BORED AT WORK

I get a lot of requests for mentions in my Blog. Just there Mary was sobbing gently to herself in the Anonymous Multi-national, cry "why, why oh why am I not on the Flog?"
"You have to do something interesting," says I, "to star in me Flog, for don't you know that's I'm a highly interesting guy with a highly interesting life."
"But how can I do something interesting?" she says,
"You have to do something," I said, blowing non-chalantly on my nails, "even if I have to make it up..."
Just then she hopped up on the table, and did a large backwards summersault and grabbed onto the rafters. Two ninjas took that as their cue to break in through the corregated ceiling.
"I will do the break of you aieeeee!" said one with a bad lip sych and dialogue that should be on engrish.com.
"I will also Mary-san" says the other, and there followed aflurry of complicated and highly cinematically-pleasing swooping moves, whic looked doubly cool when they purposefully went in slow-motion for a few seconds. When the cloud of violence dispersed, the two ninjas were to be seen in a heap on the ground, with contorted twisted bodies. Then the two ninjas were replaced by two more and Mary dealt with him in a way that's too exciting for me to even write. After them two more replaced them, and then two more and then two more after that. It went on right through my second break.
"I wanna be in the Flog too!" said Maedhbh, who hopped into a vat of hot oil and dealt with Mary-san in her own way. That was my favourite part, if I'm to be honest. Just then George Bush came in and shook her hand.
"On behalf of the people of the Unicef stake of Amigos, of which I am Presiment, I wish to thank you for ridding the planet of the evil alien terrorist bisexual Ninjas." Then when the spectacle was over, they filed carefully back to their desks, wiping away the oil and sweat from their crevices.

"What can I do that's interesting?"
I shook my head and tried to not make it obvious that I had been a million miles away.
"erm, uh..I can't possibly think..." says I.

THE TELLYLESS MARTYR

Being a bloke, I have a perfect licence to expect the world to stop turning when I fall ill, and for Bertie Ahern to delare a national day of mourning. Don't worry though, I'm not going to be dramatic. No, I'll bravely endure the onslaught of the army of viral terrorists trying to crush my spirit in a 9-11 torrent of germs. I'll be silent and bravely withhold myself against the emaciating and and mildly uncomfortable phlegmatic cloud that surrounds me. I may stumble and fall, faint in a heroic heap, and with my last dying breath whimper the words " Let it never be said that Flash grumbled when he as sick," but you will never hear me utter a single hyperbolic word that defines men as big over-the-top moans. For, as I said, I'm not dramatic.

But you know what sucks about being sick? Apart from it hampering the normal hi-jinks of me as an intrepid Indiana Jones-type adventurer (how many holy grails can i uncover if I keep coughing my guts up, disturbing thousands of years of dust? How can I deftly replace ancient security systems with counterweights if I have to wipe me nose on me sleeve?) I was left in a house with no t.v. That's right. Tellyless when sick is a jip. I tried to pick up a book and take the opporunity to read some exciting medieval verse (man am I sexy) but my eyes puffed up like an arsehole in a windtunnel. My saving grace on Wednesday was that my flatmate Jax was also sick, so we made use of our limited resources and played hide-and-seek. I thoroughly kicked her ass, even when I hid in one of the bedrooms in the corner in the dark with a laundry basket over my head. Christ do we need a t.v...

When I went back to Dublin i saw a glistening gogglebox in the corner churning out colours at me, murmuring what I imagined to be pleasant "welcome-home" noises, but it was probably Ryan Tubridy giving a generic smarmy hello. It was fitting that when I flitted on the T.V for the first time in an age, I saw a newly re-vamped Doctor Who there, as it was Peter Davidson's daleks that were my earliest T.V memory. I remember they terrified me, and I failed to see the logistic problem of organising an invasion and not being able to ascend a flight of stairs. Even an aggressive speed-bump would make the most fearsome dalek thing twice. I realised with horror, that now would be the perfect time - in our wheelchair accessible society, we are screwed if the Daleks tried to invade us. Can't make it up the steps of the Houses of Parliament? No problem for the modern dalek, there are plenty of wheelchair ramps available. Plus they get more convenient parking than us. Still, if there is a fire in a building, they're fecked and will burn with all the other wheelchair users.
With all these strange thoughts running through my head, i realised that it was probably a good thing that I don't have a t.v after all, and I switched it off, and moaned about my illness for a while.

BOOTY-FALL

The day after St. Patricks day is like the years during a nuclear winter. There's a dirty stillness in the air, and all about there is the pugency of death. Mutated sub-humans cling to the shadows, and peer out into the piercing sun with black resentful eyes. Only cockroaches have survived it; well cockroaches and those still pissed from the night before. I regarded the sullen yellow-faced post-revellers as I walked down Cork's Summerhil road. They all may as well have "regret" tatooed to the foreheads; "regret" but in smaller print beneath: "but sure wait til I meet the boys down the pub tonight and tell them all about the hi-jinks I was up to, sure wasn't only hillarious, especially that thing I did with the traffic cone. I may regret it now but I'll be feckin a legend later." Luckily most Corkmen's foreheads are large enough to contain this information. With complete glossary and explanatory notes. I should know, they're me kin.

Today though, I'm not suffering as this Patrick's day wasn't quite the embarassing spectacle my "Wept for St. Paddio" (See March 2004) was last year. I left the anonymous multi-national corporation (ie. work) at 10:30, and tried desperately to play catch up, to limited success. I found Donz on her lonesome in The Oval, doing some Claresque sleep-dancing but still somehow managed to stay more or less veritical for most of the night. I do say almost, because she did perform a graceful backwards dive into a crowd of burley men, who helped her to verticality with a courteous push. The whole effect was impressive and looked suspiciously pre-staged, I'm sure I've seen the same effect in Moulin Rouge. Nevertheless, fair play to her she saw out the full night in The Works, despite the fact that she seemed to be oblivious to everything except how much she hated the venue she was in.

When we finally climbed Summerhill and Ballyhooley Rds - two roads in cork that exhibit the x-files-worthy phenonenon of becoming steadily steeper as the the night progresses - I fell into bed... while Donz just fell. They should have ads on the telly giving stark warning about the dangers of removing your boots under the influence, something along the lines of having some fun-loving youth coming home from the pub, and in a carefree manner trying to flick off his shoe at the heel with the point of his other shoe, and then falling out a window and falling on top of a small child. That would get the message across.

Now, I sit here, in the anonymous multi-national corporation, shielded form the nuclear winter with layers of corregated steel and rays of artificial yellow light. There are morlocks all about me, all suffering from post-traumatic stress. And judging from the pained hobbling, there was a lot of unshoeing-related disasters to... erm... boot.

BOOZED AND CONFUSED

When I met Clara again last weekend, she had already had a full day. That is to say she had got up, gone to the Jameson Distillery, had got drunk, had slept, and had a hangover. Bleary-eyed and confused, she looked vaguely bewildered in the hostel reception, and I saw a shadow of tired annoyance fall across her face, as I wasn't in the first direction she faced. That's it, just ninety degrees to your left, more, more, there I am! now that wasn't so hard was it? She sat down in a swoon after that monumental effort of finding me in a room in which a flea would get Deep Vein Thrombosis. Then Kim, another delightful Canadian (yes, another bloody one!) and an Aussie (yes, another one) - who looked a little bit too much like Joe Mangel from Neighbours for my liking - went out for a few beers. Well I went out for a few beers; since they had all been fecked courtesy of Jameson's, I went to the bar in Bruxelles and requested, with the highest level of mortification, "A pint of Carlsberg and three waters please," feeling the eyes of the big smelly butch goths drilling me with contempt. And when big smelly butch goths look down their noses at you, you know you've sunk to a new low.

So I let them go home to bed, and I caught up with Crapman in the Longstone, along with the Crapmum and Diarmuid. Having arrived without Clara, Crapman arms-foldingly and eyebrow-raisedly refused to believe that she existed. We then got very sozzled, and the conversation got very blue; I would say that it was frightfully inappropriate in the presence of the Crapmum, but she was spouting the worst of it.

Sunday saw my first ever trip on the LUAS! How very exciting for me. I even got to see someone being busted for not paying their fare. I welcomed the drama since I don't have a telly at the moment, it kicked The Bill's arse. As I pulled up towards Collins Barracks I saw two Canadians waving frantically at me; I reluctantly left my live version of CSI:Dublin and joined them for a wee walk through the Phoenix Park. Enjoying the intermittent non-commital Irish sunshine, we strolled towards and sat by the Wellington monument, or as Clara called it the "phallic monument". If this is her idea of phallic, I'm in for some stiff (ahem!) competition.

Now, Lent is doing me nut. I had resolved to give up Coke (that's the drink) for the 40 days, and I half-arsedly considered extending that to all fizzy drinks (excepting beer, naturally). I made the mistake of mentioning this to Clara, who now won't let me drink anything fizzy, not for any moral reaon you understand, just to confound me. "You're breaking your bond with God!" she cries in earnest whenever I reach for anything bubbly, ignoring completely the fact that she's an atheist. So, after some merry boozing in The Brazen head, I had to settle for a tacky St. Patrick's milkshake in McDonalds. I hope God is reading this. What am I saying? - He sees all and reads all.
Man, he must HATE the internet.

"Do you SLAG me on the internet?" I just remembered Clara asking me politely not to defame her character on the Flog.
Oops.