Insert ‘Something Irish’ Here…

I was just amusing myself by thinking of great works of Art/Literature and how I might ‘Irish’ them up a bit.

The reason for this is…

Well, I haven’t a clue really…

Anyway, here’s a few ‘Irished-Up’ classics I thought of:

Stanzas Written in Dejection near Ballintubber.

Romeo and Mary-Francis

The ‘Maureen Lisa’

The Haystack Inferno

The Cray-ture in The Rye

I was reminded of this little game while I was looking over something I wrote ages ago.

In that 'thing', two characters were arguing as to why there was no such thing as a Great Irish Opera.

One character suggested that Puccini's ‘La Boheme’ could be transcribed down to Killarney, complete with the show-stopping aria;

"Yer Tiny Hand is Feckin’ Freezin’ (so it is)".

This little game can be applied to most Artistic Endeavours:

Bob Dylan – "Lie Down, Woman, Lie Down"

Henrik Ibsen – "Peer Gynt’s Goat"

Perhaps you might try putting a few of your own local places into your favourite famous works:

Ode on a Glaswegian Urn?

Indianapolis and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull?

Bleak Sten-House-Muir?

Try it. It’s a blast – a small one – but a blast nonetheless.

Sorry?

"’Get out more?"

Why?

Is there a Dr. Marten in the House?

One of my most-treasured idiosyncrasies is that I only ever own one pair of shoes at a time.

I polish them up for posh occasions and wear work boots and wellies whenever the going gets really tough and so my solitary pair of shoes last me a good long time. When I get my new shoes, I put the old ones in the bin and walk away.

I always wear the same brand of shoes. Dr. Martens Classic 1462 – Black – three eyelets – absolutely no yellow stitching. It’s a great shoe and, no, this is not a sponsored link.

Here’s the point.

Last week when my newest-of-the-new shoes arrived, I started wondering how I had ever become so attached to this particular shoe and the wondering took me back to my first encounter with a Doc Marten shoe.

I think I had actually blocked this painful and stupid memory from my brain. Anyway, here it is, in all its truth and inanity.

Christmas, 1987, my new girl would be expecting a nice Christmas present. She’s my wife now and some things don’t ever change. Anyway, hints had been dropped about a nice pair of brown Doc Marten shoes which could be found in the famous ‘Shelleys’ shoe shop in Sloane Square, London. We lived in London then so it wasn’t, like, a ferry trip across the Irish Sea or anything.

So I went to Shelley’s - a great shop - ('still not a sponsored link) and bought the shoes off a very nice girl behind a very nice oaken wood counter.

(Here’s where I do something remarkably silly. Look away if you are squeamish.)

The girl gave me two receipts – I think that’s what threw me. One receipt, I can handle but two? I needed to keep the receipt… receipts… in case the shoes didn’t fit (or fitted an ugly step-sister, or something) but how the hell do I deal with two receipts?

There was a stapler lying on the nice-girls counter. Not just any stapler. A powerful, silver, staple-gun-type-thingie.

In a flash, I had it – I would staple the two receipts together, for safe keeping. After politely asking "May I?" I placed the two receipts on the polished hardwood Sloane Square counter and lined the gun up to staple them together.

I stopped.

What had I been thinking? This powerful staple gun had no ‘back’ on it – no platform for the staple to be pushed into. The staple – and my two receipts - would be embedded into the wonderful oaken-wood countertop. Much embarrassment would undoubtedly ensue.

I smiled winningly at the girl.

Then I quickly (it had to be quick) picked up the two receipts and aligned them both along the outside edge of my index finger. Then, drawing back, I fired a single thick stainless steel staple through the two receipts and on into the soft depths of my digit.

The girl behind the preserved oaken wood counter recoiled in horror. What was this guy? A suicide-by-staple-gun fanatic or something? For my own part, I panicked, screamed then danced around a little – my receipts fluttering gently in the air. The whole shop stood and watched.

In an attempt to regain control of the situation, I slipped my finger nail under the end of the fully-embedded staple and pulled it out. It hadn’t folded over on itself inside my flesh – which was kind of good.

The staple was followed out of my finger by the mother-and-father of all blood-gushers.

I grabbed a tissue off the pristine oak counter (in retrospect, what a well-equipped counter that was), wrapped up my finger, apologised and simultaneously bled profusely, then left. My finger swelled up like a big swollen up thingie and bled weepingly for most of that day. My wife-to-be loved the shoes and the blood stained receipt from Shelleys is now a treasured family heirloom.

And from that time on, I have worn only Dr. Martens shoes.

Beowulf on DVD... Hmmmmm

I often choose my Friday night DVD's with my son John in mind.

He's twelve now and enjoys a good Friday Night Veggie as much as his old dad. But the choice is limited. Many of the old staples have been raided at this stage.

So it was with some anticipation that I rented Robert Zemeckis' (sort of) animated version of Beowulf.

I figured it would have enough dragons and creatures to keep the young man engaged while I would have a touch of Anglo-Scandinavian Epic poetry and... em... Angelina's Digitised Boobies to keep me in my seat.

Okay...

It didn't work for me, sorry.

The quality of this digitised animation just hasn't reached a technological stage yet where I can bypass it and just engage with the story. The nuts and bolts of the technology is just too 'out there' for me to avoid.

For all the braggery of how great a feat this movie is, for me it just looked like a Shrek (1) without all the excellent laughs that we had back then.

In fact, it all takes itself a bit too seriously and, as a result, raises quite a few unintentional laughs.

The bit where Beowulf takes off all his clothes to battle Grendal results in some colossal visual gymnastics in order to keep Big B's appendage off the screen.

Really 'Austin Powers' would have been proud of this one, as our hero bounds from strategically placed candlestick to candlestick which all fall away obediently every time he turns his (computer) sculpted arse to the screen.

Most memorable by far is Ray Winstone intoning in his best East London accent, "I've come ta kill yo' monstah".

That's just great!!

But overall it's not.

'Just great' that is.

Of course, I didn't get to see it in 3D.

I'm sure that would have been quite a display - what with all those swords, dragons and comely maidens protruding their bits out into the theatre.

Perhaps Ray's digitised appendage might have even taken a turn up the auditorium aisle in that version.

No, perhaps not.