A month without alcohol

Tá fíor brón orm as ocht ábhair an ailt seo. Nuair a bhí mé dhá blianna déag d’aois geall mé dom féin nach mbeinn an duine seo go deo, ach, tá sé ró-dénach anois. Mar sin ar adhaigh linn; is fuadh liom Nollaig, is fuadh liom páistí agus is fuadh liom tusa! Bah Humbug!

Ní hé nach dtaitníonn an Nollaig féin liom ach an am don bhliann. Táimid i lár an Gheimhreadh, seachtain nó dhó óna laethanta saoire agus tá an cuma ar an scéal go bhfuil níos mó obair le dénamh ná ag aon am eile i rith an téarma. Tá beagnach gach duine tinn nó go hiomláin gafa ag an gruaim. Ní gná gruaim fiú ach an gruaim marfach sin a thagann ó a bheith ag éisteacht le do chairde uilig ag gearráin an t-ám ar fad.

Ach, dar ndóigh, níl gach duine míshásta. I gcónaí bíonn amadán nó óinsín éagann a bhfuil go hiomláin i ngrá leis an Nollaig. Cathain siad aon mí déag ag fanacht air teacht agus nuair a thagann sé ar dearadh-inseoidh siad duit, arís is arís is arís eile. “Nach bhfuil an sneachta iontach? Agus na siopaí go hálainn? Oh na páistí, tá siad comh gleoite… draíocht san aer….. seacláid……bronntanas…”

Bhueil, tá an sneachta bréagach nó báisteach, na siopaí plódaithe agus na páistí? Ná habair faoina páistí. Ní draíocht atá san air ach oiread, “Avian Flu” máis aon rud. Soilsí Nollaig-gortaíonn siad mo shúile. Agus na bronntanas? Bhueil tá siad sin beagáinín conspóideach na laethanta seo nach bhfuil?

Geallaim duit, má féachainn tú sna páipéirí gach bliann ag dul ar ais chuig am an Claoímh Solais agus roimhe sin feicfidh tú pátrún. Gach uile bliann bíonn duine eichint ag gearráin faoi ‘meath na Nollaig mar féile Críostaí’ agus go bhfuil ionamarca béim ar na bronntanas. Nílaim chun briseadh leis an traidisiún sin.

Ní ó thaobh Críostaíocht de áfach, is cuma sa diabhail liom faoin religiún. An taon bhaint a bhfuil agam leis an eaglais ná geansaí Celtic i mo chófra.

An faidb a bhfuil agam ná an méid brú a chuirtear ar daoine bhronntanas a cheannacht. Is rud deas é cinnte, thatníonn bhronntanais le achainn duine ach ní rud deas é nuair a chuireann sé an té a bhfuil á cheannach leath bhealadh isteach san uaigh le strioss! Tá daoine ann, a chaithean dhá mhí iomláin ag siopadóireacht-níl sé sin nádúrtha nó sláintiúl fiú. Má tá aon duine ag iarraidh beidh oraibh fanacht go dtí an 26ú, tá orm roinnt siopadóireacht a dhénamh

I was just flicking through my profile and stuff on bebo(because I’m bored and narrcisisisi…you know what I’m trying to spell) when I remembered the ‘how you met your friend(s)’ stories. Some of them are golden but nobody is ever gonna read them on bebo because thats a bit sad(it is and you know it) so I decided to publish some of my funnies up here:

Club or Organization, Worked together
“Its really quite a funny story. I had recently joined the Al-Axa Martyrs Brigade & was on my way to a suicide bombing. Unbeknownst to me, there was a mole amongst my fellow conspirators. I was arrested & Gaz turned out to be head interrogator. Well, I developed Stockholm syndrome & he was lonely

Worked together
“Back in the ’80s we were both working as navvy’s in London. Times were different then, times were hard. I’ll never forget Christmas of ‘84, we only had enough money for one of us to go home and he insisted that it be me because my dog was sick. A true gent”

School or College
“Ever been to paris? Me and A. can show you what the Eiffel tower looks like”

Through a friend, Fate brought us together, Childhood friends
“i like Rua…. me too”

Fate brought us together
“Rua had a package to deliver that involved passing through the Egyption dessert via private bi-plane. All of a sudden this big ass mo-fucka of a guitar-sandstorm kicked off in the shape of this dudes head!! Maybe it was the acid and sleep deprivation but still, what an entrance! What a showman”

Club or Organization
“Big up the Monkstown Massive!”

Friend Story - School or College
“We met at an international jam making conference in South America and it really grew from there…yeah since then we have visited all the major jam conventions in the world….united by one force…jam! Jam is the glue that keeps our friendship, and society as a whole, together”

Family, Club or Organization, Worked together(My Breton friend)
“We met through the Celtic Underground Revolutionary Front. Our goal is to overthrow the Saxon Imperialists who have oppressed our people for too long! After the revolution we shall form a socialist union among all seven of the Celtic nations. We have no fear but that the sky may fall on our heads!”

Fate brought us together
“He’s the yin I’m the wang”

Through a friend
“sister, actually(maniacle laughter)”

School or college
“I got the styles, he’s got piles”

I would once again like to point out that there are far too many jokes about terrorism on this page and that one about the ‘Celtic Underground’ is a bit too close to the reality of our wee island.

1. Not waking up with a nasty bag of regrets every third morning-result! No really, this is huge for me-I haven’t stepped out of line in ages. You might call it boring but I call it ‘passing-second-year’

2. What else, ooh-I’m massively strong! Without getting more excercise or changing my diet I’ve managed to lose a tonne of flab and replace it with muscle-I have stretch marks on my biceps!!! Its only been two weeks!! Exclame!!!

3. Generally happier, no more visions or shakes or (un)explained fevers. Though I had one bizzarre nightmare last night.

I was at a house party(sorry, I know that this is a complete tangeant) chatting away with one of my peeps when all of a sudden I started shaking. I dropped to my knees, having a bit of a spasm coughing up this white foam(like the ‘mad dog’ in TinTin)*. All of a sudden I felt the grip of maybe six or seven hands along my sides and back. They started to lift me up out of the room-and I was petrified.

After a few minutes flying around, logic kicked in, and I decided that obviously this was some sort of dream. So, all of a sudden I was in my bedroom again. Naturally, I assumed this meant I was awake-until I started floating again. As I drifted upwards, looking down at the bed, I saw a girl that I knew a long time ago-she was asleep and hence no good for the rescue. I tried to wake her up by shouting but I didn’t shout in the dream instead I heard my real voice from outside the dream(makes perfect sense I know). The voice was all sleepy and weak, like a child
when they’re scared of the dark.

Needles to say, it didn’t work and I was off. Out of the room and into the nightsky. I flew to a graveyard on a hill, there was a lone willow tree to the left and a handful of tombstones to the right. This is where I woke up. I had been shaking for the entire duration of the dream, scared shit-fitless but the first thing that came to mind when I woke up was that I wanted to go back. I want to know whats beyond the graveyard type thing, also, it was the best damn rollercoaster I’ve ever been on. I fly pretty fast for a big guy.

Incidentally, that was the first time I’ve had more than 5 hours sleep in a number of weeks

*that has to be one of the more obscure references on the site

Check it out
http://www.aa-uk.org.uk/publications/areyou.htm

Apparently if you answer yes to any of the 20 questions you’re ‘high risk’ and if you say yes to 3 or more you are definately an alcoholic. I scored a magnificent 12!!!! I’m well proud I am.
I don’t think its a very good test though, seeing as its been nearly a fortnight and I actually don’t miss drink that much. The first two/three days were tough but thats just because I was coming down from a 5 day bender and was still hungover. Alright, granted, I may have cheated a little last Friday and Saturday by smoking a truck load of weed but other than that its been plain sailing. In fact, I only smoked the weed because I was worried about it going off during my abstinance and I didn’t want to sell it/give it away because it was a gift. A very potent Afghani gift but a gift nonetheless

No, this test doesn’t account for A) my being Irish or B) my being a student and is therefore far too tame to be taken seriously

Westport, as a town, is fucking hillarious!

We spent the entire bus ride down slagging the fact that the place was just a glorified crossroads and still managed to get lost on the Saturday afternoon-solid work from the dubs!

Initially, the bus dropped us off about a twenty minute walk outside of town. As we sauntered back in a group of local girls kidnapped two of the lads and took them for a drive. I hate to say it but we were convinced they were gonna be raped and left in a ditch somewhere-I took bets! They turned up an hour later, looking confused and used.

Went looking for somewhere to watch the match(Arsenal-V-Man U) on Saturday morning and decided on the most oldschool pub you could find. 1pm:  theres already one aul fella off his head and the entire front half of the pub is a shop. No normal shop mind, but the type of shop that has a big sack of seeds on sale right beside the cornflakes and illegal fireworks. Couple that with a barman whos voice sounds like chronic lung/throat/mouth and face cancer, that’ll never be treated, and you’ve got what I’d call a seriously oldschool pub.

 In the CastleCourt hotel. You wouldn’t even attempt it in Dublin but a close associate and I stashed a 2litre bottle of Vodka/coke right smack bang in the middle of the main courtyard-chances are that its still there if anyone wants to look. Though, its pretty potent even by my standards so be warned

The only chipper that stays open after 11pm is called “the Blue Thunder Cafe”-what a name! What a town….. I wanna go back next weekend

stole this one from BC, to be honest it could have gone either way because I could say yes to all of the options-I’m obviously very complex artistic and moody then

***Your Personality is Very Rare (ENTP)***

Your personality type is optimistic, curious, enthusiastic, and open.

Only about 4% of all people have your personality, including 3% of all women and 5% of all men.
You are Extroverted, Intuitive, Thinking, and Perceiving.

How Rare Is Your Personality?
http://www.blogthings.com/howrareisyourpersonalityquiz/

No I haven’t caved, still sober as a presbyterian thank Allah. But, I have smoked a shocking amount of weed over the last two days-is that cheating? I’m not addicted to that, yet, so I reckon its grand. Besides, blow is so indefensibly boring that I doubt it’ll ever become very popular in the Rua household

Ok, I want to preface this post by saying openly that I’ve had a long running beef with Coláiste na bhFiann. I just find them to be a bit stuck up, pretentious, full of shit and annoying-other than that I’m sure they’re lovely. Its not right to slander an entire group of people based on a few bad experiences but equally its wrong to praise someone with whome you’ve never had any good experiences. Incidentally(misspelt) this is in english because I think the conversation took place in english, don’t really know, I was fairly drunk and stoned at the time(the whole weekend really).

Some girl who Rua vaguely knows walks up and says “Hiioigh”(in that horrible tone that turns into a sigh half way through and is always a sign that this person has never had to fight for anything ever and hence deserves no respect even if they are a massive pair of mammaries-really were, I had quite the pathetic drunken stare)

Rua responds with classic ” howsh ick gowinsk? ehhhh…..”(in that tone which openely says “I’m hammered-you’re purty-I don’t care if you have nothing to say I’ll listen anyway”)

She started blabbering away about something while I swayed back and forth looking from the sky to my feet to her chest to her chest to her chest……. I have a particularily long attention span by the way.

Eventually she started coming out with a few gems they were as follows:

“I was gonna sign up to the Cumann in DIT but I thought you looked like a dickhead, I now know I was wrong”-to which I responded in my head-”I have never treated any man or woman with as little respect as I have treated you, now I know you’re a liar”-and responded aloud with-”oh no, you were right the first time-I’m a complete dickhead(which is true)”

The the classic, after a period of silence:

“Will you score my mate? She’s really low in confidence”-I have never ever heard that one before, especially seeing as how her mate was buckled in the corner, barely able to stand. I questioned her on this and she said “ye I know, but I’m sick of taking care of her”-(cough) you’re a terrible person and an amateur pimp.

Now here’s the best one. She’s in DIT, I’m in DIT. I’d know a good few people in the DIT Cumann G and would have a small bit of influence and this one knew. With one parting shot she reveals her darker purpose. In a half moan as she readdies herself to leave ”I wanna be on the commitee”.

You flatter me, lie to me, sell out your friend to me all to be on a college commitee? Jesus, I’d hate to see your presidential campaign. Thats so shallow its unbelievable

I was alert enough in my Irish lecture to have an ultra-alpha-male moment for the first time in a long time. I spent 2 hours persistantly putting the cunt on the spot-result!

I say 2 hours because it took 2 hours. The guy has a verbal sidestep that’d be the envy of any politician/hardened criminal/spokesperson for the FAI. Getting a straight answer from him is like shooting fish in a lake-it takes a whole lot of bullets but eventually ones gonna hit something.

I’ve been using far too many similes lately. Better start writing in Irish again soon before this starts to read like a series of haikus mashed up without paragraphs or sentence endings. For some reson writing in Irish acts like a check to pretentiousness for me but I only ever write in Irish when I lack oppurtunities to speak it and lately oppurtunities have been aplenty. Oireachtas na Samhna baby!!! Anyone else there? I was stoned blind but completely satisfied yup yup I agree, this post is going nowhere

Delerium Tremons, for anyone whos interested

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delirium_tremens

oh dear! We’re in trouble now son