Monday 28 April 2014

BEING SLAGGED IN PUBLIC IS THE GREATEST HONOUR!

Monty and JD - such charming young men...


 I’ve been lucky enough to live in many English speaking countries, yet the friendships I’ve forged while living in Ireland are matched only by those struck in the heat of my London youth.

Whether from Australia, America, my native England or adopted Ireland, all my friends are capable of slagging. They have to be. What’s the use of investing all that time and trust in someone if you can’t make them laugh by tearing them to pieces?

 Nobody personifies the Irish art of slagging better than my excellent friend The Body. Hanging his humour on the Continental Divide between absurdity and wisdom, there's a dryness to his wit that’s akin to having emery paper dragged across your private bits. His slaggings hurt, make you think, then laugh self-deprecatingly and on the way they teach you something about yourself.

To slag is to attack with affection, and it only really works when reciprocated. In my experience, English and Irish people enjoy and rely on slagging more than any from other nations. At risk of churning the stomachs of the Shinner-inclined amongst you, I think it’s part of our collective culture.

Our differences are mostly the result of our histories, because the humans standing in Irish and English fields and cities are not so very different: aggressive; witty; warriors who have survived invasion, we need to know we can bluster and barrage our way through friendships, free from fear of offending.

Indeed, as an Englishman living in the West of Ireland, I’ve been the victim of fairly hysterical and frequently historical Irish slagging for over two decades now, and when it has been delivered well, I’ve enjoyed it.

Slagging without humour quickly becomes abuse, but thankfully most of the time, it makes me laugh, so I take it on the chin.

In return, apart from occasionally pointing out in this colyoom one or two minor Irish idiosyncrasies that upset or amuse me, I’ve enjoyed gentle slagging pleasure by referring to ‘Double Vision’ as ‘this colyoom’.

In October 1992 I was two months off the boat, writing in this noble rag about my efforts to make sense of my new home. Ireland was so incredibly similar to England, yet enigmatically and vitally different.
 People were coming up to me in the street saying they had enjoyed my colyoom.

“My what?”
“Oh, you know. Your colyoom in the paper. Your ar-tickle.”

Aha! So in the same way that I’d heard the Irish describe a ‘fil-em’ they’d seen, they read a ‘colyoom’, not a column.

Around the same time, I was sat at the bar of my first proper ‘Local’ in Ireland, when the old fella sitting next to me asked what I did for a living. Weary of the way my fellow Englishmen tended to overreact to the word, I whispered

“I’m a writer.”
“Ah sure, isn't everyone in Ireland a scribbler?” spluttered himself. “Doesn't every gobshite have a feckin' novel stashed under the bed?”

‘Scribbler? What a brilliant word!’ I thought to myself, feeling comforted by the informality of his sniffy dismissal. ‘I’m going to love this country.’

Recently I scored a slagging that reaffirmed that feeling. Conor ‘Monty’ Montague and John Donnellan were opening Cuirt Festival’s ‘Far From Literature We Were Reared’ event with their usual double-act skit.

The gag was that John had been dropped from the evening’s line-up at the last minute, because there were so many performers there just wasn’t time for everyone. This premise allowed the lads to go through the cast list, slagging everyone as they went.

“Charlie Adley? Charlie feckin’ Adley?” pleaded John to Monty. “But he’s a Londoner! I’m Irish and you’re dropping me for an Englishman? A cockney geezer who drinks whiskey for breakfast!”

“Well, Double Vision is a very popular colyoom!”

“Double Vision. I’ll give him Double Vision. He only has double vision because he drinks whiskey for breakfast. Coming over here, shaggin’ our women - ”

“Oh, I think the women of Galway are fairly safe!” Monty interjected, to howls of laughter from everyone who knows anything of me.

As I laughed heartily at the way I was being mocked from the stage in front of a sell-out crowd at the Roisin Dubh, my heart was glowing. You don’t get taken to pieces with humour, slagged good and proper, unless you’re a part of things.

Later in the evening we briefly left the world of slagging, instead dipping our toes into the Sea of Vitriol. No harm was done.

John Donnellan had brought the house down with his piece, in which he suggested the Irish shouldn’t trust institutions of any kind. He embarrassed me by justifiably accusing scribblers of choosing to write about beauty over truth. Sometimes the sheer scope of institutionalised Irish corruption defeats my typing fingers. Then he told us all to spoil our electoral votes.

Later, while on stage to launch Seamus Ruttledge’s new album ‘Elementary Chaos’, an evidently irritated Páraic Breathnach described John’s proposal as ‘Dull’, but then went on to bemoan recent Irish encounters with the House Of Windsor.

All of a sudden I heard myself heckling:
“It’s called peace! Terrible, isn’t it!”

There are plenty of deserving nominees for the award of Best Slagging Delivered to this Scribbler by a Celt in a Starring Role, but the clear winner occurred over 20 years ago (apologies to loyal colyoomistas who have heard this one before!).

In a pub in Timoleague, Co. Cork I was demeaned with wit and perfect timing. Even though this slagging owes more to hatred than humour, it makes me laugh to this day.

As an Englishman travelling with his German girlfriend, we appeared an odd couple, receiving many raised eyebrows. Yet nothing came close to the barman’s brilliantly minimalist and wholly damning delivery.

As he lopped the tops off our creamy pints of Guinness, he looked over at us and calmly, quietly, slowly stated:

“So you are German ... and he is English ... hmmmm ... (long pause) ... well, I have no particular problem with Germans.”


©Charlie Adley
28.04.14.

Monday 21 April 2014

YOU CAN ONLY DRIVE 100 Kph AROUND THE DANGEROUS BENDS!



If you were there I feel your pain. By now you too will have received your letter from the Gardai, informing you that you were speeding. You’ll have two points on your licence and be €80 lighter after paying your fines.

The speed limit was 50 kph and I was doing 64 kph, which means my car was moving at the mind-bending nosebleed-inducing speed of 39mph in the old money.

So yes, I'm guilty as charged. It's a fair cop Guv, as they say where I'm from. I'm a criminal, a dirty filthy law-breaker, so slap those penalty points on my licence before my insurance premium starts to look affordable.

Actually I’m not sure that speeding counts as a crime. It’s more of an offence. If there is a crime being committed here, it concerns the way that our collective insurance companies will be creaming money off our bad luck.

Yes, I did say bad luck. There are places where it is essential to have a speed limit of 50 kph. I’ve seen the TV ads that tell us if you hit a child at 50 kph it has an 80% chance of survival, but if you’re travelling at 80kph, it has a 50% chance of fatal injuries. That’s a pretty powerful argument, so I wouldn't count myself ‘unlucky’ if I was caught speeding in a built-up area, where children might be playing.

But this wasn’t a built-up area. This was the road from Galway to Moycullen, as it pushes through Bushy Park. Yes, there are houses along it, big homes lived in by people who have quite possibly lobbied to have this speed limit imposed. The Camera Van was parked in the lay-by in front of the church which, to be fair, seems permanently busy with visitors, worshippers and events.

So impose a 50kph limit for 300 metres each side of the church, to protect the innocent humans, and let the limit beyond and before rise to a reasonable 80 kph.

How do I know that others have been charged too? That’d be because I remember the precise time and place we committed our collective offences.

It was a calm sunny Spring afternoon, and I was driving along in a steady stream of traffic. For once, there was nobody tailgating. Not a boy racer in sight. All of us drivers were keeping well apart from each other, easily in range of our braking distances.

The world felt like an unusually safe and civilised place. I think I was whistling tunelessly along to a Mozart violin concerto, daring to enjoy myself, and then I saw the Camera Van parked by the church.

At the time I remember thinking to myself that if they nicked me, they’d have to nick everyone else in that steady stream of traffic. Little did I suspect that they intended to do exactly that.

Really, if you want to catch as many people speeding as possible at once, just take an aerial photo of Quincentennial Bridge at any off-peak time. Nobody keeps to the speed limit there. Indeed, if they did all drive at no more than 50kph, it would cause such consternation among other drivers that it might cause reckless driving.

Mind you, there are times when slow driving really works. When the same bridge is clogged with traffic, the dreaded wave pattern of logjam comes into effect. The light goes green up ahead and a ripple of movement slowly makes its way down the traffic jam, causing us all to move a little; stop; move a little; stop.

Studies have shown that if we all just crawl along at a minuscule rate, the wave pattern disappears and we all get home earlier. In the UK they proved that if everyone drove along busy motorways like the M6 at 40 miles an hour, average journey times would be halved. 

Seems mad, because most of the time the majority of the traffic is cruising along at 80mph, but when the sheer volume of traffic collects together, causing everyone to stop, that makes the average speed collapse.

In the USA, where they understand speed, all cars slow to 25mph around schools, and when the school bus flashes its lights, everyone stops. It’s heartwarming and efficient.

Also Americans can be charged with the offence of slow driving. Bloomin’ brilliant! 

Back when I lived in north Co. Mayo, I used to get stuck for miles behind a Father Jack lookalike who drove his Berlingo van everywhere at 22 mph. After miles of frustration, I’d risk life, limb, stone walls and wildlife trying to overtake him on narrow country roads, faced with the peril of oncoming tractors bearing down on me at speeds in excess of milk floats.

Crawling into the town behind his van one day, I saw a friend of mine laughing by the roadside.

"What’s so funny?" I asked.
“The expression on your face!” she replied, explaining how the auld fella in the van was blind.
“Yeh, he must be. Shouldn’t be allowed on the road.”
“No, no, he is blind! Really and truly blind! He drove that same road into town every day for 35 years, so now that he has lost his sight he just drives it by memory.”

Looking into her eyes to see if she was pulling my plonker I saw only earnest truth. Now that I think of it, quite a bit of my life back there reminds me of Craggy Island’s crew.

What really bugs me more than anything else about being nicked for this speeding offence is that we were all driving safely.

If I’d wanted to drive faster without breaking the law, I’d have to wait until I reached the extremely dangerous bends a little further along the road, where the sign proudly and slightly madly declares you can go 100kph. 

Once again, the law is an ass, but I did the crime, so I paid the fine.


©Charlie Adley
09.04.14.

Monday 14 April 2014

MY LOVELY SPRING RAMBLE BECAME A MAD DOG DASH!

 Impossible to resist, the apparently gravity-defying Lady

“Paw, Lady!”

My 3 year-old Collie-Lab obligingly lifts her paw so that I can slip on her harness. Standing with her face pressed against the back door, she’s fizzing like a dropped bottle of Coke about the prospect of the walk.

Nevertheless she knows to do the dance, the little do-si-do where I close the kitchen door, she moves backwards so that I can open the back door and then she waits. All eternity must pass before that over-eager dog’s eyes as she waits for to me to say

“Come!”

My knee is strapped tight into a velcro brace, my foot isn’t hurting too badly and as we step out, my heart bounces like a bunny. Warm sunshine, lush green grass laden with dew and I’m out for a Spring ramble with my dog.

Well, hmmm, no, not really. I’d love nothing better than to take half a day and ramble at will across bog, down bohreen and green road, but I need to manage the pain in my joints by being sensible.

Was there ever such a boring notion as ‘sensible’?

As we turn the corner of the house and face the front gate, three of Lady’s doggy friends arrive. The young collie is on heat, her bits hanging out like a raspberry milk jelly and the randy brown terrier is jumping up on her, humping her leg, her head, anything he can reach.

Considering his legs are no higher than a matchbox, he does very well. Evidently he’s been successful elsewhere, as a litter of minuscule versions of himself and what looks like a Jack Russell mum appeared the other day at the top of the bohreen. 

Nothing will stop his drive to continue his line. Last June the Snapper and I sat and watched him try to mate with a semi-deflated football in our back garden. The adorable little dog went hammer and tongs at it for hours, only stopping when I removed the ball, deciding that the universe offered more beautiful things to watch on a Summer’s afternoon than a scarlet extended canine sausage.

Lady is overjoyed to see her pals and at this stage so am I, as I know she’ll exhaust herself playing with the Collie. She’s only 3 years old and I worry my damaged legs can’t give her the exercise she needs.

Lady and the Collie tumble each other over and over, growling roaring and pretend biting. Utterly undeterred by the arrival of another beast ten times his size, the rusty randy little Terrier gets stuck into the melée too, grabbing his front paws on any Collie parts he can, while revving up to do what dogs do.

When I set off up the bohreen, the Collie and Terrier decide to come too, and so it begins. Nearly all the many dogs that live around here run loose, but Lady is on a lead. She’s a rescue dog who has a bit of record with ducks, pheasants and whatever takes her fancy. My heart breaks that she can’t run with the others, just as my joints are breaking at having to walk her on a lead, but that’s the way it goes.

So now she’s not just pulling but straining on her lead, desperate to catch up with her mates. The one thing the doctor told me I shouldn’t do is allow myself to be pulled along by a dog, as the impact on my foot and knee will cause pain. Thanks Doc. Where are you now?

The Terrier and the Collie inadvertently torment Lady as they dive in and out of the hedges and stone walls. She whimpers and stands on two legs as she watches them race across the fields. My sorrow knows no bounds. Every part of me wants to unclip her and say

“Go on girl! Enjoy!”

If I did, I’m sure she’d return to me, or home eventually, but my working day would disappear while I waited for her, and when she came back she’d be covered in half a continent of muck that would take ages to clean off.

So we persevere: Lady straining so hard she’s almost only walking on her hind legs; me trying not to stomp my feet down hard, as I use considerable arm strength to restrain her.

Not so much a Spring ramble as a mad dog dash!

Still I insist on taking a few moments of pure pleasure from simply being here. I give thanks that I live in such a beautiful place, enjoying each morning a walk that encompasses bogland, pasture, hedgerows, trees, and distant russet roofs of ancient barns.

Fortunately, Lady hasn’t the quickest eyes in the world. Both the Snapper and myself have seen the most massive rabbits leap from the hedgerows on our walks. They are enormous, yet Lady only recognises their presence by smell, when we walk across the land they leapt over.

If rabbits are not her passion then hares are as nectar to her. Last week she suddenly went completely mental on our walk, straining and jumping with a crazed urgency I’d never seen before. Then, a good 300 metres off, we both saw the hare.

Don’t know what they feed the wildlife in these parts but none of it seems stunted in growth! Even taking into account the distance, this hare appeared the size of donkey foal, bounding in a haphazard and casual fashion across the bog.

That morning, as now, I found myself with an overexcited dog on my hands. All the way up the bog road and all the way back, Lady strains and pulls to catch up with her pals. By the time we return home my knee is sloshing around like a bag of liquid, detached from my leg completely.

On the plus-side, the dog is utterly knackered. Collapsed on the kitchen floor with her tongue lolling out, she won't need attention for hours.

Lovely! Off to work, to scribble of Spring rambles...

14.04.14
©Charlie Adley

Wednesday 9 April 2014

WHILE MAKING A LIVING I FOUND OUT I HAD A LIFE!


..."those sweet streets of Galway."

I’ve just discovered that my life’s better than I thought it was! Armed with thumb tacks, Blu-Tak and knee straps, I’ve been stomping the streets of Galway, putting up posters for my Craft of Writing Course.

What’s that? You haven’t heard of it?
Okay, let’s get the commercial out of the way and rush back to the story.


The course starts on April 23rd, Wednesdays 7:30-9:00pm, for 8 weeks. €100/€90 concessions. I like small classes, so to guarantee your place, contact the Galway Arts Centre:
091-565886
For more information, visit my Facebook page.

Now, let’s return to those streets, those sweet streets of Galway; those newsagents, pubs and cafés, libraries, shops and community centres. Walking into each wearing my most charming smile, I asked if I might put up a poster. Then I respectfully scanned those already on display, searching for something out of date.

Time after time, while I was looking for a viable spot, the person working there walked over, saying something like:

“I’ll just take this one here down, Charlie, because, well, it’s been there for months.”
Stepping backwards, I felt humbled and guiltless as they removed a poster.

“Now, Charlie, you can put yours there, now!”

I suppose it’d be reasonable to think that after 22 years in a place, I’d know a few people. After my first couple of years here I knew hordes, but ever since then I’ve been increasingly reclusive.

While the Snapper knows half the town and the other half know her, I sit at home, visit friends to drink tea and chat in their living rooms and twice or thrice a year, I wander out on wet Tuesday evenings, for one of my organic Galway publy rambles.

More than any place I know, Galway repays richly what you put into her, but having invested so little in recent years, I imagined I might be invisible.

So what a delight it was to discover that I had so many friends out there. In a pub on Dominick Street, where they hung no posters, I was told I could put mine in pride of place by the front door. In a restaurant on William Street, my poster was given prime position. In a café on Shop Street the manager offered to show them exclusively on the walls of the Ladies and Gents (oh so very apt!) and then, in a community resource centre, I bumped into a colleague from way back when I was a youth worker, who was insightful and helpful.

Everyone seemed genuinely pleased to see me and by the end of a heartwarming and successful day, my legs were worn out, I’d chatted more than I had in the previous three months combined, and discovered while out trying to make a living that I have a life: a really good life that I barely knew existed.

The experience has put as smile on my face the size of an orbital motorway.

‘Making a living’ might to others imply monetary gain, but here in the West of Ireland, in a community like Galway, that’s not the way it works. Sometimes you get paid, sometimes you don’t, but either way, the rewards are great. Here we know that there’s more to life than money. Equally, sadly, many of us also know how hard life can be when there is none, but still we help each other out.

One of my favourite unpaid things to do is read at what is in effect the end-of-Cuirt Literature Festival Party, an event that proudly runs under the banner ‘Far From Literature We Were Reared.’


Produced by Tuam’s revered songsmith and poet Seamus Ruttledge, hosted and directed by the exceedingly talented Galway writer Conor ‘Monty’ Montague, these shows in the Roisin Dubh are simply excellent nights out.

This year’s ‘Far From Literature’ is on Sunday, April 13th, from 8:00 ‘til late. Come along and enjoy the performances of Galway’s finest writers, poets, comedians and singers. Chaos and mayhem are the order of the day, splattered with laughter and for me, this year, a great big dollop of emotion.

I’ll be reading ‘Billy’, the story of a dear friend of mine who died in police custody during Thatcher’s reign of terror. His tale (hopefully!) reflects his personality, in that it’s both funny and tragic, and I’ll be delighted to honour his memory by sharing his story with you.
Although Bill died in terrible circumstances, I wrote the piece many years ago, in celebration of his life. My thinking was always that way inclined, which might partly explain why Ireland became my home. It's the only country I know in which it's culturally acceptable to enjoy a good funeral!

As somebody who has seen far too many friends die over the years, I know how wrong it is to waste our living days. Thankfully I’m able to resolve much of my grief through my scribbling, using words to wail and gnash, weep and complain how we were robbed of the beautiful Alana crushingly young; that my lovely Sonja and most beloved and beautiful friend Jon left us decades too early. I was fortunate to be able to write away my tears after the ridiculously premature deaths of Galway’s beloved Mark Logan, my wryly wonderful friend Malcolm and Billy himself, confirming yet again my belief that there is neither sense to life nor death. All we must do is make the most of living.

Evidently, I had been failing to do that, because it wasn’t until I stepped out of my daily existence in order to make a living that I discovered I still had a great Galway life!

Thanks to all of you for helping me with my posters. Hopefully, I’ll either see you down the Roisin on Sunday 13th for a great evening, or at the Arts Centre on the 23rd, arriving for my course.

Did I mention my course? Well, its....


©Charlie Adley