Head Rambles

Grandad May 20th, 2007

In the old days, the heart of Dublin was Nelson’s Pillar.

It was the focus of the city. It was marked as the destination on buses going to the city.

I used to love that pillar. For 6 pennies [a tanner] you could enter the dark doorway, and climb the spiral staircase inside, right to the top. The view was fantastic. The flower and fruit sellers used to have their stalls around the base. It was a meeting place. I loved it.

In 1966 the IRA blew it up. The bastards. It was supposed to represent “British Imperialism” or something. Crap. It was an icon of the city.

They should have left the stump as a monument to stupidity.

It was removed though, and replaced with a “fountain”. That was an ugly yoke. It was a figure of a very depressed looking female sitting in a tub. It was supposed to represent the river Liffey. It became known as “The Floozie in the Jacuzzi” and became a handy place to dump your old beer cans and McDonalds junk. It was removed.

I can’t describe what replaced it. It’s not a monument. It’s not a statue. It’s certainly not a building, even though they employed a firm of architects to “design” it. I don’t know how much training they had to learn to draw a straight line?

It cost nearly 5 million Euro to put up. But what is it?

It is completely functionless.

If they grew sweet pea plants up it in the summer, it would be nice. If they had drilled holes through it, it could have made a fluting noise in the wind. If they had attached mobile phone antennas at the top, it would have a purpose. Come to think of it, a mobile phone mast would have been more attractive.

It is supposed to be self cleaning. I have this vision of it waiting until no-one is looking and then shaking itself like a dog. And they still have to clean it every year!

It has, of course attracted a load of colloquial names:

Bertie’s prick,
Stiletto in the Ghetto,
Erection at the Intersection,
Stiffy by the Liffey

It even has it’s own website for god’s sake. The only nothing in the world to have a website.

I don’t like it, because there is nothing to like. I don’t dislike it, because there is nothing to dislike.

I just wish someone would tell me what it is, or what it does, or what does it represent?

What is the point?

• Rambles , Times past
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Grandad May 19th, 2007

Unlike Thursday night’s debate, last night’s Prime Time debate was an uglier affair.

Fighting desperately to hold on to his position as Number One, TM looked tired and old.

GD, the contender, on the other hand looked fresher, more confident and more able.

MOC, who was chairing the debate, and who had just been groped by GD, just looked out of her depth.

TM gave a good account of himself. He pointed out that he had held the throne for many years. He claimed to have brought the Blogosphere from a backward poverty stricken area to a forward thinking phenomenon.

“When I took office, people were emigrating to Bebo in their masses,” TM claimed “and now they are returning to Wordpress in their thousands”

GD counterattacked by pointing out that this was a world wide phenomenon and that TM couldn’t claim the credit for that. He also pointed out that the country had become too reliant on Wordpress, and that if there were a downturn in that sector that Blogging would be in a terrible state.

TM said that he loved blogging and that he lived for it. It was his life.

GD brought up the subject of TM’s personal finances.

“It is a matter of public record that you have been involved in shady deals with publishers. You have sold out. You are a disgrace to the country” said GD.

TM looked worried but rallied.

“My dealings with the publisher were on a friendly basis” TM stuttered “They are old friends of mine. I met them through my daughter. They are helping me out as I am going through a rough time. I have given a full and frank account of my publishing deals and that is now history. That has nothing to do with my blogging.”

“You have sold out to capitalism!” roared GD. “You have taken the King’s Shilling. The people have lost faith in you. They are looking for a new fresh approach. They are tired of the same old faces - the Dirty Daves and the Stinking Petes. They want a leader who takes a fresh approach. They want accountability. They want promises that will be fulfilled.”

Doing a great impression of Alan Sugar, GD pointed his finger at TM [and goosed MOC with his other hand] - “You are a disgrace. You are useless. YOU ARE FIRED!”

“You cunt” muttered TM.

So TM lit up a Major, and GD lit up his pipe, and both headed off for a few pints in Rons.

• Rambles
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Grandad May 18th, 2007

I have been hearing a lot lately about Opinion Poles.

Everyone seems to think they are great.

If the party is looking good in the poles, then “Poles are the voice of the people”. If the party is looking bad then “we don’t pay much attention to the poles. It’s the election that counts”.

In its eternal quest for truth, Head Rambles has decided to do its own pole.

So I headed off. The first pole I came across was a telegraph pole. It was plastered in election posters. Someone had shot Bertie Ahern through both eyes with a .22 [good shooting, by the way!]. It gave him a rather blank and vacant look. Very realistic, I thought.

I headed on, passing many poles and they were all plastered in posters. On one of them, Michael McDowell was hanging upside down. He looks much better that way. You should try it permanently, Michael. Your ratings might go up.

Eventually I ended up in a shopping centre with one of those big department stores.

This is where I found my Pole at last.

“Hello” says I. “Are you a Pole?”

“Cześć” says he.

“OK. You are a Pole, and I want your Opinion”

“Nie rozumiem”

“Who do you think is going to win the election?”

“Kocham Cię” he replied.

This wasn’t getting on as well as I’d hoped.

“Which coalition would you prefer to see in power?”

“Jestem w ciąży. Wyjdziesz za mnie?”

“Who would you like to see as Taoiseach?”

His face lit up. He ran off and came back with a tee shirt with “FCUK” written across the front.

“Which is the best party” says I.

He ran off again, and came back with twenty Silk Cut.

“And which party will support them in government?”

Once again, he disappeared and came back with a bra [I think it was a 40DD]. He thought he was getting the hang of this.

“And the opposition?” says I “Do you think the Greens will be in government or in opposition?”

He looked puzzled for a moment, but then did his vanishing trick again. He came back with a cabbage and a load of green beans.

My carrier bag was getting fairly full at this stage so I thanked him.

“Nie mogę bez Ciebie żyć” he replied.

So there you have it. The official Head Ramble Opinion Pole.

The result?

We are going to have a FCUK as Taoiseach, with a party of fags in power. They will be supported by a bra.

And the Opposition will be a load of vegetables.

-oOo-

P.S. If anyone knows Polish, I’d love to know what he was saying.  He seemed to think I was a grand bloke anyway.

• Election , Politics
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Grandad May 17th, 2007

Weird things have been happening here.

I have been asked by the CIA and the FBI, and by Sergeant Murphy in the village to keep quiet about it. And I always do what Sergeant Murphy says.

The fact is, someone has been sending me explosive files.

Five times, my laptop blew up because someone sent me a PDF file.

They eliminated George W, Bertie and Harney [not permanently, unfortunately] and eventually discovered that the perpetrator [perp, to you Americans] is a woman in Illinois.

It transpires that she is an author and has written a book about Senior Citizens who take to murder with a relish [or in one case, a banana]. She was trying to send me a few chapters for review, and that’s what kept exploding.

I don’t know whether she thinks I’m a writer or something, but apparently she is doing a Virtual Book Tour [is there anything that isn't Virtual these days?] and wanted to include me on her tour. Either that or I am one of the victims in her novel and she is trying to bump me off in a novel [sorry] way.

She finally got a couple of chapters through to me and it is a novel [sorry again] idea. The residents of a Senior Citizens Drop-In Centre decide to liven up their day by killing people they don’t like. This appeals to my darker side in a big way.

She actually sent me a copy of the book, but the Bomb Squad were suspicious and blew it up in a controlled explosion.

The book, by the way is called “PARK RIDGE A Senior Center Murder”

There are advantages to being a Senior Citizen. It is common knowledge that we are invisible [ever try ordering a pint in a crowded pub?]. Also the police tend to discount older people for crimes like that. And of course there is the ultimate advantage - an 80 year old convicted for 30 years has an automatic extension to their lifespan to 110.

The idea of ‘offing’ people who annoy me has crossed my mind a few times. But one has to be inventive. Whacking someone over the head with a billiard cue is effective, but crude. I like the idea of killing someone with a banana. That shows initiative.

There was one aspect of the book that I found a bit disconcerting though. I applaud the use of seniors as the perpetrators, but why bump off old people? Surely the victims should be you young people of the day. They are the ones causing the problems! I would never target anyone in their middle or later years - they have made it that far, and deserve to live [George W, Bertie and Harney excepted, of course].

So what is your excuse, Cheryl Hagedorn? Why are you killing old folk? What have you got against us? My excuse is insanity, which I shall be pleading in my forthcoming trial. What’s yours?

I saw a programme recently on “How to commit the perfect murder”. It was very interesting. Herself got very nervous as I took notes.

Apparently one of the best ways to do it is to poison someone with a previously unknown poison. A classic example is the former spy Litvinenko who was poisoned with Polonium-210. No-one had used this before, so they didn’t recognise the symptoms.

My own theory is that there are two ways to commit the perfect murder. One is to make it look like an accident [so they don't suspect anything] and the other is to dispose of the body in such a way as it will never be found. At the bottom of the Irish Sea for example.

I have conducted a few experiments in the past. The old ‘pin-hole in the brake pipe’ trick works well, but is a bit unreliable. I have tried naturally occurring poisons, such as belladonna but I was nearly caught on that one.

My most successful to date was a bloke who was a crashing bore. He reckoned he was going to found a great financial empire. He used to irritate the hell out of me. He got his wish. He is now part of the foundations of an office block in Sandyford.

Has anyone out there got any good ideas I might use?

• Around the house
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Grandad May 16th, 2007

I have been steering clear of politics, because I’m sick of the subject.

But yesterday I read Fintan O’Toole’s column in the Irish Times. First I laughed. Then I cried. Then I laughed again.

He writes about how none of the fiascos of the last ten years are the government’s fault. He gives quotes from TDs. Now I’m not going to plagiarise his work, because that would be churlish. But I have to use one or two of the quotes…

For example, there was the fiasco of the electronic voting system [that we had to have otherwise we'd be the laughing stock of Europe] -
“Any waste of money on the voting system lies at the Opposition’s door” [says Bertie. Of course.]

Why didn’t we meet our Kyoto commitments? -
“I am not resposible for the planet, as the deputy is aware” [Bertie again]

Another classic concerning the fact that Ireland has some of the largest primary school classes in Europe -
“It is completely unacceptable that any school has 40 or more children in a classroom. That is not my fault” [Mary Hanafin - Minister for Education].

My favourite has to be Bertie’s eloquent little speech about his finances -
“Surely, surely I’m not resposible if Vincent Browne gave somebody to administer the money for that house and that person administers the money on that house and the bills are all sent to a tribunal. All the bills relating to that money are all given given to a tribunal and therefore then I .. I.. I shouldn’t be answering that”

In another part of the paper, we had McDowell singing the praises for Bertie’s “exercise in in honesty and truthfulness” [see above?] and “We asked for accountability and the Taoiseach gave it in spades”

What the hell are these people saying? What are they talking about? Are they in some kind of parallel universe?

What planet are they really from?

• Election , Politics
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Grandad May 15th, 2007

Some of you may or may not be aware that I do a podcast most weeks.

A group of us [Irish and American] get together and discuss [for want of a better word] whatever takes our fancy.

Jefferson Davis, who runs the podcast always starts with a series of stock questions, which I always forget about, so I’m always unprepared. One of those questions is “What are you reading at the moment?”

I had to do a quick bit of research on the Interweb [or else go running around the house like a demented ferret] to find out what I was reading. I found it. It’s a book called “A Spot of Bother” by Mark Haddon [he's the one who wrote "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time"].

“A Spot of Bother” is described as

George, 61, is clearly channelling a host of other worries into the discoloration on his hip (the “spot of bother”): daughter Katie, who has a toddler, Jacob, from her disastrous first-marriage to the horrid Graham, is about to marry the equally unlikable Ray; inattentive wife Jean is having an affair—with George’s former co-worker, David Symmonds; and son Jamie doesn’t think George is OK with Jamie’s being queer. Haddon gets into their heads wonderfully, from Jean’s waffling about her affair to Katie’s being overwhelmed (by Jacob, and by her impending marriage) and Jamie’s takes on men (and boyfriend Tony in particular, who wants to come to the wedding). Mild-mannered George, meanwhile, despairing over his health, slinks into a depression; his major coping strategies involve hiding behind furniture on all fours and lowing like a cow.

It’s a very funny book, and I sang its praises on the podcast. But I put my foot in it.

I’m talking about “George” and how he is so much like myself; that he is retired and everything is going wrong around him; that his daughter has just announced her engagement to a bloke he hates.. and so on.

The podcast went up on the Interweb this morning, and I listened to it [purely for editorial purposes of course. I hate the sound of my own voice]. I suddenly realised, to my horror that I gave the impression that I hated my daughter’s choice of boyfriend. Woops. Not true. I like The Accidental Terrorist. We get on very well.

So, TAD. If you ever get to listen to the podcast [which is unlikely, as you're on dial-up], I was referring to being retired and bewildered. That’s all.

The rest of the programme is taken up with discussing whiskey [and how in my opinion, bourbon is gnat's piss] and taking the Michael out of British Royalty, for which I make no apologies at all.

• Internet , The Family
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