The Man Who Knows Everything couldn’t be diluted on ‘Brexit eggs’

Keane’s Kingdom

THE Man Who Knows Everything knew I wasn’t well up enough, so he took it upon himself to explain all about Brexit. It was as if I had a bracelet strapped to my ankle. I was incarcerated, a prisoner in my own pub. There was no escape. I am a lifer. And TMWKE, short for The Man Who Knows Everything, was the jailer. I had to shorten his name as I am too worn out to type it out in full after what he put me through. The last few lines at the bottom will explain all.

TMWKE told me by the time he was finished I would know all about Brexit. And what was even worse, he said he would ask me questions, just to make sure I understood everything.

Now you might ask why I didn’t tell him I didn’t want to listen to him, and to clear off out of the place, and not to be annoying ordinary seven-day licence publicans.

Well it’s as simple and as complicated as this. TMWKE had been through a tough time. The humanitarian in me broke out. The wife divorced him after 53 years of marriage because she couldn’t listen to him any more.

“It can be very hard on the women,” said TMWKE, knowingly, “when they do be talking to a man who is right all the time. They can’t stick it. I was very lonesome after her, though. She made a lovely pavlova of a Sunday and she was so good at it I left her to cook away herself, unsupervised.”

TMWKE is related to half the parish and if I got rid of him out of the pub, not one of his people would ever darken my door again, even though not one of them could stick listening to him. It goes back to the faction fights and if you hit one of us, you hit us all. That was the economic reason.

So with all this in mind, I ask him to tell me all about Brexit. As I say the words, I know and feel the range of emotions experienced by the Thai soccer team trapped in the cave. But at least they had each other. I was alone, all alone.

“Brexit,” said TMWKE, “is either hard or soft, like a boiled egg.”

TMWKE’s deep voice and lofty tone suggested he was speaking ex cathedra. His infallibility was gathered around him like a pope’s cloak. And then after a sip of his (free) MiWadi, he issued an addendum to the oracle. “That’s it,” says he. “No more, no less. Brexit is a boiled egg.”

I wasn’t even paid for listening to him. Around these parts, you wouldn’t be long getting the name of a desperate stingy man if you charged for MiWadi, the freeloader’s entrance ticket to the pub. “But what about the Border with the North?” I ask. “And the freedom of movement of goods produced here? And the hike up in prices of imported UK goods. Inflation. And the fact the UK is our largest trading partner, and...”

“Stop it right there,” interrupts TMWKE, “and don’t be worrying over things no one here cares a whit about. All that bothers the people of Ireland is Exit.” Then he stops for a while to hydrate on the (free) MiWadi. “Before I teach you any more about Exit, I have to say that MiWadi is very diluted by you. Throw another drop in to give it a bit more of a kick. It’s as wake (weak) as a wegetarian’s (sic) pee.”

For a second I consider pouring the MiWadi over his head, but then I think of his 237 first-, second- and third-cousins. The inclusion of their partners would bring the figure well over 400.

“Exit,” says he, “is all to do with England’s leaving the World Cup. They were bate sick by Croatia in the semi and the whole of Ireland were cheering for Croatia. So all the people of Ireland care about is the soccer, and Exit.”

I had to admit he had me listening now. “Go on,” says I.

“I want more MiWadi first,” says he. “What about the risk of diabetes?” asks I, caringly.

“I’ll take my chances,” says he, greedily. And on he goes again after downing the most of a (free) pint in one go. “Everyone knows facts, like Harry Kane’s people are from Connemara, but ere a wan could tell you wan single thing about Brexit and the 40,000 jobs we could lose. No one studies nottin any more in this country.”

He might have a point. But enough is enough. There’s no let-up. And I envy Robinson Crusoe and Howard Hughes something desperate.

I go into a world of my own and his words are the constant drone of a bluebottle trying to drive through a closed-up window in a mad, desperate bid to escape. And I’m sorry now for all the bluebottles I hunted down and murdered with a cudgel made up out of ‘Woman’s Way’.

He’s off again. I must have been a bluebottle in a former life. “And then the Irish are stone mad about Meghan Markle and Prince Harry. The people of Dublin were knocking each other over to get near them. And calling the royal family your excellency and your royal highness. Fat lads were bursting their trousers trying to curtsy. Then they have to keep their lúidín at 30 degrees north when they are drinking tea with ’em. Did you know that, smart and all as you think you are?”

I didn’t know about the tea. There was no stopping him. “The whole country was caught up in the glamour and the romance. Do you not think that’s strange and we cheerin’ agin England later on that evenin’?”

And then there was a very weird happening, which I cannot in any way fathom or explain. TMWKE stopped talking and he rested his index finger and the only thumb on his right hand under his chin. Then he comes out with the facts that rattled me to the core.

“Did you know, Billy,” said TMWKE, “that bluebottles carry E.coli and a herd of them are a sure sign of a dead rat? There’s a bad egg of a bluebottle jellyfish too, and you wouldn’t want to meet him if you were out paddling.”

How did The Man Who Knows Everything know I was thinking about bluebottles? How?