When I say ‘over’, I mean just that.  It is a possibility, nay a probability that they won’t be held again.  Damien who has organised the Awards for the last six years is retiring.  He has announced this before, but I have a feeling in my waters that he means it this time.

Needless to say, I was robbed of my gong by that upstart Manuel, and I suppose I should pass on my grudging congratulations.  If I am to be denied what is rightfully mine, the he would be my choice of usurper.

The Awards this year were a bit of a catastrophe, as Beaut.ie weren’t in the running.  I was disgusted to learn this as one of the long standing traditions of the Awards is to rip the piss out of them after.  I have no one to slag off now.  I could pick a site at random, but somehow it isn’t the same.  It’s like Easter without an egg or Christmas without a bottle of whiskey.

I deliberately didn’t nominate myself this year.  I thought I would sit this one out and watch from the side-lines, but that wasn’t to be.  Somehow my name got into the hat but I knew I wouldn’t win.  You see, the votes are rigged.  They have to be, as if they weren’t I would win in every category every year.  That would be disheartening for all the others so they deliberately disbar me.  I don’t mind.  Not in the least.

Congratulations again, Manuel.

And I hope you have eyes in the back of your head.

You’ll need ‘em.

Ya little sleeveen, ya. 

There is nothing unusual there.  I receive dozens of emails, offering me everything from Viagra to Russian brides [I usually order both.  Don’t need the Viagra but one can’t be too careful with those Russian women].  This email however was from the Irish Thingy Awards.

It told me I had been shortlisted in two categories.  [I knew that]

It told me I could only be  shortlisted in one category.  [I knew that too]

It told me that I had to decide which category to enter under.

Fuck!

I don’t know.

Is this a Personal Site or is it a Humour Site?  What differentiates a Personal Site from a Humour Site?  If it were a Personal Site, I would expect it to be all about me.  It isn’t.  If it were a Humour Site I would expect to laugh when I read it.  I don’t.

I’ll tell you what I’ll do…..

I’ll let you lot decide.

Personal or Humour?

?

That way I can blame you lot when I don’t win.

Hah!

Through some strange quirk, I seem to be on the short lists.  I confess to being a tad flattered and a tad embarrassed.  You  see, I made a point of not nominating myself this year, so at least one misguided soul must have nominated me, for which I thank you.

One of the results of being short-listed is that I get quite a few visitors wandering in from the Awards site.  If you are one of those, then you are more than welcome.  If you haven’t visited before, then maybe a few ground rules should be explained?

For a start, this is a smoking area, as distinct from a no-smoking area, so if you are in a pub, or in your office, or indeed doing over eighty on the M1, then feel free to light up.  If anyone complains, just tell ‘em to fuck off, and that I said you could smoke.

And that brings me to my second ground rule…. language.  There has been a minor kerfuffle over Melissa Leo swearing on stage so it is important to understand that I am fussy about language on this site also.  Any fucker who swans in thinking he can swear all over the shop had better fucking think again. 

If you want to know who I am, then you had better ask someone else, as I’m not too sure myself.  The old memory isn’t as good as it used to be.  If you want to know what the site is about, then I’m afraid the only way is to read it.  There are only 1757 ramblings so  it shouldn’t take too long.  If you find the answer, then could you please let me know too?

Another drop of fall-out from being shortlisted is that I get to schlop another ink-blot on the side of the site.   Just to make sure they all matched each other, I had to redraw the images which was a bit of a hassle, but one must suffer for one’s art, I suppose.

One final note, if you are a new visitor – I fucking hate that word ‘Blog’.

I would much prefer an alternative name such as ‘On Line Diary’, or OLD for short.

I could relate to that.

The Irish Blog Awards have come around again.

They are going all foreign this year and are going up to Belfast.  The Europa Hotel, no less.  The world’s most bombed hotel.  I hope hotel management learned from all that destruction because the awards mob are far more damaging than any bomb.  It’s no coincidence that the acronyms IBA and IRA are so similar.

I imagine it will be a fairly quiet affair this year though, as a shed-load of sites seem to have disappeared over the last twelve months.  I have 170 sites listed in my feed reader and it is scary when I check the inactive sites.  I keep telling myself to prune the dead sites out, but then I am afraid I will have very few left to read.

There are some really weird fucking categories this year.  “Best Outraged Blog Awards Post”?  What the fuck is that?  Maybe they mean “Best Outraged Blog Post Award”?  That doesn’t make much sense either.  Outraged at what?  God knows, there is enough to be outraged about so I can imagine there will be quite a few entries there.

I do wish they would change the name of the event though.  You know how I hate that word ‘blog’ and I refuse to call this site anything other than a site.  They should call it the Irish Awards For The Site That Is Not A Professional Website That Is Updated On A Regular Basis.  I would be more inclined to support the IAFTSTINAPWTIUOARB Awards as I would feel more at home there.

There would also be less chance of confusing them with the IRA

It may have been a bad pint, or I may just have picked up a bug somewhere but I was a bit achy, with a sore throat and generally felt a bit washed out.  It was not a night for going out, that was for sure.

As usual there was fuck all on television, so in honour of Earth Hour, I left it switched on, but tuned to a blank channel.  I didn’t feel like reading or talking.  Herself had come out in sympathy with me and was complaining of a sore throat too [but of course her throat had to be worse than mine], so the silence was mutual, and punctuated with the occasional moan from Herself.

I switched the laptop on, and put it on the table beside me.  I had the Twitter thingy running so I could see what was going on.

For the laugh, I first tuned into Earth Hour to see if anyone was saying anything about it.

There were quite a few people prattling on about it, and the level of intelligence displayed was about on par with a cabinet meeting of our government.  There were actually fuckwits out there saying how amazingly romantic Earth Hour was.  Do these gobshites not realise that it is possible to switch off a light anytime they like?  Do they have to be led like fucking sheep all the time?  I despair of the human race sometimes.

I got bored with that and switched over to the Blog Awards.

I reasoned that with the Blog Awards, I would at least find a modicum of intelligence, and at first I was not disappointed.

Eventually, the awards got underway.  There were a lot of categories, so progress was slow.  I played a wee game with myself, placing bets on the winners.  I really did very well.  I now owe myself over €400, which will come in handy for the holidays.

There were a few winners that truly delighted me.  I gave a wee whoop when Eolai picked up an award for Bicyclistic and gave a loud yell when Xbox4NappyRash also won his category.  There were quite a few other winners that cheered me immensely too, I might add.

The night was ruined for me though.

There is a certain blog that has irritated me for a very long time.  I avoid it like the plague, as I find it insufferably shallow, pink, fluffy, and quite frankly, insulting to women.  If I didn’t know better, I would say it was written by a twelve year old, during detention.  What is worse, it has an enormous following, and the following seems to be as shallow as the site itself, judging by the comments [the last time I looked – I daren’t go in more than once a year for the sake of my sanity].  Are we really breeding a generation of girls whose primary objective in life is to find the right hair conditioner, and who have nightmares about their skin cream?

This site consistently picks up awards.  My argument [with some justification] is that they always win in the one category, which is a corner of the market they just about hold for themselves.  If there were a category for cranky old pensioners, doubtless I would win fairly consistently too?

There is no love lost between us, particularly since the time I beat them to the Best Blog Golden Spider Award back in 2007, which they bitched about for quite some time after.  Heh!

Up until now, I have been quite happy to leave them in their little corner of the Interweb, while I stalk mine.  Fair’s fair.  If they have a readership then someone must like them.

Last night all that changed.

They won Best Blog of 2010!

Best    fucking    BLOG?

BEST?

What in the name of sweet suffering polecats were the judges thinking?  Were they on crack cocaine?  Were the judges all pre-pubescent airhead girls?  What the fuck is going on?

Without thinking too hard [in fact, without thinking at all] I could pick thirty better sites from the finalists.  Actually, I could pick 110 better contenders from the list of finalists [I am not counting my own entry in the interest of fairness].

I am baffled.  There are sites out there that are innovative.  There are sites that are insightful.  There are sites that show intelligence.  There are sites that give hope in a dreary world.  There are sites that are extremely well written.

Yet that wins Best Blog.

Fuck!

Irish Blogging may not be dead, but it needs one hell of a blood transfusion.

-oOo-

The award winners.

and

Bock the Robber

The decision is made.

I had every hope of attending the Irish Blog Awards tomorrow night, but due to circumstances beyond my control, I have to pull out.  That reminds me of the other night with Sharon, but that’s another story.

I know I am a finalist in the Best Blog Post category [kindly sponsored by KRO IT Solutions – have to say that], but I don’t think I will win.  In fact I have my money on one of the others, which I think is a brilliant post.  I’m not saying which one, but I will be rooting for them from afar.

I know the night is going to be a disaster in my absence.  There are going to be lots of frustrated women, and a lot of bewildered blokes looking for someone to point them in the direction of the bar, but these things just can’t be helped.  Life just deals a shit card sometimes.  There is always next year….

Incidentally, I have two tickets to the awards.

Anyone want them?

Transport and accommodation not included.

A couple of weeks ago, I mentioned that nominations were open for the Irish Blog Awards.  Last week they announced that nominations were officially open.  So what’s the difference?  Damned if I know.  I think it’s a bit like using a stretch of motorway for a few weeks before some wanker officially declares it’s open?

As far as I know, any nominations that were made before the ‘official opening’ are valid, because I got emails back thanking me for the effort I had put in, and that my nominations had been accepted.

At least they now have a closing date.  All nominations must be in by the 5th of February at 3pm.  I presume they mean 3pm GMT, but who am I to argue?

If there is anyone out there who wants a nomination, please let me know.  I will get in touch regarding payment methods.

The other big news is that the date and venue for the awards has been announced.

I have never heard of the Radisson Blu Hotel.  It sounds like something you’d flush down a toilet to make a smell.

I phoned them this morning to make a reservation.  They asked me my name so I told them.  They said they were fully booked out.  Bastards.  Those fuckers from the Cork International must have told them about last year.  I phoned again and used my Uncle Jimmy’s maiden name, and suddenly they had plenty of space.  I fucking hate that type of messing about.

Yes.  I am going [bar some unforeseen incident] and there is even a rather worrying rumour that Herself is interested in going.  In fact I intend to head on after into the wilds of Connemara and have a little break for myself.  Why not?  I deserve it.

The big question now is who else is going?

Is it going to be a repeat of last year, with myself, Bock, Twenty, Robert and Peter ripping the place asunder?  Or is it going to be a different crowd?

Anyone interesting thinking of attending?

It seems like no time since I was down in Cork at the Irish Blog Awards, and it seems like even less time since I was in Dublin for the year before.

They are on again in a couple of months, but this time they are in Galway.  I’m not sure why they keep changing the venue but I have a sneaking suspicion that they are trying to confuse me.  I suspect that they are trying to find a city that I haven’t heard of.  Well, it’s tough shit because I know where Galway is.  I don’t advertise this for obvious reasons, but Herself comes from Galway so I have had to go there a couple of times in the past.

As cities go, Galway isn’t a bad spot.  You have less chance of being drowned there than you have in Cork.  You have less chance of being stabbed/shot/mugged/murdered/raped than in Limerick.  All in all, it’s quite a friendly little city.  I have very fond memories of a stay I had there in Salthill some years ago.  We got the lounge pianist drunk and that led to a great session that lasted into the small hours of the following afternoon. I don’t know if they ever rebuilt the hotel.

I don’t know what the story is about this year.  Will I be going?  I don’t know, because I have a problem.

With impeccably bad timing, our K8 is due to drop her sprog some time around then, and for some unknown reason, Herself wants to be around for The Event.  I can’t understand the attraction myself, as a sprog is a sprog is a sprog.  Once you have seen one, you’ve seen them all.  It just means more babysitting.  I am just baffled as to why K8 chose such a fucking awkward time.

Of course I may just sneak across on my own.  Herself can stay at home In Case of Need leaving me to enjoy myself.  Last time there were a few of you women who fancied a slice of Grandad, but were scared off by Herself.  Maybe this is your chance?

Anyway, nominations are open.  I don’t know when they close, but I think it is very soon, so get voting.  The blog has to be Irish, but you don’t.

I’m not going to make any recommendations, as I am not going to do your thinking for you.  Just fucking nominate.  OK?

I wonder if I can nominate The Sprog as Best Newcomer?

But then I decided that if you were sad and lonely enough to be waiting for my rantings then you deserve to be disappointed.

It was a bit of a hectic weekend, as we travelled down to some place called Cork for the blog awards.

It was a surreal experience because, as we all know, bloggers don’t really exist – they are just comments that appear on my site and pages on my feed reader.

So the hotel was full of talking avatars.

I met who I recognised immediately.

Then there was and .

Of course, who could miss .

was much in evidence, as was

was difficult to track down, but I recognised him by the green background.

did a brilliant job of organising the whole thing as usual.

There were dozens of others most of whom I remember, some of whom I forget, some of whom I can’t remember even though I want to and others I can’t forget no matter how hard I try.

Avatars kept coming up to me saying “Howya Grandad!” which was nice, though I don’t know how they knew I was me.  I don’t know who I am half the time.

It was that kind of weekend.

Of course our K8 won the gong for Best Blogpost which I think was a very sound decision on the part of the judges.

In the meantime, The Irish Times called me a cunt.

But then I read it again, and I realised they had written ‘cult’.  My fault.  I must change these glasses.

Herself is delighted at that and is now shimmering around the house in a saffron robe chanting something about Harry Crishna, whoever he is.

I asked her if I was entitled to a few extra wives and she said I could have as many as I like as long as they don’t get under her feet.

I took the liberty of secretly recording that conversation, and my solicitor now has a copy, just in case.

I had a great weekend.

But now I think I’ll have a well earned nap.

Today is a bit chaotic because Live95FM in Limerick chose today for their interview.  Bugger.  We’ll see how that goes. 

After that Herself wants a haircut or a Brazilian or something so I have to drop her off. 

Then I have to bring Sandy to the kennels, and she hates kennels with a passion.  She gets her revenge by teaching all the other dogs her nasty tricks.

At some stage or other, we will head down to Cork.

I’m going, of course, as is Herself and we are bringing The Other Fella along as well, as I have a cunning plan.

I am going to get totally hammered and then let himself suffer the hangover tomorrow.

K8 and TAT are going too.  They are going in their own car.  However, I slipped down to their place yesterday and did a little reprogramming of their SatNav, as she and I are in the same category and I like to play with the odds.  I hope they enjoy Letterkenny.

I don’t expect to win anything.

In fact the only reason I’m going is because there are a few people who owe me pints, and I’m a great believer in other people paying their debts.

With a bit of luck, I can also convince Herself that this is our Summer Holidays, which should save a few bob later on in the year.

Lock up your daughters, Cork.

Grandad is on his way.