Call Me What You Like

Me:
i should write something later, otherwise every time i look at my blog i will see Good Charlotte and cry.
The Jaffa Cake:
i was thinking that. you'd feel better if you put something else up.

Me:
i would. but what? i won't write about you. don't fret.
The Jaffa Cake:
i don't mind you writing about me, as long as it's kept fairly oblique. and that's not because i'm trying to hide things, i'll always feel that way. a little bit.
Me:
i know. i hope i haven't put anything up that you're uncomfortable with?

The Jaffa Cake:
not at all, i've really liked everything. apart from the crack about my ginger 'tache.

obviously.

Me:
it's catching, i tell ya. i have an appointment for a wax with the beautician tomorrow. in case it spreads to your beard.

(thinks: this would make for vaguely uncomfortable cut-and-paste blog comedy gold)
The Jaffa Cake: cut and paste away, by all means. i think i have my new nickname for you.
...
Garfield.
Me:
well, i do like lasagna.

You've Got Male

Conas tá inniu? I asked him, enquiring after his health. Poor lamb's been laid low for the last week with a horrific dose of the feeling sorries for himself. Oh, I've been sympa as sympa can be, but there's only so much of that I can do before I begin to smell of pathetic. So I sent the text and braced myself for a gulping reply, engineered to elicit sympathy from this egocentric bitch. A moment later, the phone lit up. Better today, I think. Eating, showering, wanking and hoovering (not necessarily in that order).

I laughed. Because he lights up my phone, this friend, I got some Jaffa cakes in for the next time he drops over. It says on the tube that they're ideal for sports bags, but I'm sure they're good for whingebags too.

Good Day

I woke up this morning from a delicious dream only to find that I was in bed not with him, but with the Tuesday Booze Blues. Blue as raspberry Mr Freeze, blue as Neil Diamond's jeans. But there was milk for my breakfast and it did not rain on my way to work. I spent a quietly busy day there, burying my nose in some complicated grammar and snuftying around everyone's blogs for a little light relief. Wondering what to write for my own.

Lunchtime saw me off to the beautician's for a wax. "It's great to get these things out of the way while you're on your break, isn't it?" "Mmmmmff" I replied through gritted teeth, all too aware of my tendency to overshare in these situations (if there is a woman hovering over my ladygarden with hot wax I will tell her anything, without really meaning to). Relieved to be released from her care, I headed back to the office only to realise that she'd left a little wax on my skin and my thighs were sticking together, by mid-afternoon my knickers were firmly glued to me. And I was a hair's breadth from a strop.

"What do you do to cheer yourself up?" a friend asked, after I confided to him that I had either PMS or schizophrenia. "Cook, walk, read" I replied, knowing full well that I was going to get a taxi home and "enjoy" some cornflakes in front of Hollyoaks - the afternoon's conversations had cheered me sufficiently to warrant it. I'm in bad form. But people don't take my ill humour seriously when my hair is this curly, and nor should I, for I have nothing to be a grumpy cunt about.

So today, ladies and gentlemen, was a good day.

Life Coaching

keith:
how badly do you want a boyfriend?
me:
on a scale of 1-10?
keith:
yep.
me:
27. i've been single for too long. i'm bored shitless.
keith:
i'm just blabbering, i'd be able to suggest something good if i knew you better.
I NEED TO KNOW YOU, ROSIE
what are your passions?
me:
music, writing, cooking, my dogs, my friends, sex, modern art, drinking...
keith:
a recipe for disaster, you'll end up like Courtney Love if you're not careful. look at all the bad men around you, and the culture. it's all about drinking. too much drinking. add sex to that and you'll end up going home with a new man a night, add art to that and you'll meet some artist, develop a coke addiction and end up walking the streets at 4am looking to score a hit of heroin (that's where it always progresses to) any way you can (i.e. sex).
me:
you'd make some lifestyle coach, Keeks. so far your assessment of me is basically "you're fucked".
keith:
there is light at the end of the tunnel. it's not going to be easy. but with the right diet, exercise, horoscopes and yoga, you can get through this. but remember you have to keep truckin' on, the last thing we need is you getting depressed cause then you'll fall behind at work, get onto drugs, lose your friends, and fall into the same quagmire as mentioned earlier.
me:
permission to copy and paste this advice for a blog post if i have a slow day tomorrow? because this is comedy gold.
...
at least i hope to fuck it's comedy.

Ladies and gentlemen, meet Kiki. I haven't, but he hasn't let that (or the fact that he lives in Australia) stop him from stepping in and gallantly trying to solve all of my non-existent problems. His brand of advice is peculiar, his brand of humour occasionally offensive, he asks hard questions and is not afraid to make up his own answers. He likes horses, engineering, unsolicited emails and his girlfriend. He is not (yet) a professional Life Coach, but he's good at it, no?

A Little Light Reading

In the last six months or so I've ploughed my way through the following, in no particular order:

Cormac Mc Carthy's The Road (apocalypse)
Patrick Mc Cabe's Winterwood (paedophilia)
Gerard Woodward's I'll go to Bed at Noon (alcoholism)
Michael Collins' The Keepers of Truth (murder)
Anne Enright's The Gathering (suicide)
Don de Lillo's Falling Man (terrorism)
Kazuo Ishiguro's Never let me Go (organ harvesting)
Lloyd Jones' Mister Pip (genocide)
MJ Hyland's Carry me Down (unhappiness)

I've also reread Margaret Atwood's The Penelopiad (misogyny) and John Banville's Eclipse (loss) just for the craic. I have loved each and every one with the exception of Mister Pip, but though I didn't love it I did like it - it just didn't give me the same itch to reread it as the others have.

But I need a break. Can any of you recommend something that will lift my spirits?

About Bloody Time*

Good news; Joe Chester is to release his new album The Tiny Pieces Left Behind on April 18th, with a gig in Whelans on the 20th. I hope to be there with big jangly bells on. Shane Hegarty recently posted about fall-back albums; I listed Shadow's Endtroducing, Orbital's In Sides and David Gray's Lost Songs** as mine. For some reason Joe's A Murder of Crows slipped my mind - probably because I was pissed at him for taking so long to follow it up. As musical comfort food goes, the aural hot chocolate that gets me through dark days varies according to the blackness of my humour but his Murder of Crows album is certainly a staple. I can't wait to hear the new one. I will, of course, dislike and deeply resent it on first listen (as I do all new music) but once the threat of the unfamiliar passes I'll fall deeply in love with it, I imagine.

I haven't forgotten about the mix tape, by the way... We're having some "technical difficulties" here; the laptop, external hard drive and I aren't speaking at the moment. Blame it all on i-fucking-tunes. Once we're back on reasonable terms I'll get it out, I promise. I know Mademoiselle Music herself is curious as to what's on it because she hasn't a notion what I listen to; given her penchant for the shiny and new I hope she's not too disappointed. Bearing this in mind I've made an effort to include some obscure remixes she might not have heard, including a Daft Punk white label jobbie, the antidote to that fucking deplorable Kanye West assault on Stronger that marred the otherwise gorgeous CD she sent me. Other oddities include Shane Mc Gowan+Green from 2002's Collaborations and a bit of Bollywood in the shape of My Guru from Bombay the Hard Way - Guns, Cars and Sitars. It's going to be epileptic eclectic.

*Just joking, Joe. I can't imagine it's easy.
**I don't give a fuck, I love David Gray. Always have and always will. The Lost Songs album breaks my heart every time I listen to it and I love Nos da Cariad from Life in Slow Motion more than I love chocolate. So there.

Letter To An Older Rosie

I Even Stole The Major's Picture

Rosie, a chroí,

How's 35* treating you? I'm writing to you on the eve of your 27th birthday, looking for some reassurance: That you kept up the jogging and that you still pronounce it yogging, in homage to Ron Burgundy. That you've published your novel, and that someone's read it. That you've still got so many good friends. That you've grown out of jaegerbombs. That you've found a better cure for your black days than hot chocolate. That you've gotten a haircut that doesn't make you look like George from the Famous Five. That you've sorted your shit out, stopped having short-lived affairs with men who are plainly not going to fall in love with you and found one you're mad about who will. That you're healthy. That you're happy.

Ag súil go mór le do fhreagra,
R

*Inspired by the Major's Letter, it was originally to be to Rosie aged 30 but the chances of me having my shit together by then are slim to none.

Stopped In My Tracks

I spurned a number of invitations to romantic drinks and dinners yesterday evening to spend a bit of time with my grandparents. Crash Grandadicoot is still holed up in James' Hopsickle, I think he may be going for some kind of record. I took a stroll up there after I'd finished up in work yesterday evening, full of apprehension and snot. I was in no mood for the hospital, for its stomach churning smell of sickness and cabbage, for the small talk or the non-talk with whomever else might be visiting. But I needed to go, I still hadn't been to see him and I was feeling guilty about it and worried - worried that he might have forgotten me.

He used to call me #1 Grandchild, you see. He still might, on a good day. I'm the eldest of his gazillion grandkids but with a nudge and a wink he told me that it was more to this pecking order than age. It was a joke at the expense of the other kids; but fuck them, I like to think that he was partly serious and that despite my tragic lack of coordination and/or interest in sport I really am his favourite. He forgets things so easily now though that I was worried he might have forgotten me in my three week absence, and that would break my heart. This weighed down my walk, I was cold and hungry too, tired and cantalach. My mam called to see where I was at, we had our wires crossed and I was now going to miss dinner in my nana's - I got angry with her, short, ended the call in a fit of pique.

I walked on, smoking furiously and seething quietly for no good reason, trying to concentrate on the music coming through my headphones and fighting back the irrational tears. And then I noticed the Hybrid Love Seat. It's a fence, essentially, a boundary sculpture between the flat complex and the Luas stop at the hospital entrance. And it's lovely. It's thoughtful, engaging and beautiful street furniture. I stopped walking, stopped sulking, took a few minutes to read the plaque about the work, took a few minutes more to admire the bronze castings and then took stock of all that was bothering me and resolved to go for a hot chocolate before venturing up to see Crash Grandadicoot.

He was in good form, full of piss and vinegar. He sang Happy Birthday to me ("What's that song they sing again? What does it go like?") and demanded that I put my new boots up on the bed to show him. He told my nana that she looked well in her yellow sweatshirt - almost good enough to *mwah!* (making kissy noises through his gums). I came away from the visit delighted that I'd stopped by and delighted that I'd taken the time to stop by the kids' love seat on my way in, to gather my thoughts and get my shit together. I'll not leave it 3 weeks before I call in to see him again.

You can read all the bumf about the Hybrid Love Seat on the artist's site.

SWF Needs TLC

I don't know what was up with me these past few days but I've been awful fucking fidgety. Distracted, impatient, cranky. So on Wednesday night I spent the evening cooking up a storm, in an effort to ease my jangling nerves. The results? A massive pot of truly excellent chili (the Swede was digging in at 11pm and pronounced it to be "werry gub" - it was hotter than he'd bargained for) and another cauldron full of my should-be-patented beef and beer stew (I had no Guinness, so I threw in some Brahma beers instead). I have limited freezer space and can't quite manage to eat 10 dinners by myself, so I've been feeding the Swede whenever possible (he's been eating two dinners all week) and I had the SWF* over for dinner yesterday evening.

We haven't seen much of one another of late. I missed her birthday celebrations as I was ill (dentist-related trauma, don't ask) and we were both busy over Christmas, so last night was a chance for a proper catch-up. I had much to fill her in on; my recent torrid affairs and tidbits from everyone else's. I love gossiping with herself and the Jock** because no detail is too gory or insignificant. I think the friendships you forge in college are of a special nature; all the drink drugs wanton sex*** study and hard graft leads to very open, funny and honest, I-will-always-love-you-because-you-know-too-much relationships. Also; when the three of us are together we inevitably end up talking about men's willies, a subject which fascinates me and one which is so rarely if ever discussed in the polite(ish) company I keep.

Last time I saw her she had a new man (and presumably a new willy to discuss) so I was interested to hear how things were progressing. Or not. Imagine my dismay at receiving this email just hours before the dissection of their sex life was to begin over beef and beer stew:

I realised this morning that I wield a weird type of power in the office. Every time I get dumped (more on that later) one of the girls in work gets engaged the very same day! Looking back through the years, the 100% success rate can't be a coincidence. They should start setting me up with guys who 'aren't looking for anything serious' so that in a few short weeks, their boyfriends will go down on bended knee. I could charge for my services and everything!

Reminds me of an awful film that I took pains not to see. She was upset but pragmatic and very funny about it; to borrow a saying from my mother - if wit was shit, she'd be rolling in it. So we had a laugh and then we watched Top Gear, while discussing the relative merits of Clarkson and Hammond and whether or not it would ever be okay to have sex with Jeremy Paxman.

*I asked her what she'd like her blog handle to be, she suggested Single White Female.
**She didn't get to choose her own. But in college she was a sporty jock, and now she works in radio, which is close enough to disc jockey for me.
***Total lie - I studied Irish and archaeology. Nobody ever wanted to have wanton sex with me.

Dad Rocks

I had dinner with my dad this evening, catching up. One of the things I miss most about living with my parents is that although I see them very often, I don't spend much time alone with him these days. He was working late in town and called to see if I'd meet him for something to eat before he headed off home on his bike (a traffic solution rather than a mid-life crisis and I believe him, if only because he dresses like a Garda in the visi-vest and geeky white helmet).

It was really good to spend the few hours talking like we did, but demanding too. When you spend little time alone, you tend to make it count and I found some of our conversations difficult. Ever anxious to know how I am and how I'm getting on, he wastes no time in asking me. Asking me about yesterday's visit to the doctor, my progress, the consequences and how I'm feeling about them. Talking to me about work, how I'm doing for myself there and where I see my job going. Enquiring after my mental health, whether I still have black days and how I manage them. Congratulating me on looking well, doing well, feeling well and expressing myself with honesty, diplomacy and grace.

For my part I'm just as inquisitive, and he answers me with the same warm candour. There's a lot I don't know about my dad and where he comes from. He tells me about it over dinners like these, or when we go walking, or on long car journeys. Some of it is very hard to hear; his childhood was very different to the one himself and mam have given me. I know I can be an awful whingebag sometimes (for my own amusement, often as not) but I also know that I have a lot to be grateful for.

Colour Me Blue

I got into the car this evening to drive home, pleasantly tired and fed and looking forward to my bed. The weekend was great (the party on Saturday night in Galway in particular) and I was in good form. It was good to be home with my parents, to spend some time with my brother and sister (especially the Saturday morning hair salon which I'll tell you about tomorrow) and to spend time with the mutts (it's oddly flattering that the little one still wets herself with excitement every time she sees me).

But I pulled out, turned on the radio and started crying.

What the fuck? There hadn't been a bother on my two minutes beforehand and I had no idea why I was crying. I wiped the tears, sucked back the sniffles and got my shit together. Laughed. Focused on something else, resumed my usual internal monologue, listened to the radio. But for the 45 minutes it took me to drive home, every time I let my brain drift off and my concentration lapse the tears would start again.

I'm home now and The Panel is on. It's not very good but it doesn't matter, I seem to be just fine again. I'm sure I'll be rosie again by morning.

No Laughing Matter

I headed along to the Laughter Lounge last night in an effort to cure what I can only hope is PMS and not some kind of personality disorder, and also because I got a mail from them a fortnight ago offering me a special deal on tickets for the show. I wasn't in form for it at all (I haven't been in form for anything all week so far) but I figured that a comedy gig could only cheer me up, right? Wrong. I came home in such a bad mood that I gave myself a headache.

Myself and the lady of the house arrived at the door at 7.55 for an 8.30 show only to be told we weren't getting in because we were late. It seems that anyone who booked tickets online got an email advising them of an 8.30 start but the gig was in full swing already. There were 6 people behind us who looked as dismayed as we did but some budgie with a clipboard had a word with the bouncers, told us (in no uncertain terms) to put our coats in the cloakroom and then herded us down the stairs as if we were bold children. There's nothing worse than trooping in late to a stand-up gig, except perhaps when there are 8 of you and there are no seats left. We formed an inconspicuous huddle down the back until the clipboard budgie swooped in again, this time looking positively pissed off. "I'll have to put you in the back" she hissed. "It's being recorded and this looks really bad". She pointed to a curtain and ushered us in behind it to a small room behind the bar where we got to watch the gig on telly. With a time delay.

I was incensed. We decided to leave during the interval and discovered a fine crowd outside who had also turned up for an 8.30 kick-off and been told to fuck off, at least until half time. There were no apologies made, there was no acknowledgement of the mistake made in the email and apart from the lovely girl manning the cloakroom the rest of the staff were rude.

Not a night out I'd recommend.

Wispa Saves Monday

My Monday grouch has just been given a nice kick up the hole by a Wispa. I've mentioned before that I don't generally mind Mondays all that much, Tuesdays tend to be more trying. They remind me of small midlands towns; unavoidable drudgery on your way to somewhere much more fun (be your destination The Weekend or Galway) and I for one will breathe a heartfelt sigh of relief once we figure out how to bypass them.

But this particular Monday has been an exception, and for no good reason. I had a great weekend (Garage in the cinema on Friday, which was great, and then a party on Saturday night, which was even better) and my day today's not going badly (dry morning, pleasant walk, not-too-hectic workload, comedy gig later) but I got up feeling that I just couldn't be arsed. The only reason I came into work was because I figured a day spent not cleaning the flat would only put me in even worse humour. I think this morning's low should probably be attributed to Saturday night's boozing; I was in too much of a jocker yesterday even to feel like I had a hangover (I just felt like I had terminal something) so the hangover's having its way with me today instead.

On an optimistic note, I've got my costume sorted for the weekend's Halloween party, and it rocks. Inspired by Manuel's dedication to his craft, I'm going to dress up as a 1950s waitress. I can't rollerskate, so I'm going to just write "pretend these are skates" in biro on my plimsolls (Gingerbeard suggested I stick little paper wheels to the sides of them, but that would look retarded). I have the New Daddy and his wailing charge out shopping for a hat for me and I had my mam put the finishing touches to my dress over the weekend (I love it so much I wore it around the flat yesterday evening, admiring myself in the mirror and trying on lipsticks). Even writing about it has hoisted my ill humour somewhat.

I've left a Wispa sitting on my colleague's keyboard so that it might lift her mood a little, as it did mine. I'm only short of sitting on my hands to stop me snarfing it before she gets back from her meeting.

Normal Service Will Resume Shortly

I don't like to blog when I'm not in good form, I only end up with melodramatic posts like last Thursday's. Nobody likes a whingey bird, and fewer people still like poetry. So I'm going to get my shit together this week, cop on, get out, all that shite, and I'll soon be in flying fettle and wittering wittily about:

• My night out with the boys last Tuesday, which caused me to bypass Wednesday like it was a nasty little midlands town
• My night in with the New Parents on Friday, where I pretended rather uncomfortably to be a grown-up who likes dinner parties
• What a fucking disappointment Superbad was
• My anxieties about an upcoming family gathering that I've taken to calling (uncharitably) The Séance
  
• The origins of the phrase "in your la-las" (an oft-used one in our house, meaning to be in uncharacteristically dire humour (like I have been for the past week)

I'll bet you can't wait.

I Have a Fan!

...or at least someone who reads this.

Grandad recently invited his readers to introduce themselves and was inundated with affectionate and witty responses. I thought about doing the same, then realised that be more than a little dispirited if I wasn't suddenly swamped with compliments on my witty prose and stunning good looks. "I keep this blog for me, whether anyone reads it or not. " Bollocks, it seems. I care after all.

But -

I set up a stats thingy for the blog there recently and noticed today that someone over in Virginia's spent the last two days reading every last rambling I've ever posted. Legend! I've done it myself on occasion when I've come across a blog that really took my fancy and worried about looking like a crazy stalker but fuck it, if it's worth reading then I can only hope that (a) they didn't notice or (b) they were as flattered as I am at having someone who wanted to read their rantings.

Anyway, my Virginian friend, I hope that one or two of them have made you smile. You've made me smile anyway.

Easily Pleased

I sent the DJ on Phantom a text this morning:

Any chance you'd play Ann Scott's Fountain for me? G'wan! Stuck on the Naas road in poxy traffic. You'd make my morning... Rosie

And he did. Even though the song's called Mountain.

The Bloggers are Revolting

Today's post was meant to be a philosophical musing on the nature of love, but I'm not in the mood. Or rather I am, but Cupid's being a bit of a shite at the moment so if I dwell on things I'll only end up in cat humour, and that's no good to anyone. There are more than enough blogs out there already with a glass-half-empty slant on things, and I pride myself on confining my vitriol to my tales of inconsiderate pedestrians.

(As an aside, I was cycling down the canal yesterday when I got to that bit where the cycle lane's been barricaded off and you have to play with the traffic. A challenge for an uncoordinated novice like myself, made all the more difficult by two very stupid ladies strolling along the road, apparently oblivious to vehicular traffic and terrified bicyclists. As I bore down on the first of them, a look of terror in my eyes and a Fiat Cunto at my heels, I shook my head in that I'm-more-disappointed-than-anything-else manner that is usually reserved for mothers whose children have just crayoned the walls. Immediately stupid lady no. 1 squawked "There's nowhere else for us to walk!". My retort was muffled by the traffic, the 50 yards it took me to think of it and the complete failure of my lungs to cope with the exercise. "How about the footpath?" Poor, I grant you, but I like to think she got the message.)

But yeah, back to being one of the few tentative optimists in the Irish blogosphere (I hate that word, blogosphere. So wanky...). Well, perhaps I'm not an optimist exactly, but I'm at least happier with my lot (and the general status quo) than a lot of the other head-the-balls out there who favour us with their insights into life and all the rest of it on a regular basis. I hate to think of them angrily crouched over their desks, hammering the shite out of the keyboard with spittle flying from their lips as they rail furiously against the world and all its injustices. Makes me want to give them a hug, and maybe buy them a pint.