Cab said:
At the moment, I'm applying for anything and everything, including being the creep night porter at a local hotel
I'd like to work with a newspaper or site or something, writing satire of current events would be fun, I could work for Cracked and my witty column title could be "The Craic on Cracked". Nyuknyuknyuk, wordplay
Cab said:
It's a hot sunny afternoon - what alcoholic drink do you fancy?
Guinness will, always and forever, be my first love in alcohol. Mind you, when a Guinness is shite, it is properly feckin' shite ¬_¬ It can be a bit heavy for some occasions too, very filling. If I was at a barbecue or something I'd opt for Miller or Cider, as they're nice and light and tasteh and I can get to that sort of merry level of not quite sober with them, whereas Guinness always makes me sleepy.
No matter what I drink, I will invariably start singing Scissor Sisters songs as well as Bee Gees and ABBA tunes and dancing horribly to them.
Cab said:
It's a cold frosty winter's morning - what alcoholic drink do you go for?
Admittedly in this scenario Guinness probably wouldn't be my first choice. I'd probably go for a hot whiskey or else make a whiskey tea, both using Powers Whiskey. Despite our reputation for drinking it, most Irish made whiskeys are watery arsed and taste crap, Powers is the only really decent one.
I also enjoy me Baileys with ice. When I was a toddler I'd crawl around the house searching for the Baileys I knew my mother had somewhere. She walked into the kitchen once when I was about 3 and I was plopped on the floor, back against the cupboard with the Bailey's bottle between my legs and the most content smile she's ever seen on my face, according to her. Slept like a log, that night.
Cab said:
Has the Northern Ireland "troubles" affected you at all/what's your opinion of all that shit? (You don't have to answer of course. No shit stirring intended.
I'm from a town very close to the Northern Ireland border and though I was quite young at the time have very distinct memories of my experiences with the effects of the Troubles.
A few of my extended family members were in the IRA and were big Tiocfaidh ar La heads and the there was a lot of anti-British sentiment about the community in general. There were fuckin' eejits on both sides, cunts who'd fly over the borders on back roads without checkpoints and throw petrol bombs into Protestant or Catholic family houses. Wasn't uncommon to wake up and see someone boarding up windows that'd been smashed in or finding the neighbour's living room torched. It was also pretty common to be in a shop on either side of the border and be evacuated due to a bomb scare. Bomb scares were so frequent in Derry's Foyleside Centre that eventually people just started ignoring them and kept on going about their business, it was usually some wee fart would just wrap a coke bottle in newspaper and stick it under a car as a joke. Border checkpoints were also very scary, the soldiers manning the points rightfully felt very tense, as did the people crossing borders and more often than not I would just curl into a ball and hide my head going through the border points out of fear.
From a very young age I hated the troubles. I hated seeing soldiers walking around, I hated waking up one morning to hear that someone was a victim of a sectarian attack, hated hearing news of how the Irish on our side of the border were doing the exact same things to people in the North and what have you. When the Good Friday Agreement came in I remember everyone being wary and not quite optimistic about it, naturally enough, but relieved that there'd be no more guns and soldiers and whatnot. And I think it was a testament to how much the people on both sides of the conflict wanted all the bombings and killings and violence to stop that the peace has continued and relations between North and South are better and stronger than they ever were, in spite of arsehole dissidents trying to stir up shit again. Nobody wants to go back to that.
For my part, the Troubles have had a lasting effect on me in small ways. Any time I see boarded up windows I automatically think petrol bomb. Any time someone from the North asks what school I went to, I'm very reluctant to answer because during the height of the Troubles you absolutely did not tell anyone you didn't know that you were a Catholic or Protestant, even if you weren't practising the faith, which my family really weren't, the fact you went to a school with more students of one denomination was enough that, if they were sectarian, they'd kick the shit out of you, and that wariness has kind of stuck with me despite how much better things are now. The religious divide was hijacked on both sides as an excuse for conflict, in my opinion, and I've never borne any ill will towards Protestants, or England as a state or as a people for keeping Northern Ireland in the first place. I found out one of the greatest irony's of my family history when I got older, was that we were actually originally an English family who moved during the Plantations, and were protestant up until my Great Grandfather converted to marry my Great Grandmother. And then all the IRA family members were all "HERPADERCATHOLICISMFENIANFREEIRELANDSHOOTTHEPRODDIESYADADADA".
They were twats.
Basically, I hated the Troubles and hated the warmongers and sectarians on both sides, and I hate wankshafts who act like everyone wants that conflict back. I think it's one of the greatest achievements in the island's history that both sides came to peace and have fostered a strong relationship since.
Cab said:
Do you play any musicy instruments? If so what and why? If not, what would you and why?
I can play tin whistle, and dabble with the guitar like every hairy teenager ever did, still do. Tin whistle was a mandatory thing to learn in primary school. It's one of those instruments that I think can sound nice in particular songs and circumstances, but mostly sounds like a shitty steam train whistle, especially when 20 or so wheezy, asthmatic 10 year olds from Donegal are puffing into it. Guitar was something I got because I wanted to be like Kurt Cobain because Kurt Cobain could do no wrong in the mind of 13 year old me. I've kinda fallen away from guitar since moving to Dublin as I've never brought it down with me, though I've been getting the itch to play it again recently. I can also play the Bodhran, because my mother had one and I enjoyed giving it a good batterin', I've not particularly good at it but I do enjoy it.
I'd love to be able to play the piano. I think it's a gorgeous instrument capable of producing some of the most emotive music, and have great respect for anyone who plays it. Same goes for the harp. Wouldn't mind giving the aul banjo a go either.
Cab said:
What was one of your childhood gaming woo-hoo moment?
When my Sims woo-hooed
Nah, the first time I beat Ecco the Dolphin was a massive woo-hoo moment for me. That entire game was just classic and was the first game I'd played with a story that had a definite emotional impact on me.
Cab said:
Are you going to cut your hair.... ever?
I have, and wrote a long-winded memorial blog to it
here /shamelessplug
It feels strange not having it anymore, and I'm still peeved with myself over the whole selling out thing. But I will regrow it one day, I was born a long haired, scruffy hippy and I will feckin' die a long haired scruffy hippy.
Cab said:
Would you do anything life threatening yet awesome? (EG Bungee jumping, climb Everest, piss off a goose) And would you need a reason? And what would that reason be?
I have pissed off a goose before, when I was 10. Bit the bejayus out of me and chased me for a good ten minutes when I tried to run away. My mother and sister were there at the time and rather than come to my aid, they shat themselves laughing and took photographs.
I'd love to climb a mountain, one of the things I want to do is to climb each of the 12 Bens in Galway and camp for a night atop each one. I also have a bit of a fear of heights and can get very dizzy sometimes when high up, but my innate thranness makes me want to overcome that. Totally want to snowboard too.
Cab said:
Do you love smartphones and are surgically attached to yours, documenting and checking your whole life? Or are you rejecting our dependency on technology and yearning for the old Nokias to make a comeback like some kind of mobile apocalypse?
I loathe smartphones and touchscreens. I find them cumbersome, finicky and far to delicate for someone as clumsy as me. I still use an old Nokia brick phone with a keypad and the most advanced feature on it is a Snake remake. It's sturdy as bejaysus, works despite being dropped in paint, tea, falling out of my pocket when cycling numerous times and has generally bore the brunt of clumsiness quite well. I use it to text, occasionally call someone, and tell the time. It cost me a tenner and does everything a phone needs to do and it's battery lasts forever and a feckin' day before it needs to be charged again.
What, in 'unner a jaysus, is the appeal of smartphones when compared to that? The apps are shit, the battery drains faster than a toilet full of arse gravy and it costs a small feckin' loan to buy one ¬_¬ Smart my feckin' hole ¬_¬
...
Sweet Jesus I'm such an old coot