Ah so once again the Irish blogosphere provokes debate and deludes itself into thinking that the agonising hand-wringing and wailing of tears - over a simple railing against Grandad’s hatred of political correctness - actually matters.
Try saying that with a few pints on board.
Anyway, while most of you are digging trenches and preparing the Scuds to fire at each other over the Great Battleground that is the interweb (try paintballing, much better), you probably expect everyone to pitch in with ‘their two cents’ and take sides.
I’m not going to, because honestly, I’m not going to be narcissistic enough to suggest that my, or indeed anyone else’s opinions matter on the subject. Get on TV or in the papers and then you can make a difference. So I’m just keeping my lips shut and I’ll say what I like thank you very much.
Anyway, what I am concerned about is the whole Tibet thing. I have a b et on with Dave The Lawyer that Tibet gains autonomy by 2009 from China.
Who will win?? Oh, the tension!
And by the way, I’m not being ignorant not responding to your comments – other bloggers I know totally disregard theirs – but usually the post subsequent to the last one will contradict the previous one.
And I’m speaking like Yoda now. Fuck.
Today is National Drinking Day – the day nominally devoted to remembering St. Patrick, Ireland’s patron saint (feast day this year 15th March, which will tell you what’s thought of the religious side) – and as usual I went in to see the parade, which was the usual combination of brass bands, dancing, and a festive looking green-and-orange Chinese Dragon. As per usual O’Connell, Westmoreland, and D’Olier Streets were infested with cream crackers, but I retreated to the safe distance of Boheny and Nesbitt’s before finally retiring to The Punch Bowl – via a diversion I’ll discuss shortly - and here I am typing on the internet coin box thing despite my house being two minutes walk down the Rock Road.
It’s safe to say I have got into the spirit of things and am rather shitfaced, but I paid for a damn hour and I’m getting that. Anyway, after I retired to Boheny and Nesbitt’s, Ed the Ram came in, seemingly just out of bed.
‘Ed, where were you? You look like you’ve been rolling about in the fucking dump?’
‘You mean Tallaght, yeah?’
Cue hearty laughter.
‘Seriously though, I was down in Sallynoggin having relations of the intimate variety with this bird I robbed off some guy in the queue for the Nightlink home last night. She didn’t seem to care. Her roommates did mind, but I’ve agreed to meet her here now.’
We ordered a few bevvos and watched the GAA club championships until Ed received a text.
‘She’s on her way.’
A few minutes later, this at-best-average looking lassie sauntered in and plonked herself down unceremoniously on a chair.
”Afternoon, Ed. Who’s your friend?’
Ed glanced nervously towards me.
‘Eh Bernie, this is Brian, he’s an old mate of mine.’ Bernie? Jesus, what an ugly name … belongs in the bad ole days when the priests ran the country.
‘Charmed to meet you, Bernie.’
‘I’m sure you are … ‘*burp*
An excellent specimen of the Irish woman, I’m sure you’ll agree. Anyway, after a few minutes, her roommate, an absolute knockout called Orla, came into the pub.
‘Hey, you’re Ed, y4eah? Who’s this guy with you?’
I stepped in.
‘Is mise Bundaigh. Seamus Ó Bundaigh. Nah, I’m Brian. Enchanteé.’
She giggled at that, and from there on we talked about everything from cars, to Irish-Americans and their hijacking of our national day, to what our respective definitions of a good looking woman was, to rugby, and for hours more, until eventually she got locked and I, being a gentleman, offered to bring her home.
We got an ignorant taxi driver who I paid a penny tip, and then well, I’ll use an analogy to describe what happened next.
Hopefully no-one needs a full description or it’d be longer than ninety minutes …
And, on an aside, I have 25 search results for ‘thus I refute thee’. What is it? Well, according to Joe, who I heard it off, it’s a reference to Halo 2, the Xbox game. Apparently you can carry a bomb in some versions of the game, and ‘thus I refute thee’ was a phrase wrote on the bomb. I just thought it sounded cool, like a phrase a Roman emperor would use.
I returned from Brussels this morning – I said Gent, but Melissa booked it – and I had a great time. Among other things, I visited the Atomium, the Royal Belgian Military Museum, Autoworld (a vast collection of vintage cars), Heysel Stadium, the EU District, the Royal Palace at Laken, and I also visited Bruges and Antwerp, two beautiful cities. It was the perfect romantic getaway for me and my personal goddess. If I had gone here alone, I’d almost certainly be in a fantastic mood writing this. As it happens, I am alone. Melissa is in Brussels. She didn’t come back with me.
Some would say it was fate. Other, more Godly types would say it was lack of faith. Me? She gave me no reason.
We were in Bruges when she suddenly grasped my hands, and staring deeply into my eyes with those searching eyes of hers, with the spark of intelligence burning like funeral pyres in them, spoke slowly and carefully, as if she had rehearsed this.
‘Brian, I need time to think. Time to find myself.’ What the fuck?
‘What do you mean? Are you not enjoying yourself?’
She sighed. The curtain of dark hair framed her pretty features as she lowered her gaze.
‘Brian, the last few weeks have been great. But you’re not the man I need in my life right now.’ A total blindsider …
‘I’m sorry Brian, I’ll move my stuff out tonight.’
I released her hands.
‘Where are you going?’
Again, she failed to meet my gaze.
‘I rented a small apartment in Anderlecht, on Rue Liverpool. Look, I haven’t been planning this behind your back … it’s just …’
Her eyes looked crystalline; they seemed to be about to gush as her voice wavered.
‘I need to be alone.’
And that’s how muggins here ended up staring, shellshocked, at the belfry in the Grote Markt of the historic and picturesque city of Bruges, with my mouth open like a fish you might see in a Tesco supermarket. Eventually some American tourists came along and asked if I needed help. I slowly shook my head, and started shuffling along towards the train station to catch the next train to Brussels. I stumbled out of the Gare du Midi an hour later. I caught a metro into St. Catherine and took up residence at a bar nearby. The barkeep came over to me.
‘Bonsoir, Monsieur. Que aimez-vous?’
I stared wearily at him.
‘Cinq whiskeys, s’il vous plait.’
He looked taken aback, and then grinned.
‘Il n’est pas tous pour vous?’
I didn’t smile back.
‘Oui, il sera tous pour moi.’
After many more Power’s, I stumbled drunkenly back to my hotel, asked for my room-key to a clearly worried clerk, and then flopped on my bed before passing out. I woke the following morning; she hadn’t returned. I packed my things and headed to the airport. I half-considered ringing some of the other slags I once had my way with so I could obliterate her memory, but found myself unable to do it. I still haven’t stopped considering it though.
Thus the mighty Brian Damage was felled by a slip of a woman; a girl who broke my heart in the land of waffles and chocolate. Time to get back on my feet – there’s no point whinging about a woman who spurned me. Still though, not until I’ve finished this bottle of JD’s finest at least …
Yeah, in response to my earlier post – read it or else I’ll get Ed the Ram after you and you don’t want that – I’m off to Gent with Melissa for a week.
So, in the meantime, do whatever it is you lot do with yourselves when you’re not blogging. Smoke weed, or play with yourselves, or watch Scrubs. Oh. Wait. That’s me.
Jerky Joe: I was reading The Times today at work – are your blog mates having an award ceremony?
Me: Say what?
Jerky Joe: Yep, here it is. (Pulls out article.) You heading to this love-in?
I’m going to be honest here - the next person I hear going ‘waah … blogging is my right as a person and I enjoy it!’ I will personally visit them and fucking remove every tooth they have in their heads and make them eat them. I heard bloggers were an intelligent group of people, and yet I find an agonising debate about its future apparently raging within its midst, the likes of which I last heard in Tesco near Vincent’s, where a child was throwing a tantrum because Mammy wouldn’t buy Cheerios. That reminds me of this chick I was trying to reach the try line with a few years back – she hadn’t gone all the way before, mind you – and spent an hour having a heartfelt discussion with herself and her fucking wallpaper about whether or not she should.
This ‘discussion’ is exactly like that – a pointless debate with no end. I could have gone out and easily found another woman; she didn’t have to partake in the Brian Damage Experience. In the end she did, but that’s a superfluous point. And you lot can blog away and wonder why, but do you need to? Do you need to justify doing it? If you’re in China, or Venezuela and you got the barrel of an AK-47 jammed into the base of your skull, then maybe, yeah.
Why do I do it? That’s not important, nor do I think about it. Neither should you, just be grateful for the fact that you can.
Why the sudden burst of aggression? A ceremony called the Irish Blog Awards was held recently, and as one journo called it, it was truly ‘the Pulitzer Prize of blogging’. Of course, where there are sycophants there will be arseholes and some journos criticised the event for glorifying what they felt was a non-event.
Here’s my two cents, for what it’s worth. Blogging is not a big medium, it is a niche medium. It is no bigger than other ways of getting your point across like online forums or public speeches. The fact that a few transcend the genre and have gone on to achieve notoriety or acclaim in other media are the exception rather than the rule, a similar situation to Claire Byrne, a newsreader, paid to voice her opinions in the Sunday Tribune. The rest of you bloggers continue regardless of attention, and of you’re fine with that, as I am, fair fucks to you.
I don’t begrudge those who won at the Irish Blog Awards, but neither do I care, as in my view it’s just another identikit award ceremony. Good luck to you all, but don’t expect any roses any time soon.
The recent declaration of Kosovo interested me, if only because I remember attempting to study for my Junior Cert and ending up watching NATO bomb seven colours of shite out of Belgrade. Great footage topped only by the US bombing the shite out of Baghdad.
Cities that get the shit bombed out of them tend to begin with the letter ‘B’, it seems.
Anyway I mention this because Ed the Ram took a junket along with his fellow PriceWaterhouseCooper’s employees to the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, the bit that Turkey invaded in the 70’s, and when attempting to cross the border into Greek Cyprus, he was refused entry because the TRNC had stamped his passport. Pissed was he because PWC had booked their hotel for the Greek end of Nicosia and so he and the crew holed up in a park bench in Turkish Cyprus until they found a hotel the following day, and then had by all accounts a fantastic holiday in the TRNC, what Ed the Ram is now calling the ‘good’ bit of Cyprus.
That got me thinking. Ed had to sleep out, and was effectively homeless for one night. Ed has a track record with homeless people, as he was once walking down Grafton Street and saw some Romanian holding a filthy ragged covered baby begging for cash (child exploitation in my book), and he took two steps to the side, one to the back, ran at the paper cup with the money and hit it a kick that sent it flying down towards Stephen’s Green. He turned and smiled at her.
‘Work for your money.’ he said, which was frankly hilarious at the time.
This same man spent a night homeless, and yet he’s said that all homeless people should be put in jail ….
Excuse me, I have to go … make a phonecall …
PS – Congrats to Grandad of Head Rambles – he won an award at the recent Irish Blog Awards, so head on over and give him a Hail Jesus while you’re at it.
