Re: Leisurely Scribbles (part 5)

It's good to have you back Jem Lad, and I'm glad you had a grand time of things in Wexford. We were only there about four days I think it was, but thoroughly enjoyed the charm and beauty of the place and the friendliness of the people.

I know love does funny things to some people, but wearing blinkers when it rears its head is never such a good idea.

Re: Leisurely Scribbles (part 5)

Thanks Fruity, I hope you and your lovely wife manage to get a break too, it does one a power of good, especially after this covid thing, the mental strain has been tough on all of us.

What really shocked me at the beginning was how no country had a clue how to deal with it, talk about being caught with yer trousers down, running around like headless chickens, unbelievable when you think of all the techy stuff out there now, sending missions to Mars carrying mini helicopters and flying them at will, then consider one invisible bug comes along and brings the whole world to a standstill?, time we got our priorities in order I think.

As that great hippy poet of the 70’s Denim DeWeed said
“The world is just a big ball of shit heading towards an astronomical fan”
How right he was, the planet has lost the plot altogether.

Sad that DeWeed died aged 41 doing a bungee jump that went wrong, his last words before he jumped were “I don’t know where I’m heading, but here I come anyway”, not bad as final words go, but little did he know they were going to be his last.

He wasn’t a bad oul soul so I reckon he went down first and then his spirit ascended to the pearly gates to meet the first and greatest hippy of them all, he who always advocated love, peace, and understanding, and isn’t that what we all want.

And now for something unrelated.

My brother in law is in his mid 60’s and has been a hard working lavatory cleaner/attendant for 35 years, but when an American cleaning company took over the contract recently he was threatened with the sack for being too slow at his work.
God love him, he’s had a gammy leg for the past five years, fell off his bike and cracked something in the knee area and was left with a permanent limp, anyway he was bluntly told by his new American boss to “Get his shit together or get out”

He’s not the brightest star in the sky, and certainly not used to Americanisms, so I needn’t tell you it left him more than a bit confused.
I rang him this morning but he wasn’t there, his wife told me he was gone into town to buy some heavy duty plastic bags and a good strong shovel.

I wonder where he’ll put it all.

Re: Leisurely Scribbles (part 5)

The Out Tray has been dealt with, the In Tray has been disposed of, this is just a P.O Box now (P155 off Box).

Re: Leisurely Scribbles (part 5)

I think I'll settle for the milk tray Spitty, the jumbo box please.


I once met a girl from Famagusta
Known locally as Cyprus Augusta
She was fond of the lies, you could tell by her eyes
So nobody ever could trust her.

I almost bumped into her in Courtown Harbour while on holidays last week, boy has Augusta lashed on the pounds, nay stones, since she was a young one back in the 60’s.
I whispered a silent prayer of thanks to meself as she passed by, and was I glad the good Lord gave me the strength to resist her charms that night so long ago in old Kerrigan’s corn field.
******

If you are around my age you’ll no doubt have heard of Tessie O’Shea singer and actress, or Two Ton Tessie as she was often billed, well we had our own version of her over here back in the 70’s, Two Ton Nellie. I saw her once up in the local, she was a truly great pint drinker and darts player, a very strong willed lady, alas both are no longer with us.


Two Ton Nellie rolled into the pub
Then after ten pints she felt like some grub

The barman said if she’d wait he wouldn’t fail her
Then he wheeled out her lunch on a big wooden trailer

At her face I chanced a quick glance
I got a shock, she looked like Jack Palance

But her hair was nice and had a sheen to it
Lovely red colour, bright and clean to wit

She washed it every day without fail
Even when she spent some time in jail

Her TV licence she had refused to pay
Said she was free to watch whatever she may

But the judge did not concur with her assumption
He gave her six months then adjourned for his luncheon

When she got out she had lost a lot of weight
She was delighted and kissed the warder as she went out the gate

And that is the tale of Two Ton Nellie
Who could never get enough to fill her belly.

Re: Leisurely Scribbles (part 5)

Oh yes, I remember watching Tessie O'Shea, and her counterpart, Mrs Mills.
We also had a local lad from Bristol called Russ Conway who was very popular.

I've never heard of your Nellie though.

That was good, honest family entertainment.

Re: Leisurely Scribbles (part 5)

Russ Conway was very popular over here too Fruity, as was Winifred Atwell, great ‘Hooley’ or party stuff all before the Beatles and all the other groups came on the scene.
My father in law had one of those stand up pianos in the living room and manys the great night I had there.
God be good to him, he was one kind decent man, he was only 61 when he died of cancer, the couple were very close and his wife died two years later when she was 61, she never got over losing him.
******

Statictronic trance?

“When she heard her husband was eaten by an alien Dogatite she went into a statictronic trance”

Don’t ask me what that is, I just heard it in a horror film set in the future that I watched last night and thought it sounded great, a statictronic trance indeed, anyone know what that is?.

Once at a hooley in Killarney I drank a half bottle of Mick Gilligan’s “Patrick’s Day Special” poteen and went into a state of total numbness for about an hour, when I came out of it they couldn’t stop me dancing all over the place like yerman outa Boney M.
I wonder was I in a statictronic trance?.
Of course I was in me prime at that time, couldn’t do it now.

I think the fella who wrote the script for that film got the idea to call his alien monsters Dogatites from watching his dog tearing apart a pair of his wife’s discarded tights one night when he was bored, but I could be wrong.
Great imaginations these fiction writing lads and lassies, all they need is a little spark of an idea and they’re away in a hack.
*******

Here’s Winnie with the ever smiling face and her characteristic wink.

Re: Leisurely Scribbles (part 5)

I have always loved TV but I’m afraid it’s had it’s day now.

I remember when we got our first TV set back in 1960, it was a Pye 14” wooden affair and weighed half a ton, it stood about 3 feet high in it’s own cabinet and took pride of place in the living room, it was on HP and cost the staggering sum of fifteen bob a week!, but we managed it as my Dad had just returned to work after being out for ten years with TB, my older brother and me were also working.

Many years later in the 70’s when I was married with two kids we bought our first colour TV, that would have cost about £800 cash so we got it on ‘the weekly plan’ and we paid over £1,200 before it was cleared.
Look at how much they have come down in price since them, you can get a really big smart TV now for less than €500!

But that’s all reminiscing, what I really want to say it that the young folks today, well those in my own family and their friends, never bother with TV unless there’s some football or other sport they are into is on, as soon as that’s over it’s back to the computer or onto the phone again.

There was a time when the next day folks would all be talking about what was on the TV last night, no one cares now, except a few oldies.

I don’t watch a lot of it myself now either, most of the films I watch are on youtube which is internet through the TV, and when I’m in bed there are endless audio books to chose from the same source, the wife’s favourite channel on TV is Challenge who show nothing only repeated old quiz show programs that drew huge audiences in their hayday.
Yes I’d definitely say TV as we knew and loved is finished, the sparkle has gone out of it.

The boy little went into the pet shop wanting to buy a budgie, he pointed to a row of caged birds on the top shelf and asked how much they cost.
“£10.50 each” says the man.
“And how much are the budgies underneath them?” asked the boy.
“£8”
“They look the same to me, how come the ones on top are dearer” inquired the boy.
“Because they are on higher perches”

Oh God! I don’t know where I got the courage to repeat that old relic, sorry but I just had to get it out of my system.

The only stuff most folks get on HP now are cars, houses, and sometimes computers, mortgages are the same as HP just on a bigger scale with a different name but regular repayments all the same.
Are we better off today then? or are we still still being fooled by changing the names of borrowing money?
Methinks the world’s economies would collapse if everyone stopped borrowing money.

Re: Leisurely Scribbles (part 5)

Yep, about to test the theory.

Re: Leisurely Scribbles (part 5)

We had a telly from the late fifties/early sixties. Bought and paid for. Dad had a good job.
I remember watching things like, Watch with Mother, The Royal Tournament with the Field Gun Race, and the first episode of Doctor Who.

I left home at eighteen but came back for holidays and the odd weekend. A few years after I left, I came home to find Dad had bought a new telly. He said, "Look, it's got BBC 2"
"Yes Dad. It's a colour TV as well!" said I.

Six years of rented accommodation later, I bought my first home, and rented a telly. A couple of years later my parents gave me their "old" colour telly. There were still only three channels available though.
A fourth channel began broadcasting in the early eighties, then it just seemed a new channel appeared every month after that, especially once satellite TV had started.

Ten years later there was a song going around called 57 channels and nothing on. Pretty prophetic really.

Now there are so many channels and so many programmes to choose from that it is difficult to choose what to watch.

Now we can record so much stuff we generally don't watch much live TV anymore.

We talk about TV programmes with friends and family, but more so about a series rather than a specific programme on a specific dare, such as, "did you see what was on last night?"

Re: Leisurely Scribbles (part 5)

Not long after we were married in 1965 we had one of those ’slot TV’s’ where you put two bob in every three or four hours like a gas meter affair, Christ it used to drive us mad the it went out and we had to rush to find the right coin to in the bloody thing, back then the TV stations only broadcast from 6pm until twelve midnight, though the children programs may have been on earlier.
*****

I hate that stupid expression “It’s a no brainer” everyone seems to be using it now parrot fashion, even the dogs on the street are barking it out.
My two adult grand kids use it a lot too.
I was always a curious person and was determined to seek out the origin, after much painstaking research I finally found the answer.

It all originated from an incident between those bodysnatchers Burke and Hare and Robert Knox the famous Anatomist who financed their wicked deeds.

Things were becoming very slack in the fresh corpse department, the pair of villains were sitting drinking in Hare’s room waiting for Professor Robert Knox from Edinburgh university to call, when they heard the secret knock on the door Burke answered it and let the professor in.

“Well I hope you have something fresh for me today Burke, I’m doing an important dissection in the morning” said the Professor.

“Im afraid we only have two week old stiffs Doc, this new cremation trend is badly affecting business” sighs Burke.

“No no my good man!, they won’t do at all”

“Oh I almost forget Doc, we do have a young man who died just last night, he was drunk, fell under a hackney and was decapitated, we couldn’t find the head but the rest of him is in immaculate condition, you can have him cheap for ten shillings seeing that you have an important session tomorrow, besides you are our best customer”

The professor rubs his chin in thought for a while, then Hare speaks.

Go on, take it Doc, a real bargain at ten bob, you don’t have to think it over... it’s a no brainer”