Ciaran’s Peculier [sic] Blog

Brendan and Jack were having a quiet drink when Brendan asks him.
“If you heard Jack that the world was going to end in fifteen minutes, what would you do?”
“Well in the time left I’d shag everything that moved I suppose. How about you Brendan. What would you do?”
“I’d try to stand perfectly still,” Brendan replies.

One more? Why not. What do a Rubik’s Cube and a prick have in common? The more you play with it the harder it gets.

 Now a bird never flew on one wing. Define egghead: What Mrs Dumpty givers Humpty.

What has four legs and flies?

A dead horse.

….. Sick or what?

Mary told her parents she was going out with some of the girls from work for a drink, and that they shouldn’t wait up. In fact she was going on a ate with the office stud. He wanted her to come back to his place, but because she was a virgin and she sensed that his intentions were not honourable she invited him back to her home, cautioning him not to make a noise.
Once inside the door he announced that he needed to go to the toilet – badly. As this would have meant a trip upstairs past her parents’ room she stopped him.
“But it’s urgent. Can I go in the kitchen sink?” he pleads.
I don’t know”, she aide. “So long as you don’t make a sound and clean up after you.”
He agrees and goes into the kitchen. Mary stands nervously outside, expecting his imminent re-emergence. But the seonds become minutes, and she eventually says. “Are you ok in there?” whereupon he sicks his head round the door and asks:
 ”Is thereany toilet paper?”

And he could just as well have wiped his arse with the booklet about the Fleadh in Cavan that I receiverd today. I deon’t know whether it was addressed to me at all. It just read “Ciaran Parker 4 Earlsvale Road.” Now I live at 5 Earlsvale Road, and I couldn’t be addressed by my proper title as this would have made that blatherskite from Belturbet look bad. The idea that someone else has a PhD in Cavan, of longer standing, is something he just can’t hack, so I have to be airbrushed out. To be honest the whole thing makes me totally ashamed to be from Cavan.

Ricky finally summons up the courage to ask Rachel, the office bike, out on a date. Afterwards they pull into a lay-be where they kiss for a while, and Ricky, sensing that Rachel is hot, pushes his hand up under her skirt and between her thighs.

“What are you doing?” she asks coyly.

“I’d like a little pussy Rachel”.

“So would I”, she answers. “Mine’s the size of a bucket.”

Eventually, his hand reaches its destination and he is soon inside her knickers. She responds characteristically with moans and sounds of arousal, until suddenly Rachel yells:

“Owww! That hurts you bastard.”

“What’s wrong?”

“You should have taken your ring off before you finger-fucked me” she replies.

“Hey, that’s not my ring: it’s my watch”

Some of the senior staff in the six local authorities whose planning decisions are being investigated by the minister for the environment must be feeling pretty pissed. N doubt they are seething with resentment at being apparently singled out for public opprobrium, when the planning practices of other local authorities (no names mentioned) are equally questionable. But no one need worry. The whole thing will be a whitewash and the final report of the inspectors has already been written (oops, shouldn’t have said that: sorry).

According to RTE news Gardai are investigating a suspected arson attack at an industrial estate in Dublin.

 The arsonist(s) are probably on the run now, fearing apprehension, but I want to give them some words of consolation for the future. You should really get out of the grime of the big city and move to a border county. There your involvement with arson will be initially forgotten, especially if you join Fianna Fail and the Knights of St Columbanus. You will then be able to look back upon your past with pride and speak candidly and unashamedly about it. And what’s more you will even get a job with the local authority.

 Instead of having to keep a low profile to escape the Bill, you will be able to have your mugs emblazoned on a weekly basis in the local paper. When you attend social events camera bulbs will flash as if you were Brittney Spears. If you still have criminal tendencies you will be able to steal with impunity, and because of your newfound friends you will be able to slander decent people, and what’s more be believed.

Rosie, my sister Gill and myself have received an invitation to an event to be held in the Irish Wheelchair Association headquarters at Corlurgan, on May 28^th. This is a play about disabled people and starring disabled people from Co. Cavan. It is a most worthy project and I wish it the greatest success to those taking part.

 There are a number of aspects that trouble me however. First, as far as I can discern, the play has not been written by disabled people, but by an able-bodied dramatist, maybe commissioned by Cavan County Council’s Arts Office. There seems to be the implication here that disabled people’s thoughts are too raw and coarse to be consumed by the general, able-bodied public, and have to be interpreted by someone else. Is it about disabled people’s journeys but in the words of the able-bodied? Apart from those unfortunate enough to suffer from aphasia or any other condition that causes loss of speech, all the disabled people I know (including myself) can speak very well and clearly.

 Bound up with this may be the assumption that disabled people wouldn’t be able to formulate their thoughts intelligently, let alone write a play.

 As I have a prior engagement I won’t be able to attend. This should not be seen as a snub by me towards those taking part in the play, who have my boundless respect and admiration. Unfortunately I feel I know what is going to happen. The event will be turned into a photo opportunity. My good friend Brian Mulligan will be on hand to take the pictures of the disabled who will be lined up for the shot. They will thus appear as nice, well-behaved and non-threatening cripples. This will then appear in the pages of the Anglo-Celt as exhibits in the ego-trips of those able-bodied people who want to appear caring. It might be said that the disabled are therefore being cynically used.  Bridget Boyle will be there of course, and I wouldn’t be surprised if she doesn’t have her friend Whacko Jacko Keys there. Bridget enjoys the privileged position of being the only disabled person he deigns to communicate with.  Another sure show will be the chairman of the County Council, Winston Bennett, who will play the role of the self-important courthouse jester by wearing a silly chain round his neck. (Now men who wear jewellery are often ridiculed and called names like “trannies”. What’s more the only people I know who are called Winston are from the West Indies.)

 The drama has been assisted by Cavan County Council’s Arts Office. I used to enjoy very close relations with the office’s staff but I seem to have dropped out of their orbit. I cannot understand why the Arts Officer, my dear (or at least I though dear) friend Catriona O’Reilly never told me about this project. No doubt it would have been inappropriate for her to have contacts with me. How could she own up to being the friend of someone who has said such dreadful things about poor Brendan Snott and his neurotic predecessor in the Ballyjamesduff County vomitarium? She could have contacted me by ‘phone while out walking were she afraid that contact me through her office would be overheard.

 I cannot second-guess the play’s contents, but I do hope that it is realistic and not a dire panegyric singing the praises of the Irish Wheelchair Association or telling of Cavan’s disabled community’s gratitude to Cavan County Council for putting them on the housing waiting list – and keeping them there – where they know that any criticism of the council’s policies will earn them backward movement on the said list. Funny thing is that I don’t think there are that many houses being built, but no doubt the council will restart their construction once they get some of the 25 million euro they’re owed by developers.)

 Now I am confined to a wheelchair, although thankfully I can walk for about half a mile each day. The play is called Our Journey, but I don’t feel it’s my journey, as nobody ever contacted me for my input. This is not prompted by churlish resentment. I do believe that my story, which is not superior to anyone else’s, might be of interest. It is certainly of no lesser value, but it seems that some of those behind this project just don’t want to hear it. They may think that it would be too embarrassing and too likely to offend “certain people”. Yet my disabled journey is a joyful story. I see my disabilities as gifts from God; they are challenges which have been given to me and which I see myself as having a duty to overcome as best I can. I know that there would be many who would bristle with discomfort were I to say the unutterable, that I am actually proud of my disabilities and how I continue to deal with them on a daily basis.

 But it seems as if there are some in Cavan who want to ignore me. The great lie is spread that I am angry.  I am portrayed as someone who has never accepted my position as a cripple, one of God’s accursed. My outlook is heretical, because I do not humbly accept my disabilities as the actions of a wrathful God, (and it goes without saying that the people who think this know God well). What is more I refuse to come to terms with the “fact” that no mater how many books I write or languages I learn I can nevcr, never be as good as the laziest and most incompetent able-bodied person.

 I am therefore not worthy of charity, (not that I want it), or kindness. The nun who used to wipe clean the blackboard when she would see me attempting to discern what she had written, and who forbade any of my classmates to give me their notes, was thus justified because I had stood up to her tyranny. I haven’t changed. In the past I have offended the petty local establishment and thumbed my nose at organisations like the knights of St Columbanus. Did I not go to a Protestant school and refuse to kiss Bishop McKiernan’s ring? I must therefore be punished by being airbrushed out of Cavan’s reality like someone who doesn’t exist, never has and never will.

 Let me repeat that I wish the event all the very best luck. At least I was invited. In the past Tess Kennedy of the Irish MS Society, which has close links to the IWA, has invited me to give talks on local history and other subjects to members in St Christopher’s, and I hope that those who attended enjoyed themselves and found the experience as instructive and rewarding as I did. This action stands in marked contrast to that of the National Council for the Blind in Cavan. Now both Tess and Bridget Boyle knew of my skills and abilities, and both of them were well aware of my contributions to the sadly defunct Cavan Echo. They have never been afraid to count me as a friend and indeed an equal.

 No doubt Dr Snott, so long employed by Cavan County Council and taken to their collective heart, thought that he was a real clever boy when he accepted the invitation to speak from the NCBI on a topic that I had worked on for over two decades. The apposite adjective for him is, I believe unprintable even on my blog.

It rains a lot here in Ireland, and sometimes the rain can come down in such a torrent that the drains overflow. When this occurs the drain’s contents of leaves, dirt and other ordure flow out along the streets. These days following St Patrick’s Day witness this process in reverse, as much of the filth of cabinet ministers, parliamentarians and county councillors who have taken holidays at public expense over the holiday return unbidden to our shores to resume their collective larceny closer to home. I think I speak for the majority of people in Ireland when I say that no one would shed a tear if they never came back.

 The Catholic hierarchy is I believe partly responsible for much of the crisis currently affecting the church, but I believe in giving credit where credit is due. What would happen if, at important feasts in the Church calendar like Christmas or Easter, the hierarchy announced that it was heading off abroad for “deserved” holidays at the mass goers’ expense? Of course they wouldn’t be called holidays. No, they’d be described as trips to observe missionary activity. Now apart from a handful of globe-trotting prelates, including a deceased bishop recently in the news who used to love visit his diocesan priests in a place called Minna, none of them do this. They remain at their posts. It is often said that Catholic bishops aren’t elected, yet the Catholic church has never claimed to be a democracy. Those whom we elect democratically, who crawl on their fat bellies to win our confidence no sooner get elected than they depart on holidays at our expense and smirk at us that they’re able to get away with it because there is nothing we can do.

 Is it true that Aer Lingus cabin crew seek danger money” at this time of the year, as compensation for having to deal with returning county councillors who demand extra alcohol even when they’ve already had more than enough? Readers will know the incident I’m referring to. They will also know the political party the individual belonged to. They may not know that soon after his return he received a standing ovation from the local branch of his party. What was that for? Good on ya mate for acting the cunt?

In today’s post I received an invitation to a talk organised by the National Council for the Blind (NCBI). This is to take place in Cavan’s library and the speaker will be Cavan County Museum’s Dr Brendan Scott, who will talk about the Franciscan friary in Cavan, a subject of such great relevance to the blind and partially sighted.

 Now I know that Dr Scot and his miserable friends, who are such avid readers of my blog, would love me to spill my guts on my blog about this. But to be honest, I can’t be arsed. However, I never realised that Brendan Scott of Belturbet is such a low-down, cowardly, cruel cur.  His father seems such a nice man though.

 As for the NCBI they once again prove themselves to be useless. Indeed, one must question their role as a charitable organisation which claims to be representing the interests of the blind and partially sighted. When they want someone to give a lecture they don’t turn to the partially sighted person in their locality who has a PhD in history as well as years of lecturing experience. They claim ignorance of his existence, even though he is no shrinking violet, and in spite of also being confined to a wheelchair, leads a very public life. Instead they have to ask the County Council and the County Manager’s little darling. In the light of my description of him I think this speaks volumes.

It seems the Soldiers of Destiny are attempting to re-form in Cavan, and come out of the burrows of shame into which they have quite rightly retreated.

 My sister recently received an invitation to a cumann meeting in Cavan town. The invitation listed all of the great things Fianna Fail had done for Cavan town, though surely such pork-barrel politics is seen for the scam it is. When any political party takes credit for anything I’m reminded of a comment made by Al Gore in the 1992 Presidential debate in the US, when he said George Bush Sr’s attempts to take credit for the fall of the Berlin wall was a bit like the cock taking credit for the sunrise.

 The invitation went on to mention minister Brendan Smith, but failed to refer to his reluctance to meet with a local farmers’ delegation, or his insistence on using a private limousine to take him from a hotel to a nearby conference centre, even though his colleague, Minister Mary Coughlan, was staying in the same five-star hotel. Brendan may be personally honest, but yet he sits at cabinet with a group of lying gangsters whose policies include stealing money from the blind and then refusing to own up to their cowardly actions.

 And then it finished by mentioning Fianna Fail councillors, but once again it was quite about the gargantuan sums in travel expenses racked up by some of them. But we must be even-handed here. The pursuance of the “grab” culture is just as evident amongst members of Fine Gael.

 As for the invitation I am assured by my sister that she has no intention of accepting it.

Like any Irish person I was dismayed by the events in the Stade de France. Pride in the land of my birth made me want to see the Boys in Green qualify for the world cup. It is dreadful to see hard work and talent and commitment rewarded with failure.

 I know that if the Irish team had qualified for South Africa, every scumbag government minister would fly out at public expense to cheer on the lads on our behalf, though they’d never asked us beforehand. What’s more, unlike most Irish fans, they would stay in the plushest accommodation. Neither would I be surprised if delegations of county councillors did not escape to the sun, maybe because of some tenuous links between one of the players and their county. They would justify their junkets as “supporting a local lad” or some other trite shite, and those who would look askance at their larceny would be denounced as party-pooping begrudgers.

 I believe that the goal scored by Thierry Henry, in spite of handling the ball, should be looked at in an Irish context. Here was the committed, talented team who had played their hearts out for ages, and who were much better than their opponents one of whom scored a decisive goal even though this violated the rules. These ought to have been observed and enforced by the referee – that’s what he’s there for, but instead he didn’t notice the fault because he was looking the other way, or had his head up his arse, or because he was related to the wrong-doer, or maybe because he was at mass… Whatever the reason, the result stands in defiance of the rules and the spirit of fair play and justice which inspired them. In this regard I see the events of last night as a metaphor for so much of what goes on in contemporary Ireland.

Hey Bobby, what's the French for 'cute hoor'?