To celebrate my forty year anniversary as a Type 1 diabetic, today I went to the clinic. While I am not certain of the exact date of my diagnosis I know that it was in June 1978. Therefore I am declaring today to be the official anniversary. I was still basically a toddler, not having started primary school. For my improvement I was meeting a dietitian who was going to explain the wonders of carb counting to me. Continue reading Burning up
For the first three months of this year the country was obsessed with a trial. A rape trial involving two famous Irish rugby internationals Paddy Jackson and Stuart Olding, and an unnamed woman (as opposed to unidentified – her name was all over social media despite reporting restrictions). In June 2016, after the rugby players had returned from a tour kicking a ball somewhere, and chasing it, they’d gone out on the town in Belfast. They drank oceans of alcohol and were treated like kings – our society lionises men who can run fast after a ball – be that a rugby ball, a football, or a sliotar. After the VIP lounge at some Nite Klub, they repaired to Jackson’s house for a party. Present were four men and four women. Continue reading The Paddy Jackson trial
The bank holiday weekend was the business. Continue reading Home for the holidays
I am wearing a pedometer. This is a device that you connect to your belt which counts the number of steps you take. I am aiming for 10,000 steps per day for the next 100 days. You might be wondering why I am involved in such a suspiciously healthy sounding activity? Well these little devices are being handed out free at work, and we have been placed into teams of five. The mission is to get the staff moving, through teamwork and competition. ‘Make fitness FUN’ in other words. Obviously I have no truck with the team building part of this campaign. That sounds sinister and corporate – and as a secret communist, I’ll be having none of that kind of lark. While it may be true that no man is an island, I have no issue with being a peninsula – not cut off from my colleagues entirely, but nonetheless at a safe distance from their heart-warming tale of suburban, heterosexual married bliss. Continue reading A target for inclusion?
The concert was in Vicar Street – one of the world’s greatest performance venues, for an audience. It is relatively new, so lacks the smell of despair and stale vomit, that older venues can possess. It has a capacity of 1200 people which is ideal – large enough to feel like an event, yet compact enough that you are never too far from the stage, and you are guaranteed a good vantage point. Continue reading In the lounge with Father John Misty
June 2018 marks the quarter century anniversary of the decriminalisation of homosexuality in the Republic of Ireland . To mark this event Acting Out Theatre in conjunction with Outhouse (the Dublin LGBT community and resource centre) and Dublin Pride have commissioned a series of monologues inspired by this momentous occasion. The show is called ‘The Decriminalisation Monologues’. One of the writers approached to write a piece was my good self. If someone asks me how I managed to get such an illustrious gig, I peer over my lorgnettes, give a knowing, throaty chuckle, and hoarsely whisper ‘I was commissioned. Darling.’ Continue reading The Decriminalisation Monologues : ‘The Number’
‘Aren’t you in Limerick though?’
Actually I wasn’t. While it is certainly true that I had been contemplating a trip home on Friday to cast a 2nd vote in the abortion referendum, I had ultimately decided that I would not do this. My respect for democracy and terror of ending up in the slammer for the crime of voting twice was too great. I had transferred my voting registration from Limerick to Dublin when I move back to Ireland after fifteen years in the Netherlands. Yet somehow a voting card had been sent to both places. Continue reading Ireland says YES. Notes from the Castle
As I left my flat this morning, instead of turning right to go to the LUAS stop, I swung left. Today I planned to walk to the bus stop, instead of my usual semi-conscious slouch on the tram. Not because I had turned over a new leaf and now loved mornings however. By walking to the bus stop, I would pass the St. Laurence O’Toole primary school – my local polling station. In my grubby, little paws was clenched my voting card. In my stylish man-bag, my passport in case the Feds asked me for ID. With a purposeful strut I entered the school. Not a student was to be seen. As a child, I loved general elections and referenda, for the simple reason that it always meant a day off school – primary schools being the usual location for the physical practice of democracy. Continue reading Lovely day for a ‘YES’
On this date three years ago I was home for a holiday in Ireland. I had come #HomeToVote in the same sex marriage referendum. I sprung from my bed early that Saturday morning with a feeling of trepidation. Living in the Netherlands I had been spared the toxic horror of the six month, public trial that the LGBT community had been subjected to during the campaign. Having arrived home a couple of days before the vote, I had managed to haul my bones around Limerick for a lunchtime leafleting campaign; and an evening door to door campaign. There had been a tension in the air, but nonetheless an air of cautious optimism. An unverifiable inkling that the country might be about to improve. Continue reading The necessity of ‘Yes’
I am trying. Trying valiantly not to stick my ungainly hoof into other people’s business. This morning was a challenge. I have not spoken about him before but I share a bus route to work each day with a bearded gentleman of around my own age. He has always struck me as slightly odd – in both his appearance and his demeanour. The fact that he wears a wedding ring was an indication that somebody somewhere had enjoyed his company at some point – perhaps they still do. Continue reading The man on the bus and the unmarried Mammies
midnightmurphy 