Archive for the 'Tourists' Category

The last resort

Grandad April 21st, 2008

It was a funny old day yesterday.

The first thing I noticed when I got up was the beautiful sound of Spring.

I opened the windows to listen to the blackbirds, the finches, the doves and the gunfire.

The gunfire sounded interesting, so I went down to the village to get the paper.  Sure enough, the villagers had caught themselves a tourist bus, and the tourists had tried to take refuge in the church.  That was foolish, because everyone knows our church is closed on a Sunday.

So I racked up my score a bit, and went home.

Last night, Herself got a bit stroppy because I was cursing at the Interweb  and saying rude things about servers that blow up, so I locked her in the coal hole and went for a pint.

Pullit served me my pint and we got chatting.

“What was that all about this morning?” I asked.  “It’s a little early in the year for large tourist buses?”

“Did you not hear?” said Pullit.  “Some feckin’ eejit has put out a brochure advertising this village as a tourist attraction.”

“Who would do that?” I said, though I knew it was just the kind of stunt Pullit would pull.

He looked all innocent.  “I haven’t a clue.  But we’re in for an interesting summer.”

“What does the brochure say?”

He went off to get me another pint and when he came back he slapped a brochure on the counter.

It was beautifully printed.  There were lovely photographs of the village which had been nicely enhanced to make the place look quite attractive.  There was a fancy little map showing how to get here.  Of course, the pub had a nice little feature spot of its own.

“It’s going to be a good summer,” I said.

“Aye,” Pullit replied.  “Plenty of sport.”

Printed across the front in nice Celtic lettering was the title.

brochure

Grandad goes Hungary

Grandad February 10th, 2008

I decided to cook last night.

I have a varied selection of interesting recipes, but none of them are written down and all rely on instinct so I can’t pass them on to The Humble Housewife or Our Grannies Recipes.

I thought I would go for my version of Hungarian Goulash.

hungarian_goulash_01

I nipped down to the village for some ingredients, but, damnit, do you think I could find any Hungarians anywhere?

No.

There were Poles, Estonians, Bulgarians, Chinese and a clatter of Americans.

And an Italian.

We had my version of Spaghetti Bolognaise instead.

Monday morning blues

Grandad January 21st, 2008

It’s Monday morning and I’m in one of those moods.

There is a howling gale outside and I’m cold, because I have all the windows open.  I have to keep them open because the wind is making the boiler smoke.  I’d switch off the boiler, but then Herself would complain.  Frankly, I’d rather suffer the cold and wind.

I went down to the village to cheer myself up.  That didn’t work, because there are no damned tourists around.  There’s never a damned tourist when you want one, and then they appear in bus loads.  Damned inconsiderate, I call it. 

There was no parking either.  I hate that.  Surely they know I’m coming?  I had to park at a bus stop, on top of a Garda ‘No Parking’ cone which I squished.  Serves them right for putting it there. 

They tell me that when women want cheering up, they go shopping, so I’m going to try that.

I’m going to buy one of these……..

I know it’s an SUV, but I’m getting one anyway.  Just in time for the tourist season.

You’ll probably find me at the Cliffs of Moher.  Or maybe Glendalough.  Or the Rock of Cashel.

Or maybe I’ll just drive around Dublin Airport car park?

The first one of the year

Grandad January 9th, 2008

Herself ran out of cigarettes yesterday.

This p*ssed me off, because I don’t like her smoking cigarettes.  I’m trying to persuade her to switch to the pipe.

Anyway she insisted I go down and buy her some.  She can be quite persuasive, especially with that twelve inch kitchen knife in her hand.

So, despite the fact that I was nice and cosy and warm at last, I hauled myself out to the car.  It was sleeting heavily, and the car was covered in half an inch of slush.  This meant I couldn’t see where I was going.  But that didn’t matter, as I knew the way anyway.

So I drove down.  I got colder by the second and my feet were wet.  I was not a happy bunny.

It was nice and warm in the tobacconist, so I stayed for a chat.  There was a customer there who joined in.  It transpired he was a tourist, though I should have guessed that from the strange accent.

He was from Iceland, and had come very early in the season, because he wanted to see the country when there were no crowds around.  He said he was hiking because he wanted to see the real Ireland. He said he wanted to absorb the landscape in all it’s pristine beauty.  Or words to that effect.

But then he made a big mistake.  He asked for directions to Kilkenny.  That’s like asking a neurological surgeon to describe the central nervous system. 

I ask him if he wanted a lift, and he gladly accepted.

He is now absorbing the Irish landscape. 

Or rather, the Irish landscape is absorbing him.

At the bottom of the landfill.

Proving a point

Grandad December 17th, 2007

 

I bought myself an early Christmas present.

It’s a Barrett M-107 rifle.

m107

I couldn’t wait to play with it, so the other day, Doc and I went off for a bit of hunting.

Tourists are pretty thin on the ground at the moment, but there are still a few around.  We just had to rely on luck.

As it happened, we were in luck.  We were up in one of the back valleys when Doc pointed.  "There you go" he said, pointing to some woods on the far side of the valley.  I got out the binoculars, and sure enough there were two of them.  They were over a mile away, but I could see they were Canadians by the flags on their rucksacks.

As we watched, one of them got up and pulled down his trousers.  He was obviously going to take a dump.

"F*ck" said Doc, "That’s disgusting"

"Quick" says I, "Which one?"

"The one on the right"

So the one on the right it was.  I took quick aim and fired.

"Holy God" said Doc. "That was a brilliant shot."

"Not bad" says I.  "It’s a damn good gun.  And it proves one thing."

"What’s that?"

"Bears don’t shit in our woods!"

And if you don’t believe me, ask that bloke in Chicago who is missing a right testicle.

I’ve been tagged again

Grandad November 11th, 2007

Our K8 has come up with a new meme.

And, bless her little cotton socks, she has passed it on to me.

She wants me to write a post that uses every tag. It’s all very well for her - she only has a few. I have loads. The cow!

Now I may be getting old but I find these difficult. I had a hard days blogging yesterday, as I had a good rant on a podcast to America. That was after I did my post on Cully and Sully.

So today I went for a ramble around the garden, trying to think of a topic. No go. There was no inspiration around the house either, and I’m damned if I’m going around the village or around the town for something so trivial.

Back in the 70’s life was a lot simpler. There were no computers or Internet, or even television so there were no memes. I had no irritating daughter in the family either. We found our pleasures in simple things. I remember learning to drive so we could go on holidays touring in the West, with no worries about flying and Global Warming. We had such simple sports as children in times past, like watching spiders spin their webs, and the designs they’d make. We’d go for rambles through the woods and have picnics of tea and spam sandwiches. We were a lot healthier for it.

Nowadays, work is the new religion and people have lost the use of their imagination. People only get worked up over celebrities and smoking out corrupt politicians. They panic over property prices and have lost sight of the soul of life.

No.

I can’t think of anything.

I elect not to do it.

I’m going to file this under Uncatagorised.

Maybe Sixty should have a bash at this?

Or how about Kirk at Just Thinkin’? I haven’t tagged him before.

And it’s a while since I annoyed Grannymar!!

tag-award

F*cking memes….

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