Twenty’s Christmas greetings

by Twenty Major on December 24th, 2004

I’ve been indulging in the Christmas spirit. And stout. And whiskey. Forgive my non-appearance yesterday and for the coming days.

To all my readers who are not cunts I wish you a splendid Christmas and a great 2005.

To anyone who’s a cunt and might be reading this I wish you salmonella, distemper and the pox.

Take care.

Twenty Major.

All I want for Christmas…

by Twenty Major on December 22nd, 2004

…is the heart of my mortal enemy - 80s pop star Daryl Hall.

Not many people know that he started his singing career here in Dublin. He left his native USA in the early 70s and was backpacking around Europe before he found his way to Dublin. Whilst here he fell in love with a beautiful young girl from the inner city. Sadly she broke his heart and stole everything he owned forcing him to take to busking at the bottom of Grafton Street. He was literally singing for his supper.

Anyway, one day I was passing by when I heard this remarkably soulful voice singing ‘Waterloo sunset’ by The Kinks. I stopped to listen, looking at this straggly haired blonde American boy. ‘That boy has got something, the cunt’, I said to myself and over a cup of coffee he told me his sad tale of a love gone wrong and a robbery that went totally right (for the robbers).

Well, what could I do? At that time an old pal of mine was the head of talent for the Braemor Rooms, home of great cabaret in Dublin. I used to do the odd turn but I’d always dreamed of being a great duo, like Simon and Garfunkel, Sonny and Cher or Foster and Allen. So I convinced my pal to give me and Daryl a spot on a Thursday night.

MAJOR AND HALL, as we were known, soon became very popular with the discerning cabaret public of Dublin south and soon there was talk of record deals, major tours and even getting our gig moved to Friday night.

Then one night I met up with Daryl for a few beers in Mulligans on Poolbeg Street, he always said the smooth Guinness helped coat his vocal cords which gave his voice that vibrant timbre I had come to love. When I arrived to meet him he was standing with a little dark haired chap with a moustache.

“Hey Twenty,” said Daryl. “This is my new friend John Oates”

Turns out Oates was another backpacking wastrel who had decided to stop for a few days in Dublin, or Waterford. Had he stopped in Waterford he’d have become victim of the Dungarvan Hostel fire which claimed the lives of so many unkempt youngsters, but as fate would have it he chose Dublin.

Soon they were fast friends, two Americans, and I, the poor auld Dubliner, was oft shunted to the side as their conversations became uninteligible to me. What were sidewalks, faucets and wasn’t fall something you did after too many pints? One day Daryl came to me and said he’d earned enough money to go back home and John Oates was going with him. He promised to send for me, that we’d be MAJOR, HALL AND OATES, but he never did. I even wrote a song called ‘He’s gone’ which I recorded onto a cassette and mailed to Daryl. I think we all know what happened then.

My dreams of being Ireland’s first white soul star were in ruins and when Johnny Logan came along I knew my chance had passed me by.

Ever since then I’ve sought revenge - mostly by sitting in the pub and telling this story to anyone who’d listen - so if anyone has Daryl Hall’s phone number, home address and details of the security at his mansion, please let me know.

And that’s why I’d like Daryl Hall’s heart for Christmas.

Limerick City, Ireland

by Twenty Major on December 21st, 2004

Gardai were shocked this morning when it emerged that a man had not been shot in Limerick City last night.

At around 10pm last night Derek Walsh was walking towards his home in the Prospect Avenue area of the city when no shots were fired. He was not rushed to Mid Western Regional Hospital in Dooradoyle where he did not die or suffer serious injuries. He is not in a stable or critical condition and family are not by his no bedside.

The non-existent shooters, who are well known to Gardai, are believed to have no problem at all with Mr Walsh and there is no history of family feuds. A Garda spokesman released a statement saying “At this time we have taken nobody into custody to not help us with our no enquiries.”

Local residents were appalled that a night had passed peacefully. 87 year old Bridie O’Byrne said “I couldn’t sleep at night knowing that nobody was killed. The sooner things return to normal around here the better”, while neighbour of the not victim, Shakey McDonagh said “It’ll be a sad day unless somebody gets knocked off. This town has a reputation to uphold and unless the crims start killing people again the ordinary people of this Limerick will have to go out with their revolvers and put things straight.”

Feed the world…

by Twenty Major on December 20th, 2004

…let them know it’s Christmas time and that you’re inside with a roaring fire stuffing your face with delicious roast turkey and ham, with all the trimmings, taking great pleasure from the expensive gifts that you didn’t really need while they bake in the sun and try and to catch and eat the flies that keep landing on them.

How Band Aid could have been improved, Part 3

And there won’t be snow…

by Twenty Major on December 19th, 2004

…in Palmerstown this Christmas time. The greatest gift they’ll get this year is lice.

How Band Aid could have been improved, Part 2

There’s a world outside your window…

by Twenty Major on December 19th, 2004

…but you’re too afraid to go out because you suffer from acute agrophobia and the thought of stepping outside your front door is enough to make you want to shit your pants, piss yourself and vomit at the same time.

How Band Aid could have been improved, Part 1

Carol Singers and Christmas shopping

by Twenty Major on December 18th, 2004

I am going into town now to do some Christmas shopping. Grafton Street is my destination.

I wonder if there’ll be Carol singers and if so I wonder if they’ll be Irish or will they, following a recent trend in most other service industries, have been replaced by swathes of Chinese people.

We wish you a melly clissmas but as new year not for many weeks we not say anything about tha’ ok?

It does get a bit annoying though at this time. The city centre is busy enough without do-gooders rattling change boxes under my seasonally red nose. Yes, I know the price of a pint would feed a starving donkey/child/refugee for 12 years but you know what? I’d prefer the pint, thanks. Now piss off.

Then there are the queues. Last year I rememeber queueing in one particular shop for about 15 minutes. Yes, there were a lot of people but the shop in question appeared to have imported its workers from some asylum or special school somewhere. Each transaction took them ages. Anyway, we were standing, patiently waiting, until one woman, who saw queueing with plebs as being way below her station, decided she’d march to the front and get served first.

Irish people being the courteous, kind and lily-livered sort that they are stood aghast at the cheek, whispering “Ooooh, did you see that?” But not one of them would say a word to her. It was time to stand up for the rights of my fellow queuers. I cleared my throat, scratched my arse then bellowed “OI! THERE’S A FUCKING QUEUE HERE YOU OLD CUNT. GET TO THE BACK OF IT OR FUCK OFF!”

I love sharing the Christmas spirit with my fellow Dubs.

More broadcasting fun

by Twenty Major on December 17th, 2004

A caller to Liveline in RTE Radio 1 became an instant legend in my book when he was discussing Environment Minister Martin Cullen and his controversial PR adviser Monica Leech. Calling himself Norman and saying he was a member of the PDs from Cork he took full advantage of there being no in-studio delay so any inappropriate comments can be filtered out by producers.

Here’s what he said: “We really don’t know what she’s been doing anyway. Maybe she’s been doing other things for him besides constituency work - maybe she’s sucking his cock”

A very astute point, you’d have to say. Naturally Joe Duffy, the presenter, was morto and cut to an ad break. All I can say is well done, Norman, whoever you are. Keep up the good work.

It put in mind of a couple of incidents when I, Twenty Major, used to be a popular radio presenter. It’s true. Obviously I can’t give details about my illustrious past as too many people would talk but I can tell you what happened.

It’s a lunch-time radio show, just after the farming news (obviously this station was outside of Dublin, that’s as much as I’m telling you), and the pre-planned playlist had me doing some kind of ‘play some songs, read some news headlines, let the listeners guess the year’ type shite. Anyway, one of the songs was Shout by the dwarfy little ginger cunny, Lulu. So instead of saying ‘Lulu had a hit’ I said ‘Lulu had a shit….’ then, for the first and only time in my radio career, collapsed into a fit of giggling. The more I tried not to laugh the more I laughed. Eventually I just played the song but that didn’t occur to me for at least 30 seconds and the audience was treated to me ‘tee-heeing’ like a schoolgirl.

The other story involves me doing a link into a song, then leaving the microphone up whilst I told the person in the studio all about the tendency the Head of Programming had of putting his hand on my knee in a way that wasn’t just ‘hahaha I’m Terry Wogan’. That made for a fun week or two at the station, let me tell you.

I also got into a bit of trouble once by suggesting Elizabeth Hurley was so-named because she liked to anally pleasure herself with a hurling stick.

But that’s a whole other story.

Phone calls

by Twenty Major on December 16th, 2004

*ring ring*

“Hello, Hughes and Hughes books. How can I help you?”

“Hello. I’d like to speak to Mr Hughes or Mr Hughes, please.”

“Erm…who are you looking for?”

“Mr Hughes or Mr Hughes. Proprietors of your fine establishment”

“Well…er…Hughes and Hughes is just a name.”

“What?”

“Erm…uhm…Hughes and Hughes is just a name. Like HMV. You wouldn’t ring up HMV and ask for Mr HMV, would you?”

“So what you’re saying is that neither Mr Hughes nor Mr Hughes actually exists.”

“Exactly!”

“Or maybe you’re just saying that. It could be another version of ‘He’s in a meeting right now’”

“No Sir, I assure you that there are no Mr Hughes’ here for you to talk to you.”

“You people make me sick.”

“Well, if I could jus-”

*hang-up*

*ring ring*

“Hello, HMV. Can I help you?”

Ireland AM on TV3 - Fashion my arse

by Twenty Major on December 15th, 2004

Last night I had a kind of Christmas get-together with some old chums. Seany the Skank, Tommy ‘The cuntbuster’ McNamee, Lyrical Liam and I quaffed expensive champagne at the Morrisson Hotel then took in an excellent dinner at the Merrion and topped it off with a night of entertainment at a private gentleman’s pub. Or we had a rake of pints in the Foggy Dew. Believe what you want.

Anyway, as I was sitting on the couch this morning waiting for the coffee to percolate (or the kettle to boil) I happened to switch onto TV3. Ireland AM, their morning show was on, and I was lucky to catch the fashion segment with the presenter who looks like a 50s movie star (but who scares me because she looks like she’s 6′7″) and some woman in a dress which can only be described as being the colour of vomit mixed with oil and water with some old horse piss throw in on top of it.

Anyway, they were showcasing some of the latest fashions from vom-dress’s boutique (which I can’t remember the name of). I find it hard to believe they weren’t taking the piss. Vom-dress says “This beautiful combination is the embodiment of chic-bohemian style merged with comfort and elegance” as the model came out wearing what could only be described as the kind of get-up a bag lady with cataracts might wear. Jeans, a purple top, some other kind of skirt (I’m not Jonny Fashion but I know skirt over jeans = lame) and a rather wanky looking bag.

Other beautiful outfits included a purple dress with shoulder pads so wide they’d make Crystal Carrington come in her pants just look at them, a green silk thing which just looked like it needed a good ironing and a metallic gold dress which made the model look like a mermaid with a giant arse. All the time Vom-dress is simpering and talking about how beautiful and unique they are. Newsflash sister, the only reason they’re unique is because the designer made one, realised it looked like shit and gave up. More cunture than couture, let me tell you.

Then there were the shoes. I don’t think there was a pair under €420. What’s wrong with a good pair of Clarks? They’re comfortable and you get plenty of wear out of them. Instead they want the ladies of Ireland to suffer frostbite on their feet as they go out with a couple of gaudy straps attached to a sole and they want them to pay through the nose for them.

Fashion really is a load of old bollocks. The only way this could have been any worse is if they’d had Mark Cagney commenting on the models or that fat cunt from the sports news on the catwalk.