cá bhfuil mo chos eile?

That's what our little fella woke up saying in the middle of the night the other night.  It means "where is my other leg?" for the non irish speakers out there.

We have lots of colorful conversations nowadays - he wanted to go to the shop the other night, and listed out all the things he'd like to get, and when we asked where he'd get the money, he said he'd get some money in the shop too... now that I've written it down it doesn't sound altogether that hilarious anymore - you had to be there, or maybe you had to be in my head.

Another thing that isn't vaguely hilarious perhaps is the following, but again it was mildly amusing inside my own head... I attended a course today called  "How to cure a pig"  - a half pig was brought out at the start, but to be honest they didn't cure him at all - if anything he just kept getting deader and deader looking...

My head is a drunken audience

So Long Lou

Sad to hear Lou Reed is not in the world anymore.

I adored most of what I ever heard belonging to him, grateful I got to see him in the Point in 96.

Just one of his many gems at the link below

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q7gBPBBZHw4

A Project

For myself and maybe for some of youse, lazy daisies... that have the ability to write, but lack the je ne sais quoi* to actually send it out...
The mission is to send stuff out to every single outlet on this list....  List of Lit Mags  - or else take a random selection of their titles and use it as a prompt to write - or else simply continue to do as you were doing and see where that gets you (where you are)...

*Quoi = confidence is the what, or time, or mental energy, headspace perhaps to finish it, or pride - unwillingness to let some other human being use their power in saying no...

Alternatively start your own magazine.

I'm accepting free submissions now, in my comment box, for my upcoming blog post/ EZINE which will be published very soon or else before the third quarter of the 17th month, and for which I, quite simply, want to gather the very best of writing, or art on the world WIDE web, or wrart... and i won't be paying contributors, but they will have the honour of being part of the tremendous and wondrous thing that is the very next** in a long long line of posts, of varying length and brevity....

**(unless I decide to hold it for the post after that)

Best of luck and don't be too disheartened, I aim to answer your comment within 3 months, I don't accept simultaneous, heterogenous, homozygous, or magnatamous submissions or emmissions.

Catch up

Hiya folksies

How's the summer with ye?  It's actually summer here for the first time ever, we're living at the beach every weekend, that and the back garden, and we're slipping around a lot thanks to the sun cream that i luckily bought a whole case of at the start of the summer, since I need to have it in every bag and every pram and every car, cos I'm so crazy and unpredictable, I never know where I'm going next (to the beach) or with what bag (the big one that keeps drinks cool, or the big cheap flowery looking one).

Looking forward to Louise's new book that's coming out soon - the Doll House, and to a mini reunion that's happening soon with writing buddies of yore.  I have a new writing group, but I've only attended about 3 times in the last year, and brought my first story written in about two years in to them lately.   As opposed to the old prolific days pre baba, when all the spare energy that didn't go towards keeping work from firing me could go into writing, or radio show preparing, and we used to meet every two weeks.

No other craic here, little fella's in good form, enjoying his copy of the Caterpillar magazine and eagerly awaiting the next bus...

We only had the punk music on for a minute

and this happened....

(If I turn my back on the mess it won't exist)

In fairness though, he's probably done this just as often to a bit of Jazz, Classical or the Fair City theme music, but I wouldn't have noticed (so engrossed in the goings on of Bella, or in the case of Jazz perfecting my elbow twitch), it was just that when everything was upended this time, it fit perfectly with the music playing in the background -

(Don't be worrying now, I just put on a bit of Boyzone after and he had it all cleaned up in no time... :-)

Any weird effects of various music genres in your home?

Sketcher

Some art in reverse order, and because I'm enjoying the recent spurt of extra blogging.  :-)

Squiggle with a face

A messy disgrace

A window in space

Waiter feeds bluey lace

Fighting demons with grace

and beneath all the trace

Tate Modern and other collectors and art agent types can contact me through my telepathic line, I'll know.

Cars in the Bed

There can be little in life more irksome for a dog that loves to slumber than cars in the bed.... except perhaps for having an owner who makes you pose beside the cars in your bed, so that she can have others laugh at your plight.

I can see it in her eyes alright

"I'll get you back, some day, some way"

The Length and length

Today I've travelled the length and length of the country, well almost, woke up in Cork, went to work in Belfast, and now am on an iron road back to Cork again.  It's a cushy life, a four hour working day, with a 12 hour commute. 
I don't do it often.
I was technically also supposed to work on route, and I might yet (you see I'm very busy and important and the world will end without my input), but events conspired against me being especially productive.  You see the wireless was rubbish all the way up to the top of the country, so I couldn't speak to Mr Email all day until 1.30 when the magic elves in the office I eventually arrived to work at wove their way into my machine and planted hundreds of wonderful ideas for work into it.
You see, I'm like a hamster or some other such trained thing that sits in front of something and waits for it to tell me what to do, when the bell sounds I press the right buttons and get a treat, or a shock if I press the wrong ones, it sounds terribly cruel, but it's easier than childminding, and mysteriously they pay me enough so that I can pay someone else to childmind my beautiful child.
The day wasn't a total loss.
When the elves had moved all the magic instructions for what to do next into my machine (breathe in breathe out, check whether these oranges look nice enough for this new yogurt pot, predict the future, make up a good reason for why we're doing what we're already doing and why it has or hasn't worked), I was going to be able to read and work, and sweat and groan and respond all the way down the country again, falling down the map like an Ant down a crack in the wall with too big a crumb of sticky cake on its back on a hot june day, but no, it wasn't to be - there were no plugs on the train going to Dubland.  There are plugs on the train going to Cork though, and that is because people who go to Cork are sexier and more switched on, and brilliant in general than people going to Dubland, or maybe it's just the age of the train.  Either way
and moving swiftly along
not wanting to alienate my dublin reader
gloss gloss gloss
I didn't completely waste the day.
I got to read much of Niamh Boyce's wonderful book "The Herbalist" - It's the first book I've EVER had to skip to the end of to see what was going to happen before I continued reading, the words were too much in danger of physically hurting me, if I didn't peek ahead.  It's not something I ever have done before (as you can tell from the very sincere EVER in big letters earlier in this paragraph), but god that woman can write.  I'm very proud to have the same first name as her.   Not that this makes me as good a writer automatically per se, but it would give one some hope.
Other things I got done on route have included but not been limited to...
- noticing brilliant dublin street art between the jervis and smithfield - and I mean brilliant - almost Banksy brilliant.
- remembering brilliant times in places that I passed, like - the night we went to see republic of loose, or the time my brother and I walked in from Heuston to town on our own and I was only 8 or something and he wanted to save money for McDonalds or music or something, the time with people I'd met in Irish college in Mallow - under the railway bridge out messing late at night, windsurfing near the sandflats of malahide (ok wind drifting), watching harry potter in drogheda and having the kids in the seats behind us calling out all the words, visiting a deserted house in the shade of croke park with someone mysterious,
- also seeing people writing with marker on turnips (ok that actually happened last week in work rather than today, but it makes a good story, and if you've lasted this far down the page you deserve a good story)
- catching up with good buddies on the phone.
- getting a sizeable blog written.
 - writing a teeny tiny bit
- reading half of Staring at Lakes - a memoir by Michael Harding - an honest and funny man.

Now for some actual work, sure I've another 2 hours on the train yet!!!

Caterpillar News

So the younger sibling of the marvellous Moth Magazine, aka the Caterpillar, was launched yesterday and anyway, I've a poem in it.  I'm quite thrilled about it, as it's the only submission I've made this year, so, so far 2013 has been a year of 100% success.

The poem chosen to be in this very special first edition of Ireland's first (that I'm aware of) literary magazine for children... is non other than the very first ever of my Poems to Dissuade.  Click here to see the full line up in the magazine.  It's a very pretty looking publication I have to say.

In other news, there was a marathon in our city today.  I say city, but you can walk from one end to the other in 20 mins.  In fact, you can run 26 miles around it too, as it turns out - causing all kinds of traffic tomfoolery on the way.  We caught the train in and saw a few of the mad things that were finishing the run. I have to say, it was quite a spectacle.  People with all inhibitions lost, bodies and faces contorted in severe pain, but with joy there too, and they didn't seem one bit disappointed that after all that effort, all the months of preparation and training, the course led them right back to where they had begun.

Meanwhile, little boy turned two on Saturday. Just because he's only two doesn't mean he can't blow out the candles 3 times though (and he knows how to enjoy himself at a rock festival)

Hope your Summer is taking care of you......................

 

So I built a wall on a beach.  What did you do with the summer so far?

Vicious Fishes

I thought we'd be safe enough - to watch a cookery show - me and the little man this evening.  I didn't feel like dancing, or running up and down the hallway with cars, trying to stop him climbing into the sink (yes he's discovered the art of chair dragging) so tv it was, now I don't know about you, but I've had enough tellytubbies, and yet somehow knew he wouldn't go for a boring old soap - inspired by his excited perusal of a cookery book last night, screeching "oh yummy yummy" at every page, i put a cookery show playing on the player.
It started well.  Fishing boats.  Men walking over rocks. Children picking periwinkles, squealing and laughing.  He was all in favour.
Then the horror.  Sea Bass it might have been.  Beheaded.  Then filleted.  My compassionate little soldier was almost sobbing on the sofa next to me, worry and pure revulsion showing in his little eyes as the cook held up the bones showing off how little meat was left on them.  Looking at me, as if to say, why are you not outraged, why are we not going to tell that man that this is not nice behaviour.... (after all he's not allowed kick the dog, surely this is unfair?)  

We will not be watching "Martin's Mad About Fish" for some time, and I may even write a strongly worded letter to the broadcaster insisting that they should have a warning for parents that young children may find the images disturbing....  Or not.
It did look pretty tasty.

A load of balls

Working next door to a cash and carry has its advantages.  I enjoy sometimes going in for a browse, imagining buying a big wheel of cheese to make some mouse crazy with happiness, or marvelling at the pillow sized bags of marshmallows that only a giant could possibly finish (in one go)...  There are insane frozen chocolate cakes too with enough in them for a hike to the arctic circle and possibly back....
but most things there are just too much -  you'll never use that much ketchup yourself, unless you bath in it, the only way you'd ever need that much porridge would be if you were covering the driveway in it, so I don't shop there.
Too much is too much sometimes, and another thing there is a little too much of in my life right now is balls. There are hundreds of balls inside and outside of my home.  The dog probably brought the first of them, but now Danger has acquired a fair few, but worst of all we have tons of balls contributed from the neighbours - they throw and kick them into our back garden at all hours of the day and night.  They break windows.  Knock on the door looking for them back.  Do I sound like a grouch?  I do my best to give the balls back to their rightful owners, unlike the guy who used to live here, apparently his name was Hitler, and he never gave back a single ball - anyway - even as I type, the summer is approaching, the toddler is being fitted with a helmet, balls are bouncing off the windows, the dog is salivating... there is a surplus of round things.

Boast

My son is an amazing up and coming artiste.

There you have it - the first post beginning with the words "My son" - a slippery slope you may say - slithering down into the mires of mediocrity, boasting about a child that is no better or worse than any other, chirping proudly as if it's anything to do with me what magic he may or may not possess... ah but there I'll have to stop you, for my son is an amazing up and coming artiste... the "e" on the artiste only proves it.

Here's what he made tonight, a vicious, frankly honest and delicately fragmented look at modern life, told from the innocence of the young with the sharp edges and blistering heat of a 21 month old mind in turmoil, or as he calls it "Obair"  - (Irish for Work).... he has already pointed out to us the multi-facets of the work, how some parts seemed to have gotten hurt "Bupa" (Spanish for little hurt - we keep correcting him and telling him it's VHI), he kept shouting at his father to watch as he stuck on the metallic pieces of paper, and has now pointed out to us the stars, dogs, and boats that we are only beginning to see...  He's asleep now as I type this, obviously drained from the effort...
Anyway - that's the Boast, now that it's out I can calm down and refrain from ringing up Mensa or anything...

Strangers of the day

So today, I tried hard to notice strangers.  They're human beings after all, and they live all over the place, buying things, indeed selling things in the same shops we do, even working in the same places as us.  (And I say us in the comforting sense of we, me and you, my lovely blog readers, who I know individually and treasure dearly - give an aul wink into that Webcam, you never know how clever my blog might be at reaching out... but enough creepiness, and on to creepiness directed at others....)
Here's what I found out -
The delivery man for the company that dropped in three boxes for a colleague of mine, likes to pretend he knows his customers by their first name, "I've a few boxes for (Colleague) here" he said with a knowing wink, ok not really a wink, but he probably did blink, I didn't see his face since I just signed his electronic signing thing with a nostalgic feeling - reminding me as it did of the old etch a sketch.. - see I noticed the thing more than the person there... next challenge puhlease (as I chant to myself, I am a people person, I am a people person)
Lunch time - what better time to make new friends - I sat with one IT person I know, and two other probable IT people.. and they are people - believe me, I saw them eating - well actually I saw them with plates of what looked like an absence of lunch on them... wait a minute!  They advised me on my IT problems, with competing grandeur and fake excitement befitting the glamourous world of IT - it's like OZ, same exact number of vowels and consonents - coincidence?

On my way home I tried to notice strangers in traffic - people coming against me - well lit by an orangey snow ridden low winter sun, that was blinding them all and making them look probably a lot more annoyed than they actually were - one couple were very similar to each other in their "sun grimace" a remarkable show of unibleness (unity in miserableness), while another young lady in a beetle should have looked cool and popular, but she just looked hassled.
Bottom Line: Not one stranger in traffic or anywhere else today looked like someone I wanted to be.  Nor do I think I'll be winning any people person prizes, but then the prizes for those things tend to be rubbish enough and I do not need another goldfish.
What do you notice about the strangers around you?

What can you do in 5 mins?

I have decided to make this blog the no 1 home on the internet for home-makers, domestic gods & goddesses (not wanting to be sexist), and have-it-all-ers... how will I manage this?
Easy Peasy - I will follow up last week's sensational meditation on light bulb changing with another useful house person's story - this time, about a recipe.
No ordinary recipe
A recipe for a magical person.
Anabel Karmel was recommended to me when my young fella was just a sprout, when we were just beginning our journey into food.  "She makes it easy" I was told, by another fellow goddess of  things in homes, "she plans out every day what you should give the baby - you don't have to think at all" Now if you know me, or if you've been reading my blog of late - you may  have noticed that thinking is something I have become particularly averse to since the great adventure of parenthood began... So I was all for it.
I am a freezer filler of a mother.  Making up for the guilt of not being at home all day every day to nourish my child with cuddles and hugs, I, instead choose to shun all processed food (despite it & it's industry providing me with a livelihood for the last however long people have been paying me to show up places and talk seriously with a look of concern) - and cook regularly in the home, for my darling, so I can fill the freezer full of love.
Now, Danger is no fussy eater, and for the first 5 or 6 months of "solids" (which were far from solid on the way in or out i can tell you) he didn't mind getting the same ice cube shapes of butternut squash, parsnip, carrot etc, that Anabel recommended. She did recommend plenty of other stuff too, but they didn't say suitable for freezing on them - ipso facto...
However, of late, he seems to be getting a little, fatigued, with lasagne 5 times a week, interspersed with ckn stew, ckn balls, fish curry, and fish & tomato stuff.
So back to Anabel I went, to open up the chapter on 2 - 3 year olds -  She had a lovely looking recipe for fish balls.
She is a big lying liar though.... or else she is writing for wonder woman, or else there was a typo and a 0 missing... because it was wrote there that in 5 minutes one could - grate some carrot, make breadcrumbs, beat an egg, finely chop some onions, chop up the fish mix, and all  sorts of other things (each of which actually easily take me 10 mins to do), then roll the mixture up into cherry tomato sized pieces.  5 minutes preparation time.  With a straight face she said that - obviously not including the time you need to clean the fishy mess off your hands either.
Either she is trying to make me feel like a loser or I am just not as good a cook as I thought (and yes, a good cook in my book is a fast one)
Danger enjoyed the stupid things in the end anyway - I didn't get to try them, since they had far too much effort gone in for me to waste one on myself!!!

(you could have prepared fish balls in the time taken to read this by the way)

Light bulb moment

Light bulb moments sure are magical things, I had three of them this very evening.

The risks of light bulb moments are many, but the rewards are great.  You risk being killed stone dead, because you forgot which way the switch should be (off is good, but can be hard to predict on those two switch lights at the top of the stairs for example), an even greater risk is that the extra light will just show you that a particular part of the house, which you had thought was looking particularly snazzy lately actually has a huge amount of dirt temporarily hidden by the darkness, and then the worst risk of all is that you'll open the box of light bulb, yes light bulb, to find that it's got no two pins to hold it hanging up in the fixture or else it has - but your fixture is missing the holes to hold the pins.

my light bulb moments of this evening revealed one further risk - poorly matched bulbs.  It's such a shame when you buy a bulb to put in a light that has three bulbs, and the other two are all fancy and pointed and the new one added in there looks like a complete tool (unfashionable or stupid person)

Don't say you haven't been warned.

Greg

This week, there was a poetry festival in town, and I was delighted to attend the award giving for the Gregory O Donohue prize.
I found myself getting nervous in the audience, as the compere read out stuff the judge had said about the entries... I found myself feeling like maybe they'll say I was the winner, though I didn't enter, maybe I was still the poet of extraordinary quality that was about to be presented with a big fat cheque... (they didn't present the cheque on stage as it turned out - that's a bit too lotto i suppose)...  I did the same in first year of secondary school when the student of the year was being announced - I have a ridiculous level of optimism sometimes, perhaps it was because i had just written a poem at home for the first time in yonks.

Following the poet who came third, and then the poet who came first came 5 emerging poets.

The first was the most emerging of emerging - sure didn't she come up with the name, it was great to see Kate from Emerging Writer fame doing her thing again.  I found her "it's what's in it" poem very touching, and even asked afterwards was it a new version, cos I never remembered it hitting home so much before, but maybe that's just a side effect of having grown up and having an actual singing dancing munchkin of my own.  Flaming for Vincent was a bit of a classic too.  I won't tell you about the others, you should have been there, if you're so interested.

There I was on Thursday of this week....

wondering why no one had commented on my blog - which, according to the new scheme of things, was to be published without fail of a Sunday.
But then I found to my horror - that actually, just deciding and even intending to do something do very little towards the actual happening of things unless you also do the thing.  Even on Thursday I planned to post about this remarkable phenomenon, but I have since found out that planning - similar to deciding and intending - also lacks that special bit of action and world changing potential that doing does have....
Lesson learned, Cruel Blog Life-Lesson Master Monster.... lesson learned.

Best things in life being free...

So this new found organised me has been a bit touch and go - yes, I've managed to finally clear out under the stairs where baby things have foundered ever since the young fella was a baby, just a short time ago, but no, I haven't lost my incredible gift for NOT planning ahead, and not doing things that make sense in the right order...
Such as?
Such as having a shower before departing for a social trip/ visit to our kith and kin in Gaillimh, leading to the sad state of affairs of being on the road good and early, but having the hair style of an asylum inmate, and not one of the nice asylums where they wash your hair regularly.  This was the predicament feacing the cushions family on the N20 Saturday last.

So we did what any family would do under the circumstances, we talked about what the best possible solution to the problem might be, and laughed at the thought of stopping off in a 5 star hotel, and renting a room with them for the sake of a shower.  How we laughed.  The money department is of a good bit of concern to a lot of people these days, and we're no exception, so 250 euro for a shower seemed like a little too much to be paying.
Laughing was all I thought we'd do about it.  But Mr Cushions took the turn off for Dromoland Castle.  And drove all the way up to the car park, both of us laughing at the pristeen golf course, the sound of clay pigeons being shot at, the stretched limo outside the front door.  In with us, and our secret weapon - the amazing Danger cushion.  He was charming everyone in sight, thinking the men in armour were santy claus, and being forgiven for coating the tables with half chewed liga.  You'd think they could afford new couches, but the furniture they had was absolutely ancient.  Well, I got to see where all the money they saved on not doing up the place went, when I, after 20 minutes or so of relaxation and people watching, ventured downstairs to the 5 star Spa.
It went like this
"I don't have an appointment or anything"
Nice girl smiles politely
"But we're on a journey and..."
Still smiling politely
"I was wondering how much it would be... to take a shower"
"Oh that's no problem, they're through there, " thinks for a second... "Eh are you a guest?"
"No" But it was too late, she had already raised my hopes and gorgeous girl that she was, waved me on.
There never was such a shower, as my father in law once famously remarked about a Turkey, (replacing the word Shower with Turkey in that case).
It was as big as a house, with two shower heads, one power shower, good as a massage, and one rain head type thing that felt like being in a tropical storm of hot water, and fragrant shampoo and body wash of course.  Stepping out into a chunky robe, and slippers, and using the fancy schmancy moisturiser and power hair drier, I felt as happy as I've felt all year.  All you need in life is a brass neck.
Thank you kind girl in the black uniform, and of course, thank you NAMA.

Once a Week Wendy

So, I've decided to try and live a more organised life.

Being organised, for me, means bringing things upstairs with me when I'm going upstairs.  Mainly things that belong upstairs, not just everything, I'm selective.  It works the other way too, I try to bring things downstairs  that belong downstairs.  (can you believe you just wasted 7 seconds of your life reading that?)  But it obviously doesn't work all the time - otherwise why would there be so many things in the wrong place in the first place, although I can proudly say I've never left Plaice in the wrong place, (mainly because I wouldn't bring Plaice back to my place in the first place).
So, bottom line, what does this mean for you, talented reader and decipherer of intermittent gibberish?  It means that I am endeavouring from now on, to supply you with gibberish at a target frequency of once per week, thanks to all the extra time I'll have in my life from being more organised.

This week I will tell you all about LesMis, in case you haven't seen it.  Just the important bits mind:
They sing all the way through.  There are close ups of people you'd prefer to see from the back row of the Point Depot back in the day (though you'd give out about the acoustics there, just to fit in with everyone else who gave out about it).  There's a child on a horse drawn carraige, cgi'd onto it - in this day and age - without a hair moving in the breeze and him meant to be trotting along, and I found that toe-curlingly annoying, I mean - just put the child on a real carraige - did he have some kind of equestrian allergy?  - steps around obvious joke here -.  Sacha Baron Cohen is brilliant in it, I just love funny bits in anything, especially in something so completely miserable outside of the funny bits - makes the funny bits shine even shinier.
That song "Bring him home" is actually from a "shortly after Dad meets daughter boyfriend moment", and isn't half as moving in it's real context as it was in all those imagined contexts I had for it down through the years, having conveniently forgotten its context in the point that night, or maybe they left it out that night, from what I remember it was long enough....
That is all.

Tune in again next week for more top quality Gibber Jabber.

If I said it once....

Here's a poem I originally posted on this blog almost 3 years ago - 13 April 2010 to be precise...  pity no one ever listens...



A Poem which aims to dissuade you from bringing your horse to Tesco

this poem has found a new home, so I'm taking it down from here... more news of that anon...

Literary Highlights / Book List of 2012

12 days into the 13th  year of the 21st century, and I'm only now getting round to writing up my literary highlights and booklist for the last 12 months,  speaking of 12...

1.   I took this snapshot myself on my computer, at 12 mins past 12, on the 12th of the 12th Oh 12,  I thought it was pretty cool at the time - so cool it counts as my no. 1 literary highlight... If I'm going to come up with 10 as usual - I better start small.
2. Attended a course entitled parallel worlds and how to create them, run by Trevor Joyce in UCC, it was pretty much a tour of things he likes that are a bit obscure in writing, and was interesting, if a little light on the practical side... ie he didn't really push us to try things out ourselves - but it was good to devote an hour and a bit a week to the aul writing, and definitely helped ease the pain of being back out in the land of work.
3. The Medicine Session - got to go say some poems for nice people in Lismore at the coolest gathering south of the Shannon thanks to the lovely watercats.
4.  IPYPIASM has once more been a roaring success with some lovely newcomers and the brilliant Titus as hostess and competitor with the mostess.
5.  Attended a lovely writing workshop given by Afric McGlinchey.
6.  I didn't enter a single competition all year, so therefore didn't lose any.
7.  Nor was I refused publication in a single magazine, low or high brow, paying or not, tree killing or online.
8.  Neither did a single agent or publisher say that any novel of mine, no matter how long ago I wrote it, was unworthy of their attention or representation, although I've never sent any novel to an agent or publisher, so I could say that for every year.
9.  I was asked to write, and did write, a review of a poetry book.
10.  I only had 38 posts on this blog, which you'd imagine would have freed me up for hours of creativity, hours and hours....


And now for the book list
I didn't keep much of a log of reading this year, so I'm just squeezing in what I remember here, some good some bad. Favourites in bold to save you the reading if you're very busy and important (like myself)

Franny & Zooey by JD Salinger I really liked, as you'll know from the post "I love JD"
Jo Brand's autobiography was one of a number of books that were about to be thrown out from my parents house and which I rescued in hopes that it might be amazing, and it was, but not in a really good way - ah no, Jo, I jest, if you're reading this, it was fine, just very like a big long series of emails to a friend recounting ups and downs of life without much in the way of insight into comedienneship.
I had a Kevin Barry feast with City of Bohane and Dark lies the Island, both brilliant in different ways, one of the stories from Dark lies the island will haunt me probably until I no longer know my own name.
A little Jennifer Johnston with the Gingerbread woman, was of her usual quality too - ie great.
The Baron in the trees on the other hand, while light and readable could have easily been left in the trees with us all equally happy.
I can thank my book club for that last one, and thanks too to them, for my getting to read Anna Karenina, actually the wikipedia page about Anna Karenina.
Anne Enright's Making Babies was a good read, funny and honest.
A sense of an ending by Julian Barnes - recycled a bit from an earlier book of his I read, but got alot right.
Book of the year was of course Red Ribbons by Louise Phillips, I loved the pace and excitement, so proud of Louise's writing, a clever blend of thoughtfulness and action, a very successful debut for her and really well deserved.
There was a light one over the Christmas, about a magical health spa and three different women with three different challenges in life, can't remember the name now - maybe "Always and Forever" - something along those lines.
Also read Cinderella in Irish Luathriona it's called - that was a good one too.
Christine Falls and A Death in Summer provided my John Banville fix this year in the guise of Benjamin Black, I liked em, dark, but a good pace.
Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe was amazing, full of story telling touches, beautifully written, like a piece of the past, sliced out and served, extremely well worth reading.

New Year, No Fear!!!

So, here we are, another IPYPIASM draws to a close, Bug snuck another one in at the end - call over here for a lookie at it in close up, and the story behind it, bringing the USA a marvellous one poem clear of the previous year's score... so scores on the doors ended up at

USA  8.5
Scotland (the incredible) 19 (up 5 since 2011)
Ireland 15  (down 6 on last year)
England 1 (down 5)
RoW 0

Not that it's a competition or anything, and yadda yadda, taking part, xmas spirit etc,,, but - we'll be back, oh yes, next year we will be back!!

Thanks all for taking part, and most of all to Titus for being a great hostess!!