Chewing gum and chewing the fat during two road trips
WEDNESDAY: JUNE 9
THIS being deadline day again – Christ above, this year is whizzing by – and a magically manic kind of day, I listen repeatedly to an acoustic version of Manic Monday (by The Bangles).
Even though today is Wednesday, Google couldn’t give me a Manic Wednesday song. A fun fact about this catchy pop ditty that The
Bangles put on their second studio album (Different Light, 1986) is that Prince wrote this song. He of yesterday’s diary entry regarding Sinead O’Connor.
Having half of the Pfizer/BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine has given me the urge to ask questions that previously didn’t matter. For example, who has been fined €150 for not binning their gum when they’re done? There is a Gum Little Taskforce (GLT). Things to chew over, I suppose. But please dispose of these thoughts properly when you are finishing ruminating. According to the GLT website, 92% of people now recognise that Dublin GAA’s Senior Gaelic footballers will never lose again. Sorry, 92% of people now recognise that dropped gum is litter.
Among the dozens of television channels I have access to (but never watch), I stumbled across a gem – Talking Pictures TV. The first offering that I enjoyed here was a 1981 movie called Dangerous Davies: The Last Detective (starring Bernard Cribbins). Yes, it is better than Avengers: Infinity Nonsense.
THURSDAY: JUNE 10
I WOKE up much later than planned. Not only did I oversleep due to yesterday being deadline day, there was also the issue of some outdoor pints yesterday evening.
Caheny’s on Mail Coach Road, a pub that is the epitome of community spirit, is where myself and herself sat outside, savouring a sense of normality in cider form. I believe Caheny’s to be a mixture of the Rovers Return (Coronation Street)/The Woolpark (Emmerdale)/The Queen Vic (EastEnders). A pitstop at Sligo Fish & Chips completed a memorable, unplanned excursion.
After getting ready for work I paused to give thanks – a hot shower, clean clothes and the chance to be creative. OK, I would like to see Tourlestrane’s John Kelly and Rory McHugh of Easkey play for the Sligo Senior Gaelic football team and, who knows, maybe Patrick Hoban would be a good attacking option for Rovers. But one can’t have everything.
It turns out I missed today’s solar eclipse. Something else I missed (but was glad I did) was the live outdoor gig at Dublin’s Iveagh Gardens. This was the first Irish gig since the pandemic changed everything in 2020. Restrictions were in place (no drink, those in attendance were grouped in pods of four) as this was a pilot event to see how live events can work while Covid-19 remains a threat.
All fine so far. The concert-goers interviewed on RTÉ, however, were orgasmic in their comments. No, this
wasn’t a reincarnation of Elvis they had been watching, David Bowie, Kurt Cobain, Joe Dolan, The Doors or even The Saw Doctors.
James Vincent McMorrow (who?) and Sorcha Richardson (who?) were the artists to usher in live music’s return. Yikes.
FRIDAY: JUNE 11
GIVEN that today began at 12.01am, this is where I’ll start. Actually it was around 1.14am. A group of young people decided that our long window sill would be a good place to stop, sit and chat, with the remainder of this nest of teens opting to lean against my Skoda (each with arms folded like Friends star Matt LeBlanc).
After a few minutes of trying to sleep with this unexpected background noise, I took action. I refrained from cursing or shouting. From the upstairs bedroom, I negotiated their exit (to another window sill and car, just not mine).
This was only the beginning of a strange day. I spotted a pair of lost glasses at a bus stop. Does this mean that the person who left them behind didn’t see the bus coming?
Without knowing how busy I will be in the coming weeks (herself often jokes that I’m the only person ever to work early and late plus every hour in between), I’m not sure how many of the 51 games from Euro 2020 that
I will get to watch live. Still, I got to watch the tournament opener – Italy against Turkey – and I promise myself that I will watch the final on Sunday, July 11.
Before kick-off, the sight of a miniature remote controlled car bringing out the match ball was strange – but no stranger than GAA matches of the past where high-ranking Catholic clergy would throw the ball in for major fixtures.
As Italy got to grips with Turkey (who clearly missed striker Cenk Tosun, their top scorer from the qualifiers), it was evident that Turkey wouldn’t manage a shot on target (which they didn’t).
When Italy scored their second goal – a nice 66th minute snaffle from striker Ciro Immobile – I reckoned that Turkey’s goose was cooked.
Also, according to a stat I overheard on Mail Coach Road, this is Italian defender’s Giorgio Chiellini’s EIGHTH major tournament. He still has time to play in the Abbott Cup with Cloonacool.
SATURDAY: JUNE 12
A GARDA speed van was on lower Pearse Road. I didn’t know I was walking that fast to the office. Before the first of this weekend’s road trips, a gig in Omagh to watch Sligo hurlers, I filled the Skoda at Sligo Fuels. This car runs on diesel,
rather that the wit of Gavin and Alan, my regular road trip buddies. On the way over to Sligo Fuels, the dereliction and abandonment of Sligo docklands is so obvious. There is a history here, several buildings that must be preserved, but also empty, unused sites, forgotten spaces. Listlessness. A sense of wasted development opportunities.
Listless is what Sligo hurlers were in the first-half of their game against Tyrone. Their display made as much sense as the script from Pulp Fiction being dubbed over Darby O’Gill and the Little People. It the second-half it was business as usual. Sligo won, stylishly.
The Showgrounds was painful viewing as Rovers’ unbeaten sequence was smashed by Drogheda United’s Chris ‘Tevez’ Lyons. He scored two wonder goals to leave Rovers fans wondering. The hosts, who lost 2-1, shouldn’t panic yet, though.
SUNDAY: JUNE 13
BEFORE my jetting off for the sunny setting of Portlaoise, herself tells me that she enjoyed her catch up yesterday evening with friends at Sligo town’s new Temple Bar area, Doorly Park/Riverside. The Blue Lagoon’s outdoor seating area was buzzing, with mouth-watering food available from Koha Street Kitchen.
Google Maps told me that getting to Portlaoise on foot would take two days (of continuous walking) so I suppose we should have left on Friday. Which would have meant missing the start of Euro 2020 along with yesterday’s hurling and Rovers’ episode. Speaking of hurling and Rovers, I mentioned to Sligo hurling boss Padraig Mannion that one of his star players, Rory McHugh, was a dab hand at soccer as a teenager with Dromore Villa.
With not much to say about Sligo’s loss to Wexford, either before or after it happened, Alan suggested that Emo, a village in Laois, is where the rock genre Emo originated. We also spotted a sign for Russelltown. We didn’t have time for further investigation – is there a town named in honour of John Russell, the Rovers assistant manager? Road trips always seem to spawn more questions that answers. Much like an Emo song.
MONDAY: JUNE 14
THOSE weekend drives around Ireland are taking their toll. Trapped in a place called Very Tired But I’ve No Time To Sleep, I prop my mind up with high-caffeine drinks and drinks with an even higher caffeine content. Yesterday, at MW Hire O’Moore Park, the guys at the entry gate were almost too friendly. For GAA matchday stewards. After giving my name, the chap with the moustache and the clipboard called me a “gentleman, saint and scholar”. Stunned, I replied that I would settle for being just one of these identities.
In the evening I got some shut-eye upstairs as, downstairs, herself invited Elvis into the house. Elvis Presley: The Searcher is a docuseries on Netflix. It is said that Elvis never died. Well, his music never will. Macy, one of our dogs, was snoring – she sounded like a slowly deflating balloon that was wheezily refusing to give up the last of its air.
TUESDAY: JUNE 15
AWAKE early, I opt for Depeche Mode remixes as today’s soundtrack. I remind Alan that ‘Murder Lord’, a phrase that Gavin came up with during last Sunday’s road trip to Portlaoise, would be a catchy name for an Xbox or PlayStation game.
The Yeats Society Sligo need you. Well, it needs your cash. I have my own views on Yeats and such but I realise that a Sligo without a Yeats Society would lead to cultural carnage. This is an organisation as fundamentally important to Sligo as Rovers is. YSS (Yeats Society Sligo) is great for the town. In fact, a merger with the Bit O’Red could be their ticket to survival. Yeats Society Sligo Rovers? Sounds poetic.
Even though I’m 50% closer to being fully vaccinated, I worry about the implications of a summer rise of the Delta variant. I’ve lost all interest in Euro 2020 (until the final). England’s game against Croatia last Sunday was the first time since 1992 that either Liverpool or United weren’t represented in a Blighty starting XI.