Hallowe’en

by Twenty Major on October 31st, 2004

Ahhh, all the kids out in their costumes, and for some of them it’s a valuable introduction to their future career as feckless little beggars. Going to door to door ‘Help the halloween party!’ they cry and hold out a bag for you to fill with sweets.

I have gained a reputation for not giving out sweets. I give fruit.

“Here are some delicious apples for you all!” I say. Even behind the masks I can see the look of scorn on their faces and they slink off down the driveway muttering.

“I heard that ya little feckers!” I might shout after them every once in a while.

“That’s because of your big ears ya feckin’ bollix” one might shout back before they all run as fast as their little legs will carry them.

But which one of them will get the poison one? I’ll have to wait for tomorrow’s newspapers to find that out.

Bewley’s cafés, Dublin.

by Twenty Major on October 29th, 2004

I see Bewley’s Cafés on Westmoreland Street and Grafton Street are to close with the loss of more than 200 jobs in Dublin. Not much of a surprise. Let me tell you why.

If you’re on the continent and you go into even the shittiest little café and order a coffee they take a scoop of fresh coffee, do the do with their machines, add the milk and it’s a guaranteed winner every time. In Spain and Italy in particular the coffee is fantastic and cheap too.

You go into Bewleys and you get a giant mug which is filled up from a cauldron of coffee that they’ve stewed up early that morning. It’s like drinking hot mud, except not as nice. It’s been like that for years. I just don’t understand why they haven’t closed earlier.

Obviously they’ve got a lot of history. Bewley’s cafés are long associated with Dublin’s literary scene and for as long as I can remember the early opening was a winner with Debs ball attendees as they staggered around town looking for an early breakfast.

Back in the day I used to always arrange to meet friends outside Bewleys on Grafton Street, not that you’d ever really go in, but it’s halfway down the street and handy for when you had to meet friends who had the misfortune of living on the Northside of town.

But now they’re going to close. And it’s their own fault for serving muck for years. No doubt it’ll be snapped up by somebody like Starbucks who can serve giant beakers of triple-decaff-mocha-choca-latté for €4 a pop and the homogonisation (is that a word, if not it should be) of the world can continue at pace.

———————–

This court case about Eamon Dunphy, the bouncer and the kiss is quite revolting, isn’t it? Obviously this big tough bouncer feels terribly emasculated having been given a smacker by the former Milwall player but I think I’d be more concerned about getting the appropriate shots than looking for compensation.

Pigs heads

by Twenty Major on October 28th, 2004

Imagine the scene. You’re driving to work. You look ahead of you and see a pig’s head on a stake. Frightening. But don’t worry, it’s just an advertisement for a performance of Lord of the Flies, the William Goldman novel about kids stranded on an island who go pig hunting then turn into savages who try and kill each other, like Blackrock College students coming out of Annabels.

It’s certainly an interesting way to promote the play and to be honest I’m all for it. It’s different. It gets people talking and we should do more stuff like this. In an age when beheadings are de riguer and we see dead bodies from crazy wars on the news every day why should anyone be offended by the head of an animal most of the people in Ireland devour on a daily basis?

I expect other theatre groups to follow suit. Romeo and Juliet could be promoted by having an open tomb with the dead bodies of two lovestruck teenagers, let’s do Othello with a Nigerian immigrant and Michael McDowell as Iago, we could have an inner city family on a reality TV show thinking they’re about to win the lottery in Juno and the Paycock style (and wouldn’t Eamon Dunphy make a most excellent Joxer?) while valuable promotion for Dublin’s new light rail system could be made by painting naked pictures of beautiful women on the side of the trams for ‘A LUAS car named desire’.

Once my term as President is over (I’ll give auld Mary another seven years before I make my move) I might become a marketing genius.

Nothing to do? Let’s get pissed.

by Twenty Major on October 27th, 2004

Desperate for something to do on a Saturday night after everyone is kicked out of the clubs and pubs at the same time it appears people are throwing themselves into the River Liffey for dares.

A senior officer at the Dublin Fire Brigade reckons they’re dealing with at least ten cases every week. This also puts a strain on the ambulance services because it’s fucking freezing in there and the jumpers are coming out with hypothermia. Given the state of the River Liffey I’d do some checks for Ebola and those little killer fish that swim down the eye of your mickey.

I suppose the reason there’s such a drinking culture in Ireland is that there’s fuck all else to do. The weather is shite so all you can do is head for a bar or restaurant and then onto a club if you’re feeling up to it. Isn’t it about time that the government did something about this? It’s not as if they’re sitting around waiting to see if the weather will improve so they can offer healthy outdoor activities. That’s just not going to happen, so I’ve come up with a few ideas that will give people something to do rather than going out and getting pissed all the time.

1 - Demolish Trinity College and build dozens of 5-a-side football pitches with that cool new astroturf that doesn’t strip the skin from you if you happen to fall over. This stuff is almost like real grass. Obviously you’d have to pay for your pitch, but what’s €25 for an hour between 10 people? Nothing. Money raised could be spent on the maintenance of the pitches, the upkeep of the Book of Kells (which would be laminated, divided into separate pages and put up above the urinals so everyone could have a read) and for burning the bodies of dead tramps. This scheme also has the added bonus of ridding the city of thousands of wanky students.

2 - Put a tightrope between the that tall building - whose name escapes me but the Daniel O’Connell pub is just to right of it - on Eden Quay and the Baileys sign on the opposite side of the river. Put up an initial prize of €10,000 for anyone who can cross and charge €10 a go. Each entry adds to the prize fund. To make it more interesting invent a special cannon that shoots basketballs at the contestants as they try to make it across. I haven’t yet decided about safety nets although if they were to be used some kind of fabric that conducts an electrical current would be ideal because not only would you see them fall, you’d also see them getting zapped with an almost fatal charge of electricity afterwards.

3 - Do a ‘How long can you go without your mobile?’ challenge. Take ten teenagers and put them in a room with only books for entertainment. Last one to take out their mobile to txt one of their friends, make an inane phone call or try to play classic arcade games on a screen smaller than their brains wins a prize. A year’s supply of books from Easons. They think they’re playing for a year’s unlimited credit in their mobile. If they complain they get punched in the face. With an anvil.

4 - Invent a new TV show called ‘Justin Thyme’ where teams of contestants have to scour the country looking for people called Justin. When they get 5 Justins they have to disembowel them and stuff them with thyme. To avoid capture any Justin can use high powered weapons of their choice, including handguns, swords and the music of Enya.

5 - Instead of tying a piece of paper to leg of a racing pigeon, parents see if their child can become famous by tying their newborn infant to the legs of specially trained condors who race from town to town. Upon landing in each town the child is tattooed with a mark to prove they’ve landed. First condor-child team back at base wins.

6 - Beat the junkie - Heroin addicts are lured from their lairs with the promise of free drugs and clean underwear. Once they emerge from their underground caverns they’re set upon by teenaged schoolgirls armed with bats. They proceed to batter the junkies to within a specified measurement of their lives. If one team succeeds in beating a junkie to within an inch of their lives they can claim the prize of a night with Brian McFadden.

And those are just off the top of my head. Any suggestions?

John Peel

by Twenty Major on October 26th, 2004

Why is it that John Peel had to die yet Gareth O’Callaghan still lives?

His wonderful voice, enthusiasm for music and true radio personality will be missed.

A vote for Bush is a vote for a robot

by Twenty Major on October 26th, 2004

Twenty Major has discovered that George W Bush is not human but is the third generation of an artificial lifeform known as a Dimborg. These creatures were designed to become domestic help - Robo-butlers, if you will - but soon it was discovered they could be programmed to act in any way their handlers decided.

Recent footage of Bush during his debates with John Kerry showed a box sized hump on his back which many thought was a radio transmitter/receiver pack which allowed him to be guided through the discussions like some kind of sub-Cyrano de Bergerac fool. It’s simply not true. That box shaped him is where his external power pack is held. Normally the President is powered by 14 walkman sized batteries but canny Democrats bought up every single battery in town before the debates meaning Bush had to wear his slightly cumbersome pack instead.

Previous Dimborgs have included Lee Harvey Oswald, Keith Harris and Orville, 80s rock chick Pat Benetar and Hollywood star Eric Roberts.

Dimborgs look and feel amazingly real although long-term problems with their brain to speech transmissions are proving tricky to overcome.

Tell your friends, don’t vote for Bush unless you want a robot as President. And not a good robot like Bender.

A poem for Pat

by Twenty Major on October 26th, 2004

I’m not a great fan of poetry, but being unable to think of something to write about this morning I decided I’d Durcan out a poem about Late Late Show presenter Pat Kenny. Hope you like it:

He’s a cunty cunt

Retire, or die, you piss faced cunt

Madonna - Material bint

by Twenty Major on October 25th, 2004

Celebrity faith. What a load of bollocks it all is.

This is what a friend of Madonna and Guy Ritchie’s said about their recent conversion to the Kabbalah faith: “Rabbi Berg is the founding father of their religion and they both credit him with turning their lives around.”

Turning their lives around? I’ve heard some utter crap in my life but that’s right up there with the best.

Kabbalah has helped these two multi-millionaires become…erm…still multi-millionaires.

In reality what Kabbalah has done is made the most successful female artist of the last 20 years, who wrote great pop songs, into a crashing bore who thinks she can write children’s books and makes cover versions of American Pie, possibly the cuntiest song ever written. And it’s turned Ritchie, lauded as the future of English film after the tremendous Lock, Stock and two smoking barrells, into a fake Lord of the Manor, with his Pringle jumpers and flat caps and films that take less at the box office than Shanghai Surprise.

If it’s turned their lives around so much they’ve gone from being well respected professionals to laughable stereotypes then this is quite a religion. If you can call it that.

Going around the place with a fucking rubber band on their arms like it’s deep and meaningul. It’s not. It’s for celebrities with lives so empty and vacant they feel this fake spiritualism makes them better people. It’s rubbish.

Now don’t get me wrong. People can believe in what they want. People can have faith in what they want, but do it in private. Don’t fucking announce it every time you step outside the fucking front door. I don’t care. I don’t want to read about it, hear about it, see it, smell it or anything else. It just smacks of publicity seeking for the cult religion’s leader who’s getting minted off the back of his celebrity converts. The Scientologists must be spewing.

If I could offer some small advice to Madoggy and Ritchie, it would be this: “Drop dead you cunts.”

Bono gets his lyrics back

by Twenty Major on October 23rd, 2004

A woman has returned a suitcase full of notes and lyrics that was stolen from U2 in 1981. How nice.

Amazingly this suitcase contained the original lyrics to ‘New Year’s Day’ which when it was first written was a petty snipe at a local rival of The Edge’s called ‘Hugh Deer’. It poked fun at his open sexuality, here’s a snippet.

Tell all your friends that Hugh Deer’s gay.

Those of you who thought Sunday Bloody Sunday was a song with a keen political message will be shocked by the original lyrics.

I can’t believe that Hugh Deer’s gay

How long, how lo-ooo-ooo-ooong.

Bono often thought that the suitcase being stolen was a blessing in disguise as ‘New Year’s Day’ is the first song played in discos up and down the country after Auld Lang Syne and the snowy video was a major factor in propelling the Dublin lads to stardom.

We tried to get a comment from both parties, but Bono was off saving the world while Hugh Deer was told to never speak with his mouth full.

Sunday is a day of rest. Back on Monday.

Kids and the playground

by Twenty Major on October 22nd, 2004

It seems kids these days are missing out on physical exercise which has the result of turning lots of them into roly-poly, Billy Bunter-esque fatties. A reason that has been given is that schools are afraid of litigation so strenuous physical games have been banned from the playgrounds. Now the kids just slump around sending text messages to each other.

Schools have banned skipping ropes, hula-hoops (the toys not the fattening deep fried snack) and in some cases even running in the schoolyard is not allowed. Add to that the thought-free Findus chicken and oven chip dinners most kids are dished up and it’s no wonder the children of Ireland are turning into little Sumo wrestlers.

When they play now they play with Playstations and computers. Back when I was a kid we used to go out all day to play. In the summer holidays the first game of football would start around 10am, and the games would continue until we couldn’t see any more (either from dog-poo in our eyes blindness or nightfall, whichever came first). When Wimbledon was on we’d play tennis, when there was cricket on we’d play cricket (with our wooden tennis rackets with those bendy blue and white strings as the cricket bat), and if there were girls hanging around sometimes we’d play rounders so they could join in.

When sports got a bit tiresome we’d play games like bulldog. You start with 10 kids, for example, 9 on side of the kerb, 1 in the middle. Then all 9 kids would run at once to the other side of the road with the kid in the middle trying to stop them. If you got caught you joined the kid in the middle. After a while it would be 5-5, then 3-7 until eventually you were left with 1 against 9. Being amongst the last few your chances of injury were heightened considerably. It wasn’t uncommon to see bloody noses, swollen lips and sprained ankles.

I remember one game when there were 2 of us left and about 11 in the middle. Just me and another little lad called Shane. We’re standing on the kerb getting ready. The kids in the middle are telling us how badly we’re going to get hurt and there’s no way we’re going through. Shane was a little bit mad. I once saw him try and kick the shit out of a lamp-post after he’d run into it headfirst playing football. Anyway, he took off at a rate of knots, screaming at the top of his lungs.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRR-urkkkkkkkkkk - he went. Two of guys in the middle had clotheslined him, catching him right in the throat. He lay gasping and choking on the ground so loudly they all forgot about me and went over to check. It was one of my finest victories ever and for about a week afterwards Shane’s voice sounded exactly like Bonnie Tyler’s singing. Everyone thought he was cool though.

We used to show off our injuries like medals. I once slipped off my bike and gashed my thigh, I still sport the scar to this day. Peter used to get nosebleeds all the time. At first he was kind of freaked out by them but in the end when it started bleeding he wouldn’t even hold his head up and pinch. He’d let the blood run down his face and chase after smaller kids or girls.

Then there was Carl. We all used to play up this side road near our houses. Quite often we’d be playing football and there’d be a call of nature meaning you had to go back home to use the toilet (this is when sitting on the toilet was required, the woods beside the football pitch were perfect for taking a whizz), but Carl never wanted to stop playing. So when he badly needed to go for a poo he’d get down on one knee, almost like the way you’d kneel for royalty, and he was convinced this would push the poo back up and let him play on for longer. This worked even when he had a turtle’s tail. One day he did it too often and went home complaining of stomach cramps. We didn’t see him for a few days after that and it turns out he had some kind of poisoned bowel.

Anyway, the point is none of us were fat. That’s because we went outside of our houses. We didn’t have mobile phones for parents to check up on us. We left, we came back, we left again, to no great schedule. It’s a shame that today’s media has turned the world into a place that’s apparently not safe for kids to do anything when in reality it’s probably no more dangerous than when we were growing up.

As for the schools banning running, they should be brought to court for being stupid cunts, a new offence which, I believe if added to the justice system in Ireland, would see prison overcrowding become a massive problem but would make our towns and cities better places to live.