullingar as per the original plan. I wasn't expecting to enjoy it to be honest, feeling a little under pressure to look lovely and charm strangers (only the latter would be a forté of mine...) not to mention behave myself in the company of both my parents and copious amounts of free booze, but I had an absolute ball.
And behaved myself to boot. I even met a nice boy (a teacher! how horribly respectable!) and didn't kiss him; a sure sign that I've a genuine interest. Judging by the sly winks and unsubtle nudges I was getting from the assembled company on my last night there, he may have been exhibiting some signs of interest himself. He's still there (being of a respectable profession with a ridiculous amount of holidays) but I've made some preliminary enquiries, so let's sit back and hope like fuck that he takes the bait when he gets home.
Someone has to.
Anyway, back to the wedding. At the risk of sounding like a big girl's blouse, it was a genuinely moving occasion. There was a series of misfortunes and a comedy of errors in the run up to it; the groom's sister took ill and didn't make it over, the groom left his suit in the airport, the choirboy got wankered and smashed his head off a pool table (needing 8 stitches and a good slagging), one of the groomsmen had his clothes and cash delivered by the cops having woken up in his knickers in the piazza in the wee small hours, one of the pretty ladies stood on a sea urchin, that kind of thing. But the day itself went without a hitch. (Or it didn't... pardon the disgustingly obvious pun). She looked beautiful, he looked proud, they both looked happy and grateful for their good fortune. I got to wear my big sunglasses and a bigger hat, and someone told me I looked like Buffy in that dirty teen chick flick adaptation of Les Liasons Dangereuses (untrue, but very flattering). There was no Come on Eileen, no Birdy Song, no Cliff Richard, just some ancient local boys who looked like they'd been embalmed and then reanimated for the occasion, belting out the tunes in the corner as we ate our way into the early hours of Saturday morning. My brother -the best man- gave a speech that was both sweet and utterly mortifying, and carried it off with eloquence he didn't know he had. My parents reminisced about their own wedding (at 22 years of age, it seems unimaginable now) and my faith in romance felt magically restored.
So here's to optimism. I hope a few more of my mates decide to tie the knot soon, because in spite of the rain and the swankles, it's put me in a good mood.
