Brendan 的个人资料Desperately Seeking...So...照片日志列表更多  |  工具 帮助 |
|
1月23日 Friday Feast 176Appetizer Can't decide between beer and coffee. I guess I'd have to go for coffee, because I can happily drink that anytime - even I can't drink beer in the morning. Soup Two Christmas cards that I rescued from the trash (I don't mean I took them from the trash, I mean I kept them instead of throwing them out, which is what we do with mail that can't be forwarded or returned to sender) - one shows a beautiful image by Louis Haghe of the Nave of St.Peter's in Rome, the other a quote from John 3:16: "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life." My coffee travel mug that Brittany gave me which has photos of our summer fun inside the thermos lining. A portable CD player that a nice lady in work lets me use to listen to audio books so that I don't go insane. Salad 10. (Interpret that as you like!) Main Course England has lots of places with terrible names, like Scunthorpe and Slough, but to change them to something better would be a waste of a great gift. I'd rather go for something silly and frivolous, like changing Dublin to something like Little Belfast, simply because it would annoy the hell out of the super-proud citizens. Dessert My mother. My father. (This is topical - she's buzzing around the living room as I type, looking for books that she's implying I threw out!) Otherwise: children yelling. Children laughing. Happy Birthday To MeThe problem with Christmas and birthdays is that you don't get to have an opinion about anything.
In the run-up to the Yuletide season if someone asks you what you think of a certain colour of shirt say, or the work of an author, or a television program, you really can't answer. The reason of course is that they may already have bought said item, or be intending to buy it for you, and your disgust at the idea of someone wearing a peuce silk shirt, or reading Russell Brand's Booky Wook, or watching 24, will hurt and offend them.
Someone told me they thought the whole idea of telling people what to get you for your birthday was crass and pointless - why not just buy it yourself? they argued- but I think it saves a lot of trouble and embarassment and awkward moments when people risk buying you something as a surprise present that you'd never in a million years choose for yourself. (This was the same person who still complains about the time I bought him something I really thought he'd use - vinegar. I realise vinegar isn't a particularly exciting gift, but for someone showing a budding interest in cooking I think you could do much worse.) When people ask me what I want for Christmas I tell them, whether they choose to get it for me or not is up to them. But when they ask me my thoughts on a certain band, or opinion of a particular cologne, I usually prevaricate and hope they'll choose wisely (or have already chosen wisely!). And seeing as my birthday follows closely on Christmas I basically don't get to have an opinion on anything for about 10 weeks, this is especially hard for someone who is as spectacularly opinionated as I am.
This year most people asked me what I wanted and then got me some of it, but the best presents were the ones I hadn't expected (which shows my friends and family have great taste!), and the cards and messages I got were even better; but the best thing about my birthday was celebrating it with my whole family, a number of close cousins, and my girlfriend - some of whom turned up as a surprise, and that's about the only safe surprise you can risk at a time like this. Fascist FashionMy boss is the sort of person who doesn't like confrontation, (which begs the question why she is working for a large, faceless organisation populated by over-worked, under-appreciated trade unionists) so I could tell by her "I'm sorry about this but please don't hit me" expression that she had bad news for me. She told me, apologetically, that my shirt didn't comply with the dress code. Now I wasn't particularly surprised; it was a University of South Carolina football shirt, and the name of their team is the Gamecocks. The name never fails to amuse me, especially when I'm in the Palmetto State where, for reasons of expediency, it's shortened to Cocks, so that all over the place you'll see bumper stickers and shorts and caps with "Go Cocks", "Cocks Rule", and, once, "I
 Cocks", but I could understand how it might offend someone of a more sensitive nature. However, it wasn't the name of the team that was the problem, it was the fact that my shirt bore the name of a place."A place?" I asked, perplexed.
"Yeah. No football (meaning soccer), rugby, or GAA shirts, nothing with political slogans, no FCUK, and no place names," she explained.
"You're joking," I tried.
"No, 'fraid not", she giggled, nervously, then retreated to her desk.
I couldn't believe it. I sat for the next few minutes mentally sorting my wardrobe, censoring my gear to suit the latest version of the dress code. When I got home I went through my drawers and took stock of the situation.
I have 29 t-shirts, 3 polo shirts, 1 rugby shirt, 1 GAA shirt, 4 long-sleeve shirts, and 5 hoodies.
Of the 29 t-shirts, no less than fifteen, more than half, are no longer permitted where I work. That means I can't wear the shirt that says where I went to college (University College Dublin), or any of the shirts I've picked up on my travels: the one from Longboards Surf Shop in Puerto Rico, the one bearing a nice embroidered image of the Statue of Liberty in NYC, the one I got at a bachelor party at Ike's Korner Grille in Spartanburg, SC, the one from Belfast, Maine - which usually works as a conversation starter and couldn't possibly offend anyone! - and many more. I can't wear any of the shirts I've been given as gifts: 2 shirts my aunt gave me that mention Hawaii and the USA Olympic team from the 1996 Olympics which took place in her state, or the one Brittany's friend Tom gave me advertising his tree service in Mount Desert, Maine. I think my US Marine Corps and Coast Guard shirts probably break the political and place name rules, and I'm afraid to wear my John Deere shirt because Massey Ferguson is a popular tractor brand here and I wouldn't want to offend any farmers up from the country to work in the big smoke. I could probably get away with wearing my Campus House shirt because that phrase is the sort of nonsense you read on clothes these days, but it is an actual place - a Christian worship centre in Indiana (running the risk of offending any non-Christians in work if that ever gets out!).
The rugby and GAA shirts are out, but I knew that anyway.
Of the 3 polo shirts two are banned: one refers to my county GAA team - Antrim, the other advertises the tree service again (I'm like a walking commercial for that company!).
Of the longsleeve shirts at least two are gone: one is for the USMC (political as well as geographical) and the other is the original South Carolina shirt that started this sartorial book burning. A third proclaims my love of Beer Chiang from Thailand, but as it's in Thai I might get away with it.
All of my hoodies are prohibited for they are variously branded Spartanburg, the US, Purdue, Canada, and Guam.
I can understand the rules regarding sports tops, political tops, and even FCUK, but I can't for the life of me figure out the problem of clothing that has the name of a place on it. And from the sounds of conversations overheard around the proverbial watercooler, neither can any of my coworkers. Perhaps it's time to join a Union... 1月19日 No Country For Old MenTHAT is no country for old men. The young
In one another's arms, birds in the trees - Those dying generations - at their song, The salmon-falls, the mackerel-crowded seas, Fish, flesh, or fowl, commend all summer long Whatever is begotten, born, and dies. Caught in that sensual music all neglect Monuments of unageing intellect. An aged man is but a paltry thing, A tattered coat upon a stick, unless Soul clap its hands and sing, and louder sing For every tatter in its mortal dress, Nor is there singing school but studying Monuments of its own magnificence; And therefore I have sailed the seas and come To the holy city of Byzantium. O sages standing in God's holy fire As in the gold mosaic of a wall, Come from the holy fire, perne in a gyre, And be the singing-masters of my soul. Consume my heart away; sick with desire And fastened to a dying animal It knows not what it is; and gather me Into the artifice of eternity. Once out of nature I shall never take My bodily form from any natural thing, But such a form as Grecian goldsmiths make Of hammered gold and gold enamelling To keep a drowsy Emperor awake; Or set upon a golden bough to sing To lords and ladies of Byzantium Of what is past, or passing, or to come.
W.B. Yeats Sailing To Byzantium 1月16日 Feast One Hundred & Seventy FiveAppetizer Conor. One 'n' please. I already have two names, i.e. my name in English and Irish, which is complicated enough, especially when you're trying to cross borders, buy plane tickets, and prove you haven't been engaged in tax evasion for many years! I did go through brief periods in my childhood when I wanted to be called such classic monikers as Axel Foley, Templeton "Faceman" Peck, Michael Knight, Marty McFly, Mitch Buchanan, and Nico Toscani, names that will allow you to follow whatever TV show or movie I was obsessed with at the time. I realise there are two David Hasselhoff characters in there, which could be worrying, but it would be worse if I'd plumped for Steven Seagal's alter-ego Gino Fellino from 1991's Out For Justice instead of the slightly more plausible Nico Toscani from his debut Above The Law. Soup I honestly can't imagine being a fashion designer, but I do like the color green, regular jeans like the ones that were widely available when I was a kid, and cashmere scarves. Salad Does shaving count?, because it sucks. I wish I could simply wish myself clean-shaven, and it would happen. I find it a pain having to pay extra-special attention to my face in the shower pre-shave, then massaging in the gel, then actually shaving - trying to get close enough without cutting yourself is not easy - then the feeling of moisturiser as it dries on your skin (Yes, I moisturise, big whoop wanna fight about it?!) Main Course I don't like walking into a bathroom and seeing the shower curtain closed, because when I was a kid I saw a movie about a knief-wielding maniac who lurked behind people's shower curtains until they'd come, unsuspecting, into their bathroom (surely the room in the house where you're at your most vulnerable?) before jumping out and slicing them to pieces. Dessert A cinnamon-scented candle on the fireplace A bottle of Sam Adam's Winter Ale on the bookshelf. Have I Got News For You on the TV. FillerI'd really like to write about some of the stuff I come across in the course of my duties in the Dead Letter Office, but as I'm bound by the Official Secrets' Act until a year after I terminate my employment, I'll not get around to that until next March, by which time I should hope to have something more interesting to write about! And, I don't want to simply post a Friday's Feast directly after another Friday's Feast, so instead I'm going to upload two videos of songs I heard and liked on MTV Dance in the wee hours of this morning. Now that's a sentence I'd never thought I'd write.
1月10日 A feast of cornucopian proportionsFeast One Hundred & Seventy FourAppetizer
|
|
|
