New acquaintance: And where did your husband go to school?
Me: Jesuit School X.
New acquaintance: Oh lovely, clever, sensitive boys.
I understand that Mr. Waffle’s school produced many chess champions but that they failed to star in rugby.
Ireland
Grim
Our cleaner, A, is from Latvia. The other day he commented on how well herself spoke French. “We used to live in Belgium,” I explained. “How many languages do you speak?” I asked. “Russian and Latvian; I studied German at university but I have nearly forgotten it all now.”
The OECD economic survey of Ireland in 2008 found that “[m]ost migrants are young, well educated and work, but are often in basic jobs.” They’re not kidding.
Instructions for a virtuous sister
Firstly, we left her kit:
Then we gave her instructions:
Friday 18
Come to the house for 6.30, if you are running late, call babyminder.
You may wish to call Domino’s or dine from the richness of the fridge. DVDs under the telly.
Try to get the boys to bed about 8. They need to go to the toilet and wash their teeth before bed. They also normally get a story. Suggest you neutralise M with a book from ENVELOPE. Boys will likely reappear. Resign yourself to ensconcing them in your own bed. They will eventually fall asleep. Do not hesitate to move them – once they are asleep, they’re asleep. They may wake up wet in the middle of the night but it’s not very likely. They are likely to be wet in the morning. You will be very lucky, if you do not have to strip a bed while we are gone. Spare sheets in the hot press – you will need a waterproof one and a flannel one. The boys’ pyjamas are in the bottom drawer in their room.
M same routine (apart from bedwetting) but she will probably be happy to read to herself once safely in bed. You can let her read herself but try to get her light off by 9.30.
Collapse.
Saturday 19
Morning
You have four options:
(a) Go to GAA
(b) Go to library
(c) Go to park
(d) Something else
Options (a) to (c) are described below.
(a) If you decide to go to the GAA (car key in ENVELOPE), it starts at 9.30 and the drive is about 10 mins so you will need to set off at 9.20. Bring their hurleys which are in the round plastic white container in the shed that doesn’t have the washing machine, some water (flasks in kitchen) – should they be thirsty, and some sustaining liga – should they be unhappy. The boys’ kit should be in the drawers in their room (socks top drawer, t-shirts below and shorts third drawer). Michael is Lions and Daniel Barcelona. M can wear her tracksuit which is on top of her clothes on the wardrobe and boasts a picture of Ben 10. Everyone’s runners should be in the hall.
The boys will be playing on the grass pitch near the road and M on the all-weather pitch near the club house. If you do go, call M’s friend’s mother H. I primed her that you might be coming (she is about my age with brown hair in a bob – v. nice). Drop M with her and proceed with the boys to their pitch – you will need to put on helmets – it’s straightforward. If I were you, I would beg the trainer to make sure that, in the football match, they both get to run with the ball, otherwise they will howl. It should be over about 11 – they will all be given lollipops and the like after.
(b) If you don’t go to the GAA (and who could blame you), you might like to try the library. Library cards in the ENVELOPE – library books to be returned on the hall table. Again a driving adventure. One is nearby and small. You turn left down an alleyway immediately beside it and come out in a small on-street car park. When leaving you have to take your life in your hands and go back up the same small alleyway. They like to run up and down the ramp outside the library and I let them. V. important this library closes for lunch (1-2). Bigger library is a little further away. I have never been but parking is free and I understand it’s bigger and better. In my experience, bigger is not always better.
(c) Park: the closest is a tiny bit too far to walk so we would usually drive. However, the park is just grass so you might prefer to go to the other park which has a good playground. There is ample parking and the playground has lots to amuse the kids. Even better, there is only one exit so you can sit on a bench beside it and let the children play. Beside the playground, there is a cafe (though it’s a bit slow).
Lunchtime
The kids may eat tomato soup (in Knorr packet) and (if you’re lucky) sandwiches – cheese for Michael, ham for the others.
Party: The party is at 2.30. Presents will be wrapped and up on the bookshelf – invitation in the envelope. House is about 10/15 mins drive from us. Do your best to make children respectable but do not kill yourself. Go in with them and ask parents what time you should collect. Enjoy your freedom. Collect them and go home.
Evening as per Friday but you may wish to vary the diet. Almost certainly they will eat nothing due to a surfeit of junk in the pm. Do not be downcast if they ignore your offering.
Sunday 20
Strongly suggest that you go to the esteemed parents-in-law.
Will try to be back by lunch time. Will call you when we’re on the road. Feel free to call us any time. I probably won’t notice the phone ringing but B is usually reliable.
Good luck.
We went to a wedding in Donegal with our time off. The sun shone. The bride was beautiful, the groom handsome and the guests interesting. What more could you ask?
Really, it will be hard to be grateful enough to my loving sister…
FURTHER AND BETTER VERMIN
The house is overrun with animals. Not nice ones. Despite forking out €243 to Mr. Rentokil, we seem to have an above average number of houseflies. So appealing in any property. This did, however, give my loving husband an opportunity to kill a fly in a most satisfactory manner. He was chasing a fly on the landing with our can of useless spray (this is the problem with everything being safe, it’s also useless) and the fly was lolling about in the air soaking up the aromas with no apparent ill effects. The fly was, however, scared of the folded Irish Times that Mr. Waffle was using to supplement the fly spray (“Help, help, the liberal Dublin media, the organ of record is coming to get me with its tales of traffic chaos in the capital”) and flew blindly into a spider’s web and was trapped. Mr. Waffle noted with satisfaction, the spider efficiently bundling up its prey – one fly down. Mr. Waffle had only recently been complaining that the huge number of spiders we have on the payroll had been failing to deliver in terms of fly catching figures and that, going forward, in the absence of improved catching capacity we might have to look at overall spider numbers with a view to effecting savings in the current economic conditions. The memo obviously leaked to the spiders and they are on their mettle.
Meanwhile, we are also fighting a rear-guard action on operation wasp. Despite laying down powder, spraying, putting out a glass of coke for them to drown in and blocking up access to their nest with a highly sophisticated barrier (a combination of an old baby’s bib and tinfoil, since you ask). They are still coming. They buzz around outside hopefully (“They used to live here, they’d never have moved without telling us…call the rest of the gang”) and, increasingly and distressingly, they also buzz around inside the house. Our reluctant conclusion is that there must be some other form of access to the nest from inside the house.
And last, but by no means least, my blog is beset by spammers. At least they can’t sting me, I suppose.
Taking my life in my hands
When I say that I cycle in and out of work, people treat me as though I am some kind of lunatic. When I say that I do it without a helmet and a high visibility jacket (in daytime people), they decide that I am a weird freak and try to talk to someone else. Dubliners firmly believe that there is nothing more dangerous than going out on a bike. My father cycled until he was 80. I cycled in and out to school regularly as a teenager, I cycled in Brussels (ok I didn’t cycle in Rome but that was because I had a moped), I feel cycling is safe enough. I even did a bit of research on it, so phased was I by the horror and awe with which my activities were treated. It’s safe enough. In fact, having cycled to work for many years, I think Dublin is far safer now than it used to be: no juggernauts on the quays; far more cycle lanes; extended car free zones.
Recently, Dublin has put in place a free bike scheme like Paris, Brussels and Copenhagen. The Irish media being what it is, this has been a national news story for well over a week now. This has tempted cautious Dubliners to try out the bicycles. There was a man on the telly the other night who announced joyfully that he had cycled up and down O’Connell Street. Something that he could have achieved very easily even before the scheme was introduced but he had just been too scared. Still, I do feel it’s a good thing. There seem to be far more bikes on the roads which, of course, makes it safer for everyone. Every hire bike rack I pass has someone struggling excitedly with the technology. In fact, the only real danger in all this is when someone who hasn’t cycled for 20 years wobbles nervously into my way on the cycle path but this is a price I am more than willing to pay to get more of us out on the roads.
The Rose of Tralee
Last week, like much of the nation, I sat down to watch the Rose of Tralee. It is what our American cousins call a beauty pageant, but it’s a weird one.
It started in 1959 as a way to boost Tralee and stay in touch with the Irish diaspora. Here’s how it works, women (under 28) are selected from Ireland and around the world. They must have some Irish link but it can be pretty tenuous (one Irish great-grandparent is fine). These are the “lovely girls” parodied by evil old Father Ted. The song, “The Rose of Tralee” features the line “She was lovely and fair as the rose of the summer/but ’twas not her beauty alone that won me”. The organisers constantly emphasise this line and that it’s not about looks alone. The women meet the judges several times during the week long festival. Certainly, the participants tend to be easy on the eye but they are not all startlingly beautiful and several of them were grand big girls this time round. Gratifyingly, none of them looks as though she’s starving.
So, the format is that contestant goes onstage, talks about her Irish roots (if from abroad), has a small chat with the presenter and then demonstrates a talent. In the past, almost invariably, Irish dancing (and there are still a fair few among the diaspora who can do a very impressive slip jig). They all wear evening dresses. This is most emphatically not the kind of event where there is a swimsuit round.
They are an impressive bunch all the same. They stood there in front of a big audience – no visible nerves and chatted away happily. As time has gone on the cohort has grown more and more educated and now the Roses are overwhelmingly young professionals – a lot of accountants for some reason – or students finishing their degrees (it’s the only beauty pageant you’d be happy to see your daughter participating in). A doctor Rose (Perth and obstetrics, since you ask) wanted to do some suturing as her special talent but the television people demurred as it would be hard to capture successfully on screen. She belted out a very acceptable song instead.
Some of my highlights from this year’s event.
Derby Rose
Insensitive presenter: And you have a brother who is very severely handicapped?
Derby Rose: Yes, that’s right. He has Cornelia de Lange syndrome. [She explains a bit about it and says she loves her brother.]
Presenter: It’s genetic, isn’t it, so your children could have it.
Her: It’s possible but the odds against it are huge, it’s as unlikely as winning the lottery.
Presenter: And as your parents get older, who will look after your brother? I suppose it will be you.
Her: Well, yes, but I love him very much and will be happy to care for him.
Kilkenny Rose
Presenter: So how did you become a Rose?
Her: Ray, my mother always wanted me to do the Rose of Tralee.
Presenter: And we’ve met.
Her: Yes, I was at the young scientist exhibition (she’s a science teacher) and some of my students saw you. They went running up to you and, like a big eejit, I ran after them. My mother was there too to help with the students because of the cutbacks and she ran up to you too. She told you that she had always wanted me to be in the Rose of Tralee and you misunderstood and thought I was a former Rose. So, my mother said, “If Ray D’Arcy thinks that you were a former Rose you can definitely do it.”
Presenter: And was she delighted when you were selected?
Her: Actually, Ray, she died that week.
Presenter (slight pause): And your father’s dead too, isn’t he?
Her: Yes Ray, he died when I was very young.
Presenter: So, you’re an orphan.
Her: Yes, I am.
Presenter: But there was another man who was like a stepfather to you.
Her: Yes, Tom.
Presenter: But he’s dead too.
Her: Yes, he is, he died when I was 17.
Presenter: God, you’re like a black widow or something.
Was she cast down? No. Afterwards for her talent she did a science trick that you could use in the pub – sucking liquid into a glass using matches, an ashtray and a vacuum. Personally, I was hoping that she would win.
Dublin Rose
Presenter: So you’re a trainee solicitor in Arthur Cox.
Dublin Rose: That’s right.
Presenter: Of course, they’re acting in relation to NAMA.
Her: Yes, that’s right. It’s a great indication of the excellent service which the firm provides.
Presenter: And they acted for a bank as well. Any concerns about conflicts of interest there?
Her: No, Ray, we have what are called Chinese Walls… [it was at this point that Mr. Waffle retired saying that he couldn’t face a Rose of Tralee contestant explaining Chinese Walls to him]
San Francisco Rose
Presenter: So you work in IT.
Her: Yes, that’s right. In Kaiser Permanente.
Presenter: And what do they do?
Her: Healthcare.
Presenter: Oh great, can you explain President Obama’s plans for healthcare reform.
Her: How long do we have, Ray?
The winner was the London Rose – a management consultant (who had done a stint as a Japanese weather girl). We heard that she got 6 A1s in her Leaving Certificate and was a scholar in Trinity College. As it happens, I was at dinner on Saturday night with four former Trinity scholars and I asked them whether they thought that having a Rose of Tralee among their number debased the currency somewhat. The jury was divided. The women felt that it did rather. The men were just baffled.
You can watch it on the internet next year. Go on, you know you want to.
