Recently, the Princess asked me what “ggu..nn.ess” meant? “Where did you see it?” I asked. “Everywhere,” she said. “Ah, I think you must mean Guinness”. “Oh, the black beer with white on top?” “Well, Guinness isn’t the only black beer with white on top, its called stout and in Cork they make two kinds of stout : Murphy’s and Beamish. In fact, your great, great uncle Tommy, your Cork Grandad’s uncle worked in the Murphy’s factory in Cork”. I’m doing my best here but I feel that I’m fighting an uphill battle.
Thalidomide
I heard a fascinating programme about Thalidomide on radio 4 as I was driving to work a while ago (it was too wet to cycle – please note defensive tone) and I ended up sitting in the car park to listen to the end of it and scuttling in late to my desk. While I did know about Thalidomide and its effects, it was much more immediate and shocking to hear the people who had been involved and the archive radio material on this. Really interesting stuff and well worth a listen.
Vote!
Last night the Princess asked her parents why there were pictures of the judge everywhere (she meant the Taoiseach – separation of powers is a mystery to the Princess, she regards the executive and judiciary as interchangeable). She spends a lot more time pounding the mean streets of the city and she likes to read everything and election posters are unavoidable. We explained that there were a number of elections looming. The local elections where we would vote for people to run Dublin and the European elections where we would vote for people to.. um…go to Brussels and Strasbourg. “And,” added Mr. Waffle, “don’t forget the by-election.” I consider myself very literate in these matters but I am having trouble working out whom they want me to vote for and for which position. It’s all very exciting though. The other night a young fella came knocking at our door urging us to vote Green in general and more specifically for him. Following a brief chat we established that he had been lectured by a former classmate of mine and our friend, the Dutch Mama when he was at college. Is it any wonder that there is a statistic that something like 90% of Irish people know their local T.D. personally?
The unkindest cut
The Princess, in her infinite wisdom, cut her hair while I was away overnight last week. She was making playdough and got some in her hair and this seemed to her the most practical way to deal with the problem. Essentially, she cut out a large clump of hair on one side of her head. I nearly cried when I saw her. “Your beautiful hair,” I said in exact imitation of my mother. “My sister is a boy now,” said Michael gloomily. We went to the hairdresser to get it all chopped off. He tsked and gave her a mullet. Her hair grows so slowly that she could be a teenager before it looks respectable again.
I spoke to her on the phone while I was away and she told me a tale of woe about how school was awful. The others had told her that she was to look for them while they hid and while she was counting they went and told the principal that she had pushed someone and she was punished. The principal and even the school secretary (who is lovely) had been very cross with her. Then, the authorities had found out that the others were lying and she was pardoned. I was very saddened by this glum little story and, the following morning, took her into school myself to get to the bottom of it. After dropping her off, I went for a word with the principal. He was astounded. The whole tale was utter fantasy. “In fact,” he said, “she is a very good child and has never been in any trouble at all.” What, internet, are we to make of this?
Finally, I discovered that in the Princess’s school, they make their first communions in their school uniforms. While this is something of which I heartily approve in theory, in practice, I find myself a little disconsolate. In theory, obviously, it stops ludicrously over the top expenditure and helps to focus the children’s (and indeed their parents’) minds on what is a very important religious event rather than an opportunity for dressing small girls as brides to be. In practice, I find that I had been somewhat looking forward to dressing my small girl as a bride to be (don’t mock the afflicted). One of the other parents said that some parents get dresses for their daughters for after the event. Even I can see that that is daft and my husband thinks that its completely ridiculous but yet, I am tempted. It’s two years away (oh stop sniggering in the corner) and perhaps herself will, once she has a thorough grasp on transubstantiation, have views on the appropriate dress code.
More from the birth announcements
Recently, at the end of two announcements where boys were given relatively innocuous names (well, Riley and Zach, if you must know, my standards are slipping) the children’s thrilled etc. parents have seen fit to finish the announcements as follows: “A caddy for Daddy!!” In both cases, two exclamation marks were called for. What is this new and sinister development? Is it in some way related to the fact that you can now play straight through Ireland from North to South given that the greater part of the island of Ireland is now made up of golf courses?
With age, possibly, comes wisdom
Many years ago, I used to drive from Dublin to Cork at Christmas with my friend M. When we were within sniffing distance of Cork city within the county bounds, in fact, he would insist on stopping for several hours in a college friend’s house. I see from the paper that said college friend’s firm is now sponsoring the Trevor/Bowen Literary Summer School. I wish now that I’d asked the friend about his reading habits rather than spending all my time there glumly nursing a cup of tea and desperate to get away. There’s a moral for young people there somewhere but I’m too tired to draw it.
