THE NAKED CARROT

Crapman's job is trying to break microchips, as is my understanding. My mental image of him is holding a sledgehammer "testing" the strength of the microchips, dipping them in a variety of beers "just to see what would happen" sticking them in ice-cube trays for a day and then frying them with onions. Then if they work afterwards it's safe to say it's ready for the market.
"I have a new job!" he tells me one day and inwardly my image of him firing microchips out of a cannon towards a wall on fire was demolished. Then I realised that it was much the same job, whatever that was, except in Clontarf. I asked him to explain to me the difference:
"Well," he says, "Imagine if I was picking 100,000 carrots a day and now I have to pick 300,000 carrots, I have to move faster, and thus I will become a more efficent carrot-picker"
This was news to me as I always thought he was an electronic engineer, and never believed his interests extended to high-level horticulture.
"Not much room in Clontarf to grow carrots" says I.
"This is the 21st century mate, high-rise carrot fields these days. Try to keep up!"

He went on to say that the head carrot-pickers were sending him to Florence to pick carrots there, which took me back to my own recent Florentine adventure, where me and Kim extended our Rome trip to take a train to see David. Inspired by Michaelangelo's assortment of near-naked Sistine doodles, Kim made it her mission to go and see the most famous nudey man in the world, which stood a 17ft pillar of pure manliness in the Accademia Gallery. It was Kim's idea. She's a right dirty ho.

I felt that before I came to grips with some nudiness I should make an attempt to sanitise myself, just in case I touched something I might might give a disease to, or get a disease from, so I washed my hands in that bronze pig fountain in the nearby marketplace. Then we rolled up our sleeves, and went to man-handle some art.

We stood in the middle of the gallery, our heads cocked, gazing on the elegant marble.
"He does have huge hands..." Kim said, pointing at the famously out of proportion mitts.
"Leave him alone," I said, staring down at my own square farmer hand-shovels.
"He does have a small willy", Kim said, staring at the famously out of proportion love muscle.
"Leave him alone," I said, staring down at my own guidebook, which clearly said that David was designed for a high pedestal, which would normalise the penis size from a perspective distant and below.

While Kim was getting her fill of willies and rock-hard arses, I was enthralled by the finest lot of late medieval art I had come across on my entire trip, and I lapped up this feast, taking care not to dribble. My medievalist guise poked out but became a little uncomfortable when I recalled that Hannibal Lector also posed as a medievalist when he was in Florence, so my medieval sensibility popped back inside, lest I go and do something mental, like eat kim, or hang a police detective, or go to the opera.
I watched "Hannibal" again when I got home, and felt myself reaching for the fava beans and the chianti when I saw how he washed his hands in the same bronze pig fountain...
I should have just picked carrots.

PAPAL ATTRACTION

The Vatican was the big one… I was in a mission to meet Pope Palpatine and learn the ways of the dark side of the force. I was sure to meet him somewhere along the corridors of the Vatican Museum, possibly in his bath-towel on his way to switch the heating on or something like that – somewhat affronted and surprised by my cry of “Hey Benny!”, almost choking on his Vatican Cocoa from his Vatican mug, before he mellows and says, “aw howerye” and brings me down into the Vatican vaults for some of the Vatican wine collection, using a few priceless medieval manuscripts to mop up the Pope’s wine spillage – he’s a messy drunk that one.

But that’s not what happened unfortunately. We didn’t have the Pope offering us a personal tour around his gaff. Instead we had to settle for our Guide – handily enough called Guido, as he led us through the ornate rooms of the Vatican museum, past so many frescos I thought I would choke. Too much beauty in the one place makes it harder to appreciate, it’s like not being able to see the wood for the trees. We had decided to go on a Monday, which we learned afterwards was a fiercely thick idea, since everyone who went on a Sunday and saw that The Vatican was closed then came back the following day.

We were throng-herded through a tiny crevice that lead to the Sistine Chapel where our absorption of Michaelangelo’s five year effort was punctuated by the Vatican security giving people a bollocking for using their cameras. The ceiling itself is a neck-creakingly exciting viewing, seeing Adam and God in their original glory, not being replaced by Bart Simpson or the Flying Spagetti Monster. No photoshopped nonsense here, every lick of paint in its original untampered, uninternet-memed beauty. Good old Michaelangelo, how he found time to battle Shredder I’ll never know.

QUEER VADIS

Sightseeing is a bit difficult when you've last night blind-drunkeness to limit your vision. On our second day of Rome the wall-to-wall landmarking was overwhelming, and it hurt my head even more. We walked down past The San Carlo Quttro Fontine, the small Carloni Basilica beside it, and then past the president's gaff - at the Quirinale - which looked like it was being guarded by the village people. Two pink-lipped cartoonish sailors flanked either side of the buildings colossal doors and had some prancing traffic-cop types giving me the eye in a highly violating manner. It was enough to wake you up, and I could feel my buttocks clenching guardedly when one shiny guard came close. Italian men, I pointed out to Kim, are better looking than the women and that's just wrong. Well-preened smooth-skinned adonises with crotch-hugging designer clobber, affectionately touching people of both sexes, is enough to make you nervous or else go on the turn. Not me though, I likes me Italian women soft-jawed and me Italian men all looking like Super Mario.

A coffee by the Trevi fountain was all the perk I needed. We sat there recharging our batteries, and the cowherd of tourists filed past us, flowing down the cobbled streetlet like water. Some of this Trevi-fountain run-off would flow into the plethora of souvenir-shops, collecting all sorts of made-in-china debree along the way. We watched as the shopkeeper of one of these across the way broke out into song, her voice lifting over the hissy mono of her stereo, oblivious to our bemusement. We owed her a little rummage around her shop at least, if only to catch her rendition of the next track. We didn't buy anything though. We're cheap like that.

With the Pantheon and the Chiesa di sant Maria Sopra Minerva under our belts Something caught my eye then, as we passed the Templo Adriano. A calendar of pin-up priests sat at one of the souvenir stands, each month of the year looking more ruggedly divine than the last. Maybe I was dizzy with the gayness of the place, but I had to buy it. If you had been there, you would've too. When Kim and I got back to Cork, we'd give it to Jacqui, who we're pretty sure has a secret penchant for men who look like gay priests. The best present ever.

ROMAN CHARGES

The weather had been clear over Europe: the captain had come over the intercom to tell us we were sweeping over Paris, saying the Eiffel Tower was visibible. You couldn't miss it, it was lit up like a Christmas tree. My first view of Rome was similar: the starry orange streetlamps criss-crossed the paralleled streets, punctuated by the Colosseum glowing like a giant novelty candle holder.
The Pressure was on: I was to meet Kim at Rome Campioni airport, my flight had been late exiting Shannon , and Kim had been waiting for me, half-starting dozens of word puzzles since she landed over two hours ago. Now though, we were waiting on board for the bus to carry us to the airport. Fair enough I thought to myself, it might have been a heck of a walk. Except when we piled ourselves into the shuttle bus we zipped around a corner and we were at the terminal before the rush-for-the-seats crowd had a chance mould their ass-groove into the seats. When we got to Rome central, directions for the hostel actually made us walk in a circle - I should have known when it listed three lefts in a row - and this directional maze meant that I was hardly able to find my way back to our hostel for the rest of the holiday without Kim's help. There's nothing like a bit of female visual sense to overcome the shortcomings of male directional logic - so much for "give me the map, I own a penis". The hostel was a stones throw from the Termini station and the Piazza del Republica, a semicircled set of ornate eigtheenth-century buildings with a fountain in the centre. The fountain was placed on one of the most impenetrable traffic islands I've ever seen. There were people over there though, sitting by the fountain, though how they made it there is anyone's guess. I imagined that they had in fact been there for months, and they all hade complicated back-stories like the characters on LOST. I'm sure at the finale of LOST it'll be revealed that the whole adventure took place on a traffic island – that's my theory anyway and you read it here first.

The Piazza de Republica. Many have crossed the road to visit the fountain. Few have returned


The following morning we walked down to the Colosseum, passing Trajan's Column and The Roman Forum on the way. Our tour guide for the colosseum was called Isabella, and Kim found it hilarious everytime she introduced herself to a new member of the group: "I'm Isa for your questions" she said. We felt it was a bit unclassy to introduce yourself as being "easa" people might get the wrong idea. Many Ooos and a plethora of Aaaahs later and we had finished our Colosseum tour, and then we began our Italian holiday tradition or taking pictures of Tiger and Evil-Donkey, the more famous the location the better. In the Colosseum, we realised we decided to take them when there was a large surge in the crowd, leaving people baffled and bemused.


After a Pizza and siesta, we headed out to test the nightlife in Rome. On the corner near our hostel there was a bar-fight in progress, possibly the most gentlemanly I've ever seen, this was good old fashioned fisticuffs, all upper body work, with punches you could hardly imagine impacting on the male-preened visages of the Italian fancy-men. We drank expensive pints in two Irish themed pubs, Marconi's and The Fiddler's Elbow, before meeting a bunch of Canadians with "Road pops", which is basically legalised knacker drinking, and so we spent the reminder of the night drinking Peroni in the Piazza, with only the odd conversation with a dodgy Italian drunk to punctuate our liquid Picnic. One hairy-palmed trog tried to convince us to get on a bus with him to God knows where, where we would have been castrated like a Nero concubine and forced to partake in some eunuch orgy. Fortunately, amid the Roman lust for violence and the ever-increasing threat of gentlemanly fisticuffs we survived our first night in Rome. The next morning however it felt that Trajan's Column was being erected in my head. All I wanted to do was escape to some Island somewhere - and I knew just the place.

Garth Marenghi's Darkplace

FICKLE MATTERS

So I finally got the Crapman and the Crapwife down to the sunny south. I found them in their new Crapmobile with all the Craphounds sleeping in the Crap boot. I got in the Crapmobile then and gave Crapdirections to my house, almost trying to direct them across a pedestrian bridge. Pretty of crap of me. But we finally did get up to Monastery Hill, the soiree which followed was far from crap, complete with beer, rice crispy buns, and medieval-themed baking from the beacon. She spelt out the word "alchemist" - her medieval epithet for me - atop the buns with silver edible baubles. At least I hope they were edible. This was silver that wasn't turned into gold anyway, it came out the other end relatively unchanged through bodily alchemy. Speaking of it, poo-poo became a bit of a running (no pun intended) theme for the remainder of the weekend; whilst sitting eating ice-creams in the Bishop Lucey Park the next day, Crapman imposed upon a piece of performance art an interpretation of "taking a rather large uncomfortable dump." His name is Crapman after all (well, not really). Not to stay on a mucky subject, but "poo" comes from the Middle English word poupen or popen, and it originally meant "fart." The word "fart" appears to be much older, coming from the old english "feortan," proving indeed that the fart comes before the poop. I'm glad though, because I hate it when they come at the same time, it's embarrassing not to mention messy. I'd like to say that etymologies and medieval word-associations were floating around my head while watching the performance art thrust upon us, but Crapman was right: it was shit, and that's all I could think about.

THE CRAPCAVE AND THE CASTLE INFLATABLE

Awnya and Crapman had the grand opening of the Crapcave(tm) and had us intrepid superhero types over for a soiree avec les slabs of meat sur le barbeque, avec un chef Anglais dangereuse.

Anyway, so there I was out in Loughshinny, sipping on my cheap-assed Bavaria beer, when out their back garden I spied - shimmering in the sun with undiscovered treasure like some newly discovered Aztec pyramid - was one of Man's most extraordinarily amazing contributions in the history of invention and inflatables. The Bouncy Castle stood there, wavering slightly as the air coursed through it with a gentle enginious hum, filling out it's inflatable crevices, taunting me with it's pneumatic quiver.
As the sun began to dip behind the Fingal the trees and hedges, the thought occured to me - to us - that surely the last child must be gone, surely it's past their bedtime, surely now, we could take that castle, it could be ALL OURS... There was just one rule: NO SHOES.

So my army of men, with an average age of 28, stormed the Castle Inflatable, throwing ourselves through an invisible portcullis all trying (put failing) to look as cool as yer man off Die Hard. Our hefty lumptiness almost toppled the castle on it's side, and our efforts to oust each other from the castle's interior concussed at least one of our party (poor Jonanthan!). Through this rumpus pandemonium, one of the neighbour's kids approached us, and said - arms folded and eyebrow arched - "Playtime is over!"
So shamefaced, bruised and concussed, we made our way back to the adult world at the opposite end of the garden.

"How much did the Bouncy Castle cost you?" The Crapdad asked him.
"1080 euro," Crapman replied.
"1080 euro!"
"80 euro to rent it, a thousand more cause these f*ckers have wrecked it!"

CAMPY-FRIES

You know what's cheaper than going on holidays? Surrounding yourself with foreigners and pretending that you're in their country. Or simply sample some minute aspect of an exotic society with a bit of imagination, and you never have to go too far from home. Thus, a trip to the the local offy for a few cans of Dutch Gold becomes a vertible Whirlwind tour of the Netherlands. Or, for the truly adventurous, a sip of Tiger transports you to 19th century India, as part of a pompous upper-class toffee-nosed safari hunters, tracking down a particular ferocious - well, tiger. Also, when you are abroad, a quick swig of the Guinness will stave off homesicknesses, by instantly injecting a bit of tooralooraloo into your heart, transporting you to a typical irish location, such as a dirty bus stop in the rain surrounded by pot-bellied farmers and bling-laden scangers.

The last of the Americans have now left Cork; the wind billows through the Leeside Apartment blocks, melodiously rustling some stray plastic bag - a remnant, perhaps of some trip to tescos from a bygone era to buy macaroni and cheese or peanut butter and jelly. The boisterous hubbub that emantated from there on a friday or saturday night has given way to the clumsy fumble of some nightclub refugee, foot-scraping and shuffling down the ghostly alleyways surrounding Leeside. I can no longer pretend I'm passing by Little America, I can no longer fool myself that I'm visiting a microcosm of the USA. Meg, the last American did give me something of an American sending-off however, when she - along with the penultimate american, Paul - suggested we should go camping for a night somewhere in the Cork surrounds. We bussed it to Clonakilty, whereupon we hiked out to Inchadoney in the blazing sunshine. When we arrived the sun was obscured by clouds and remained so for the rest of the trip. That did little to dispirit our emprise though; we found an empty stretch of beach and camped in a sheltered crevice in the rolling mossy dunes, that seemed to go on indefinitely with not a soul in sight.

One illegally set fire later, and the camping trip was underway. The primal animal in me dug out a very effective hearth, which was a refreshing change, for normally the primal animal in me just makes me into a desperate-for-lovin'-but-still-can't-really talk-to-women tit. Here's where the yanks introduced their national campside cuisine, which was a benefical experience for me coming from a country where such outdoor gastronomy remains undeveloped as our camp food must come under the "can it be eaten raw in case it rains which it definitely will let's face it" category. So I tried some of that peanut butter and jelly stuff, fire-cooked hot dogs, and of course, "S'mores". Now these things consisted of crackers not unlike Liga between which lay melted chocolate and marshmallows browned over the fire. Tasty, but of a level of sweetness only really suited to the American palate. Every bite, though delicious, had a sort of diabetes-rapping-at-your-door aspect about it that had your teeth partially anatomised in your head and had you hankering for a slice of Mr. Brennan's best bland loaf afterwards.

The next day we had a quick bollock-shrivelling dip in the ocean, followed by the best sandcastle in the universe. I nerdly employed medieval building techniques,though I've yet to see a medieval castle with dismembered crab claws protecting a portcullis made out of broken mussel. Despite my slightly cultural American experience, I discovered that I couldn't deny my Irishness; for, in spite of the constant cloud cover, I was red as an embarrassed devil. I shone like a hellish lighthouse and I had people coming into my bedroom at night to develop photographs. Try to heroically convince people that "oh it doesn't hurt, really" when there's people draping their washed bedsheets over you to dry them off. Since then, I've been heating bathwater for needy families, and my dead skin can be seen in the form of a snow-scene in the latest Neil Jordan film, where I'm frantically rubbing my arms from a heightened winch off-camera onto Stephen Rea's head.

FROM HOGGY'S TO HAGGIS

I left the Callshop at midnight, bearing my sobriety like a crutch through the crowd of the messy sunday drinkers, who were rolling about the streets hodgepodge and haphazard. I hung outside Hoggy's debating whether to treat myself to some Garlic cheese chips, but the line of swaying soakage-seeking post-pubbies didn't appeal so I decided to abandon my grease-quest. I had an early morning, after all, for in a few hours I would be jetting off To Edinburgh on my first trip away in what seemed like an eternity.

So, with little sleep, I found myself the next day climbing Arthur's Seat, a large mound from where you can view the whole of Old Reeky (an uninviting old name for Edinburgh apparently, from the time before the river was filled in with a park). Sitting there - Arthur didn't mind by the way - the vista reminded me of a screenshot of SimCity, where a beginner has decided to put a castle, a palace and - just for a laugh - the Athens Acropolis all within a few squares of each other. Somehow it all works though, and we wandered carefree and up and down the Royal Mile, through GreyFriars and so on until we worked up a sufficient thirst to legitimise an afternoon pint. We drank in Bobby's bar, named after Greyfriars Bobby, the little Dog who famously slept on his masters grave until his own death. The Dog's death is, Bobby's master wasn't buried alive that I know of. Suitably oiled, we went into a dinky tourist shop and biught a tasteful tee-shirt with Sotland on it, only to discover that my cohort Meg had bought the same one. We toyed with the idea of wearing them both so we'd be the typical scoff-inducing memorabilia-wearing matching tourists. Then came the Haggis, my very first try, and suitably impressed I downed it with more gusto than I had anticipated. A pint at Finnegan's wake, followed by another at Belushi's which had the coolest vending machine in the world: the jacks had more than the bog-standard johnnies for sale, but for a few extra pound coins you could vend a vibrator, a blow-up doll, or even handcuffs. I was relieved, having left my vibrator, blow-up doll and handcuffs back at the hostel. No wonder there was a line for the cubicles what with people using their new "Bendy Brenda" dolls and their "Goliath Pleasureators" and whatnot. Not real names by the way, and they're patent pending, Flash Sex Products will be in bathroom vending machines in September. My ones'll be better though. Flash's Chocolate Butt-Plugs (tm) are already arousing suspicion. Suspicion? Er, I mean interest.

After the next day's lazy stroll around in the city - where Flash, ever the avid medievalist, walked up to the entrance of Edinburgh castle but didn't bother going in - we resolved to do one of those Highland Tour things. The Third day had us bussing
it north, to explore the wilds of Scotland. We stopped off at a wee town(see how I can fit in with the locals with my flawless use of colloquialisms there) called Dunkeld, which apart from a lovely Cathedral, was home to a shop that sold kettles exclusively:
"Excuse me, do you sell teapots?"
"No, just kettles."
"Hmmm what about milk jugs, do you sell them?"
"No, just kettles."
"Phone credit maybe?"
"No, just kettles."
"Very well, then. I'll just have a packet of Chewits and a Curly Wurly."
"We just sell Kettles."
"Kettles eh? What about Harmony?"
"That's not even a thing, it's an absract concept. We JUST sell kettles."
"Okay then, I'll have one kettle then."
"Actually we're out of kettles at the moment."
"Damn. Well what about a saucepan? I could boil water for me tea in that."
"No, just kettles."
"You're not much of a kettle-shop are you?"
"Piss off."

An hour later, and we were in Loch Ness. And I mean in, as we decided to paddle in it's freezing waters. Saw no monsters, but the revelation of my sun-shy whiter than white Daz-ultra legs put fear in the locals and attracted the interest of several paranormal scientists that were present. We took a boat ride to the middle of the lake, but my makeshift Nessie-whistle, based on the one they used to summon Godzilla in the cartoon series in the 70's, failed to work. Never trust dinosaurs, isn't that what the old wives' tale says?

When we arrived in in Edinburgh we went to meet Kim in her pub called "Dirty Dick's,"
just a few doors up from "Filthy McNasty's" and (probably) across the road from (probably)"The Guarded Fanny." All this and not a sexy vending machine in sight.

DESPERATELY SEEKIN' THE BEACON

My friend the Beacon recently went to New York. Honestly she did. It didn't happen that she was she was asked out on an obscure date and thinking quickly responded that she "had to go to a conference in New York" and hence couldn't go. And it didn't happen that she contacted me to say:
"I need flight times quick! because he's talking out picking me up from the airport and everything and I don't know what to do!"
And it didn't happen that I had to go online and work out what flights went where to construe a convincing travel itinerary, to bolster the Beacon's elaborate lie. That's not what happened at all. And to prove she DID go, I provide here photographic evidence, for all of you unbelievers out there:

THE RETURN OF THE JODI

That's it, I have no other reason for writing this FLOG entry other than that title. I just had to use it, I just had to wait until Jodi returned from somewhere.

And after a month of galavanting around Europe, breathing her own special blend of American crazed ultrapresence into the life of many unprepared locals of various Euopean cultures, she came back for one last adventure in Cork city. And now she's gone again, another Leeside American has repatrioted herself back stateside. I'll make an effort to remember her at her worst - and therefore most hillarious. Like the time when she decided it would be a great idea to pull down Nancy's pants leaving her standing before us with her 18s-certificate nether-eye peering at us like a frightened flushed-out rodent. Utterly exposed with a capital Utter. Or the time she soberly sipped her first sip from her full pint in the Bailey, then dropped the whole thing and ran away. Or the time she proudly exclaimed her fear of midgets. Or the time she came by my shop after downing a bottle of wine and then almost falling in the door shouting my name over and over - quite loudly - much to the amusement of the other customers. Or the time she came in and saw my boss there and rudely pointed and said, not to discreetly: "Who's THAT guy?!!" Or the time she fell in the Lee on her last day, and screamed:"aaaagh! I'm in the Lee! What do I do? What do I do?"
Anybody else with any good Jodi stories let me know... until then we salute her, the Crazy Jew!

ERIC CLAPTON'S ENGAGEMENT

We here at THE FLOG are pleased to announce Eric Clapton's engagment to long-time beaux Christine. Congratulations Eric.

No-one else is getting engaged as far as I know, right Dave? ;-)



Christine and Eric Clapton on Eric Clapton's graduation day, when he got his MBA last summer. No-one else I know graduated around then.

BLACK FRIDAY

With excitement unbefitting of the solemnity of Good Friday I boarded the Dublin bus, that would eventually take me to The Crapcave and a pint at the now-famous Black and Parrot. I amused myself via a text conversation with Jodi, a delightful inhabititant of the Little America area of Cork. I have great fun with Jodi, because she's teh only jewish person I know, so she bears the full frontal attack of a granary-store of racial slurs that have not until found a worthy recipient.
"When's Easter?" she had asked me a few days before.
"Ah, you know Easter... " says I, "that's when your people killed my God!" to which she guffawed appreciately.
I thought of that as I texted her from the bus:
"You'd hate it here," I texted," all the pubs are shut! What's a guy to do?"
"What?" she replied, "The pubs are never shut, what happened did the pope die or something?"
I wished for a moment then that there was a emoticon to signify a weary slapping of the brow with the palm. Instead, I replied: "No! Jesus died!"
"Oh yeah," says she, "It's like Black Friday or something"
I was about to reply with "It's GOOD Friday you crazy Jew!" before I realised it was was the Gentiles, not the Jews who were crazy - for "Black Friday" was probably a better name.

ERIC CLAPTON'S BIRTHDAY

It's Eric Clapton's birthday today! Ain't he great. Look at him here, doesn't he look cool but horrendous at the same time:



There's nothing more special about today. that's it.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------


...except that I got this email from Cian today:

Flash,

On this day every year for the past few years you've made the usual
joke to Hayman about how today is Eric Clapton's birthday chortle
chortle hardy har har. Well, I think enough is enough! That
particular horse has been flogged to death and its time we focussed on
why today is so important to Hayman; its Norah Jones' birthday today
and well you know it.

okay in that spirit:

HAPPY BIRTHDAY NORAH JONES!


Norah Jones: Isn't she lovely. And it's her birthday today and Eric Claptons but no-one elses

POSTCARDS FROM THE DREDGE

St.Patrick's Day is a day celebrating a Welshman, celebrated chiefly by Americans, celebrated chiefly in a shade of luminous tropical green that is outside the forty-shades found lapping the hillsides of even the John-Hindiest of sunny days, celebrated in the most morally-lapsed unsaintly manner possible. In fact the only Irish people who celebrate it to the fullest is Diageo, owners of Guiness and Baileys. But wait - that's actually an English-owned company and all.

Who cares though? St. paddy's day is sanctified drunkeness, seemingly religion-sanctioned debauchery, trying to combine the Irish penchant for brew and a symbol of our clerical distinctiveness. All philosophies are a million miles away though when you're standing watching the carnivalised parade trumpeting past you on a damp and unseasonably frigid Friday afteroon. I bumped into the American 'troops'from the Little America area of Cork who live near the shop I'm spending all my time in these days. Any by sweet Jesus did they look ridulous: war paint, wigs, all this bright green shite that made me look down on my pissy browning shamrock shame-faced like the man with the tiny willy in a row of occupied urinals. I realised that in order to convery my Irishness I had to be content with the fact that I was Irish. I found myself wandering the stands with two them, Jodi-with-an-I and Kristine-with-a-K (for a nation that can't spell they sure are particular about their misspellings). Kristine-with-a-K was already sozzled with a capital S, and wandered down the road singing The Divinyls' "I Touch Myself" much to the wonderment of the four-year-old in front of her. I wandered away from the Americans and met up with fellow scholar Sarah for a bit, where we delighted in taking some bawdy pictures. Unfortunately at last report this picture was the screensaver to one of the computers in the English department:



Oh dear. But that's exactly the sort of thing all those John Hindeists should be taking pictures of to capture the spirit of the St. Patricks day of modern Ireland. Just look at some of these postcards that supposedly entice people to the Emerald Isle...


John Hinde. He must wait for that one sunny day in Ireland and then go mental with his camera. What a deceptive bastard.

(One other point about this photo: There's obviously a house on fire in the distance, why don't that badly-dressed couple DO something?)


The fact that this postcard has the words "industial estate" at the bottom of it should have been a clue that they were doing something fundamentally wrong. But that's not the only problem: It's a bloody pre-fab in the foreground. A big dirty prefab. Not only that but this postcard includes a car-park. And it looks like the Trotters' have parked their three-wheeler there.


It's field. And it looks pretty brown to me. The skanky umkempt bit of my back garden where my dog does her Mr.Whippies would get more tourists than that obvious land-fill.



It's a road in Skibbereen. Nothing more. Probably a tourist attraction for it's pot-holes. "Gee Maureen, that must be where Leprechauns live!"


How to take a picture for a postcard in Waterford: Wait for the grimmest, wettest day of the year, then wait 'til twilight. Oh and ensure you have half-obscured the only building of historical interest with a lamp-post.


Don't be fooled: That sun in the top left-hand corner has been cleverly photoshopped in. It doesn't matter how much colourdy sh*te ya border the picture with, it's BRAY. It's still got pebbles that would rip the verucas off ya, and a sea that'll bleach your pubes for free.

THE KINDER OLYMPICS
I've been a bit lax with the medievaling recently. In fact, I've been so lax with English as a whole I find myself inventing new words - like "medievaling." I've been covorting with medievalists recently too to try and get myself on the straight-and-narrow, but even that seems to decrease my acadmic prowess. When I meet The Rich the evening usually gives the false outward appearance befitting of - as Rich is - an eloquent anglo-saxonist who offers the UCC English department with a bit of Oxford Alumni decorum. Yet there is no medieval muscles being flexed, only the biscep and tricep exercise that comes from the flow of Rich's austere taste in wine. An austere taste utterly lost on me i might add, who has the open-mouth-instert-here attitude towards any variety of alcohol - though I AM learning. About the only thing I am learning in Richard's company. His Oxford-alumni penchant for chess is also has attempted to culture me; though Rich - being legally blind - has a bizarre shaped chess set that have nipples on them. Which at six in the morning after a night of wine-tasting I find mildly exciting. Don't ask me how but I found it difficult to decipher between the King and Queen though, which probably explains my problems with women, too.

The Beacon is the other medievalist I have acquinted myself with in an attempt to inject a bit of lift into my flaccid medievaling whip. We had made earnest plans to meet and devise a studying schedule to get us both to actually work a bit. However we applied out academic inventiveness to devising a 'Sweetie Olympics' yesterday. Now, we haven't patented this idea yet so I'm trusting yous all to give us credit for this. Sarah won the Revels event, and I won the skittles. What you do is this: in the Revels event you have to pickm one out, and then judge its flavour. In the skittles even you must pull out one and put it in your opponent's hand: they must then chew and guess the colour.
Of course this is just the tip of the Fox's glacier mint. We din't even partake of the Smarties or fruit pastilles event. I'm still fighting to get the "Walkers-Tayto Challenge" recognised as a sweetie-olympic sport, and the exact rules of th M&M event have yet to be finalised. To train ourselves into the sweetie Olympics, The Beacon also bought me this haddock-cloured cola bar which had a small cartoon dog on the back with the following description: "Coola the dog: Full of bright ideas some of which are sensible. He's not convinced the kids take him seriously enough."
What the fook? Answers on a postcard to 28 monastery Hill please. I think I'll scan it and send it into www.Engrish.com.
As for sweetie training I'm not sure I'm able for it, I woke up this morning with a skittles hangover, after intaking enough E numbers to fill a comic book where someone falls off a cliff and says "aieeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!" in every frame. Ow! I can't even eat for Ireland. Now the Bullshit Olympics, I'd have a fair chance there.

MESSY WESSY ADDENDUM

Just had a thought.
Don't panic it happens once in a while.

When the departure from Ballyhooley road finally happened just before christmas, it looked like me and Donna may have to take up our friend Jacqui's long-standing invitation to move in with her up in Monastery Hill. I did, but Donna, in true Aussie obstinance said:
"Nah. Shit. I'm not movin' up there, it's too faaah (far). It might as well be facking Africa."

And where do you think Donna's living now?

That's right, f*cking Africa.

COMPUTER BOG WARRIOR

(1 - Paperboy)

MESSY WESSY

The Yahtzee Nazi herself, Miss Donna Wescott, has taken her very wee body away from Ireland, leaving a Donna-shaped hole in Cork City. No more would I hear her intermittently screech lyrics from her iPod as she potters around the kitchen. No longer would I hear the expression "too bright" whenever we entered anywhere where the lighting level was a few degrees above pitch. No longer would I have her getting dressed and then asking me if she looked like a boy, or if she's going to work. No longer would I have her to ask me to refrain from looking at her arse. No longer would I look into her little sad face and hear her say "aw I was holding out Kev" whenever she heard of any of my romantic escapades. No longer would I hear hear her girly farts followed by a cheeky "oops!". No longer would I dance with her whilst making our way up ballyhooley road,her iPod earphones split between us. No longer would she call me Buddha whilst rubbing my year-round christmas belly for luck. No longer would I hear that classic joke :"What did the Leprechaun say to the rabbit?... f*ck off!" No longer would I get my arse kicked in scrabble, atupidly allowing Donna to include "wog" as a valid word. No longer will I hear that deeply philosophical musing: "would you rather do a donkey or a dead person?" No longer would I have trouble distiguishing between the names "Alan" and "Ellen" throught her thick Melbourne accent (or is that Malbourne?"
And no longer will the expression "f*ckin c*nts" seem as socially acceptable (I once suggested "fornicating vaginas" as a substitute, to which Donna's response was: "Keep it clean Kev..."
Poor Donna was a little emotional when we parted ways. Emotional and drunk. The dirfference bewteen drunk Donna and sober Donna is demonstrable through these two text messages she sent me, one on her last night and the next the morning of her departure.

Drunk Donna:
"kev I'm actually crying typing this. I'm going to miss you so much. I hope you come to Aus. I can't imagine not having you around"

Sober Donna:
"Hey Buddha. Just about to board. Take it easy and ya better get to Aus! Ya c*nt!"

Charming girl. I'm glad she's f*cked off.

A very Messy Wessy takes some quiet time on Christmas day

PANZERS AUF DER UNIVERSCHEN

This Christmas, the planets were aligned in a peculiar way, not only did it give me a feast of North American-ness as has been mentioned, but also resulted in a rare meeting of the "Panzies of the Universe," a group of Portmarnock vagabonds that fancy themselves as intrepid superheroes in another plane of existence. Hayman, Crapman and I met up, along with the Crapwife and the Crapcousins, for a long night of silliness. I'm not sure where the name for our little group "the panzies of the universe" came about, but I'd like to think it's a contraction of the more masculine and fearsome "Panzers of the universe" after the German tank thingy (an easy way to make anything scary is simply to translate it into German, suddenly "Santa Claus is Coming to Town" takes on all sorts of sinster overtones). The title of "Panzies" would make it sound like a homosexual love-in, but we're all as straight as a Roman road I can assure you. Okay, so Hayman and I shared a double-bed. Okay so we talked long into the night about our dreams to set up a gay club in Portmarnock called "Port-My-Cock" (Get it?). Okay, so at certain points of the night there was almost definitley spooning, and okay, so I got random pokes from the ample Haywilly (tm). But I can assure you we're all-belching all-farting all-FHM-reading sport-watching your-mothers-a-something-joke telling bunch of chisled iron archetypes of butchness. Well, except Crapman. Me and the Hayman having been trying to drag him out of the closet for years.

It was with a weary head that I arose the next morning to make my way back to Cork. And sitting comfortably was very difficult for many hours afterwards. Thanks a lot Hayman you smelly Feckit.

I GOT MY MONEY BACK

In October I wrote a Flog entry that utterly backfired."RID YOUR HOME OF CANADIANS OR YOUR MONEY BACK", referred to two Canadian friends of mine Kara and clim (or is that Clara and Kim? their teedle-dum and tweedle-dee aspect can result in a morphing of their identies) It read: "Now that that double-act have again departed, Cork is more serene place. No longer is there a whiney north-American drawl to razor-blade through the silence, no longer does the beamish-and-dogshit Cork air have to carry the impossibly-loud octave of a people who must all live very far apart from one another 'cause all they seem to do is shout." Not long after I get an email with "sneak attack" in the subject line. "Hey dude, just when you thought you'd gotten rid of the canadian girls we go for a sneak attack when you least expect it. We've booked flights into cork dec 21 and fly out on the 30th. and it's all your fault. we we're listening to the Pogues christmas song you burnt for kim, got tiery eyed [sic]and booked flights all within the course on 30 min."
Sketch lads.
Suddenly the stock of Megasleep Earplugs Ireland went up four hundred percent, the pubs of Ireland ordered an emergency shipment from Diageo, and the Dail passed a rushed bill to make an Hiberno-Canadian sexual coupling a finable offence. The hatches were bolted down, the airport police were put on high alert, and the nervous popuation quickly readied itself. The cattle huddled hodgepodge in the corner of their fields, the more vunerable woodland rodents scurried to their dens and burrows, and the birds - for the moment at least - had silenced their carefree chirps.
The storm was coming.
I reread the email as I sat in the internet call-shop, imagining this pre-apocolyptic scenario when something extraordinary happened. This attractive twinkle-eyed young girl came in and asked me for my contact details. But wait - that wasn't the extraordinary thing: from her lips there came an unmistakable North-American inflection that was - amazingly - soft spoken.
Lindsey, a cherubine Missourian seduced me into an entirely new North American world, to the beer-swill and bubble of the energetic U.S population. And there - typically - I found myself again, surrounded by the storm.
And then hurricane Clim hit. It was like tag-team-North-Americans: As Lindsey's plane landed in Kansas, Clara and Kim were boarding theirs in London ready to visit their home away from home. Cork was ready for 'em and so was I. I hoped. I had missed them, accents and all, and they were just the fun-and-frolicks tonic I needed after my all-too-brief exposure to Lindsey. So bring-it-on, what-up, yee-haw and rootin-tooin etc. American dollars welcome here, me love you long time.