Give me a Clue


People who drive have largely given up on using their indicators and it’s driving me mad.

On every street in every city there's a nobody who won't tell us about their next manoeuvre. 

I’ve learned to enunciate my swear words very clearly so that these drivers can clearly lip read my displeasure as they swing across in front of me without any prior hint of their intentions. For sure, they know a lot more about my emotional state then I know about where they intend to go next.

Even worse than the hoards of cretins who never use their indicators are those who switch on their flashing light when they are already half-way around the corner. What earthly use is that to anyone? I’ve already had to stomp on my brakes to avoid you. What’s the point of telling my you’re going to turn after you’ve already gone and done it?

It’s always been a thing but now it’s become more and more and more and more. People are buzzing all over the gaff and not giving a solitary damn about who might benefit from knowing about it.

Neither does this ill behaviour break down usefully in terms age or wealth or gender or anything else easy like that. Old and young, male and female, rich and poor, all are making their right hand turns with no regard for anyone but themselves.

Ironically enough, it’s indicative of something, this lack of indication.

We have all become increasingly self-interested and inward looking. If it doesn’t directly help us, we don’t bother doing it. Occasionally, we are guilted into some communal action by the news or by some little girl on the news. Then we flick those metaphorical flashers for a moment and feel great about how thoughtful and community-driven we all are.

Bollocks.

The unused indicator is all the indication we need. We have become a world of crude metaphorical cartoon ostriches, our heads either up our own asses or up the ass of the ostrich in front of us. We rarely think of anybody else and if we do, it’s invariably too late when it finally occurs.

The use of the indicator on your car is an outward-thinking gesture. It shows some awareness of the people who share the world around you, who are only trying to make their way safely home.

The use of the indicator doesn’t mean you have to stop and bring these people home and feed them and show them something on Netflix. None of that. It just means you care a little that they get there safely. That you are willing to do a tiny bit to make their existence a little more navigable, a little more bearable.

The use of your indicator shows that you still care a tiny bit about somebody or something other than your own ridiculous self.

So put your indicator on.

You prick.

I Like the Two Seat Option on the Train


I like the two-seat option on the train. I always try to book one of those seats which just has one other seat beside it and none across a little table from it. That’ll do me, thank you very much.

I had one on the train to Dublin on Thursday morning. I was right in beside the window and I spent nearly all of the journey listening to some podcasts and watching the landscape slide past. There was lots to see. Thousands and thousands of lambs, jumping and running and suckling at their mothers, their tails going nineteen to the dozen.

The two-seat option provides a defensible space. Someone may come and sit beside you but it is only one person on one side and that can be managed. The four-seat option (with table) is probably great fun when you’re part of an actual party of four or perhaps even three. When you’re on your own, the four-seat option (with table) so often leaves you feeling like the odd one out. That or you get a nun. I used to get a nun across from me a lot and she could smile all she wanted; it was still a bit freaky.

So, yeah, two seats good, four seats bad.

On the journey home on Thursday, I was in a four-seater. At Athlone, the one quiet person who had been sitting across from me hurried off the train. Ever since I had offered her one of my Rolos she seemed to be of the impression that I was some kind of weirdo. Heavens knows why, it wasn’t like it was the last one or anything.

As she got off, a mother and her two sons got on. They took the other three seats of my foursome. I was clearly the 25% of the equation now so I buried deeper into my book and plugged my earphones in a little tighter.

The two boys were… what ages were they? Maybe twelve and eight, something like that. They were a bit loud and lively. They sat across from each other and engaged each other in various forms of banter and taunting. Mum looked like she hadn’t slept since they were born, she kept a gentle but firm maternal paw on both of them, easing them back if they went too far.

I smiled and nodded and left it at that. Again I watched the landscape as it passed. I recognised animals and other things I had seen this morning on the outward journey. They would still be there tomorrow.

I suppose I was slightly uncomfortable with the tight little family unit at my four-seat enclave although, of course, I had no right to be. I wished I’d booked my two-seater, as I thought I had.

With about half an hour left in the journey, a general lethargy sets in to the train population. The two boys had burned up various entertainment options including noughts and crosses, mobile phone video inspection, and some messy little game where you name things from a particular letter of the alphabet and write them down.

The younger of the boys was sitting diagonally across from me. I think he was a bit intrigued that I was so silent and unengaged. I think I was probably a bit surprised myself. I usually engage too much and that’s one of the reasons why I prefer the two-seaters.

I had my inevitable penny to mark the page in my book. It sat on the table between us. I pushed the penny towards the young fella and pointed towards it with my index finger. He looked at me and looked at it and then looked at me once more. Then I passed my open hand over the coin and vanished it. It’s a pretty simple manoeuvre when you know it but the effect is still a bit startling when you don’t expect it. The boy looked stunned. I put the coin back and then vanished it again. The boy gave it a try. He couldn’t do it. Then I showed him how it was done – a very basic thing.

He spent the rest of the trip trying to master the simple trick and by the time he arrived he had it pretty much perfect. I let him keep the penny.

As we got off the train, he kept looking back at me. The two boys had reminded me of my own boys, the age gap being almost the same.

We hadn’t exchanged a single word in the whole transaction, that little family and me. I had smiled after showing the trick, mostly to reassure Mum that I wasn’t a threat to anyone. She has smiled back, an entire little world of fatigue in her eyes.

Perhaps, for a while, I would be the magic man on the train for that wee fella.

I’d kind of like that.

Sometimes, the four-seat option ain’t so bad.


The Joy of Being Decried


This is fresh. It only happened the day before yesterday.

I had to leave the office for a quick visit to a place a few doors down. It was Friday afternoon and I was a bit full of the joys. On the way, I met a group of three people coming towards me. 

I knew them so I gave them a greeting. I might have been a bit over-effusive, in retrospect, but hey it was a lovely day and the weekend was fast approaching.

So I sped past these good people, my words doubtless still ringing in their ears, and I went in and did my little bit of business.

That business was transacted way quicker than I thought it might be. To my surprise, I found myself back on the path to my office within two minutes flat.

The people who I had said 'hello' to were now just ahead of me again. They must have stopped to look in a shop window or perhaps to punctuate some point in their conversation. Whatever the reason, I found myself gaining on them yet again, as I had done a few scant moments before.

But, me being me, and odd as anything sometimes, I didn’t want to overtake them again. Perhaps I felt I had used up my best conversational ploy at my first encounter. I don’t know. Whatever the reason, I hung back a little behind them. The door to my office was only a few more paces along, I could slip in without them ever knowing I was there.

So there I was, keeping pace a little behind, in that pre-weekend sunshine, when I started to tune in to the conversation that was being had up in front.

One of the three was saying, “He’s really very nice.”

Another was saying, “I know that, I know. It’s just the constant brightness. I just find it so bloody tiring.”

And then I realised. They were talking about me.

I had reached my door. I opened it and went quickly inside. I certainly didn’t want to be spotted now that I realised I was the subject of conversation. I got in and closed the door behind me. They never knew I was there.

That’s the end of the story, really. Whatever comes after this is just me editorialising.

First off, I’m pretty sure they were talking about me. Two of them were sticking up for me and one was continuing the point that I am a bit of a fucking pain in the arse. That’s all good. I don’t tend to think that person is wrong. I have no gripe. I am a pain in the arse.

In truth, the only even slightly interesting thing about this tiny event is how I reacted to it after I got behind the safety of my door. I was elated, delighted, surprisingly raised up. I got such an honest-to-god buzz out of hearing someone berate me, admittedly in the most gentle of terms.

I wonder why.

I think it’s because I feel I am quite a lightweight person, really. Easy going, usually trying to be nice and do the right thing. Boring, not-a-force-to-be-reckoned with. That sort of thing. To hear someone say that I annoyed them seemed to somehow grant me a little more weight, a little more gravitas, in my own eyes. Suddenly I am a person who can annoy people. I am an annoyance. It really felt like the best news I had heard all day.

There is a possible second reason. I’ve written about it elsewhere in these pages. It's here actually. 

When I was young, maybe ten or so, I walked behind two ladies who were complaining roundly about my Dad, about how he always came around collecting the rent with such an annoyingly cheery disposition.

So, yeah, now I'm annoyingly cheery, just like my Old Man?

i think I’ll have me a piece of that.

Bum, Belly, and Me

A tiny verse from a tweet I saw.


Going out to have some fun
And what you get is what you see
This show is going to run and run
My bum, my belly, and me.

Going out to paint the town
And if you find you don’t agree
The three of us will track you down
My bum, my belly, and me.

Life is very short and there’s no time
For belly-bum fighting my friend
I have always thought that it's a crime,
So I will tell you once again.

Going out to live it up
And what will be will tend to be
We’ll all drink deep of life’s sweet cup
My bum, my belly, and me.