Oh, come take my hand

This is, without doubt, the most lucid of dreams. Here I crouch typing, having done with many of the morning's banalities, folded, shopped, tidied and all with an almost unbelievable whiff of reality. Sure, a sky bluer than I've seen it for many a day and the vaguely off-putting beauty of everyone that I have encountered since half-past ten point to the illusionary nature of what appears before me, but in almost every other aspect the day seems just like any other. And yet it cannot be. Momentarily I will awake, drenched in pre-performance sweat, nauseated by the instant revelation that was has gone before is naught but the workings of my sleeping, shiny happy people addled brain.

Two years and five attempts later, my having passed my driving test can only be a dream.

Clouds that pierce the illusion that tomorrow would be as yesterday

Common Law has just walked out the door, using that hoary old "work" excuse, leaving me with Data, Riker and two of Riker's friends. How the good fuck did this come about? It's a Girl Guide, having a car, being a good neighbour thing and may well become a regular event. Four children and me at the dinner table. The noise, oh mother of fuck, the noise. One of them, known to regular readers as Olivia who says "crap" all the time, is perhaps the loudest person ever in the history of the world. Every word is a shout, whenever it is not a shriek. There is no statement, question or imperative that is unworthy of a hollered "Oh my God!" preface. And the other three, newly grown up Data in particular, feel the need to compete enthusiastically yet unsuccessfully, with this tornado of tone. Two more hours before I can drop them off and go to work. They finish and drift to another room, Olivia's dinner untouched as she is "allergic to potatoes", as well as, one assumes, chicken, spinach, cannellini beans and cherry tomatoes. I crank up the Rodriguez as I clear the table, but to no avail. Every exclamation drills through my frontal lobe, the usual comfort of hot water plate rinsing easing my tension not a jot. Worst of all though is the realisation that this is just the beginning, cut to one, two, three, four five years from now, and there's two sets of friends and they're louder and brasher and even more in my fucking face.

I believe I may have some kind of nervous condition. Most likely a touch of the vapours.

Such a cost

I had my heart broken when I was a child, multiple times, in quick succession. So I thought, fuck this, and decided not to do that any more. I cry when I'm bad, I cry out of anger, I cry at weddings. People don't make me cry any more. I just turn that shit off.

So it's hard to know how adults deal with these dealings. Lost love. Love lost. It's hard to know what they need from me at these times. These loved ones, these cherished ones. Because all I ever have to offer is rage. Data falls over on the way home. I feel rage. I snuggle her and try to make her laugh but all that I feel is rage. Rage at myself because I wasn't close enough to make the catch. Rage at the ground for daring to strike my daughter. Rage, most of all, at my endless impotency in the face of this world. But I know what Data needs. She needs the stuff that I'm giving, the hugging, the hilarity. I don't know what grown-ups need.

Perhaps, like me, they just need Snickereses.

I never thought that I would find myself in bed amongst the stones

I've had a little work done. Kept the hair though.

Day is done, gone the sun

Riker has started Girl Guides. I'm not sure how I feel about this. Except that I do. I feel uneasy. Very, very uneasy. She got her Guide book yesterday and contained within is just a little bit too much of that God shit of which I am so not a fan. I fear that what with this and all the compulsory gobbledegook that they're feeding her in school we may soon have a full fledged Christian on our hands. I wrote n/a under "religion" in the form we had to fill out but I bet that won't stop them.

"Tie the knot, Riker, but tie it with Jesus' love."

"Help the old lady cross the street, but don't worry if you fuck it up and she gets pulverised by an oncoming truck as she will be with the angels all the sooner."

"Light the camp fire, Riker, and let it burn the heresy in your soul. And then let it burn all the heretics, starting with your father."

But enough about Riker. Let's talk about me.When I lived in Britland as a child there were no normal Scout troops in my area. and so I was enlisted in the Boys Brigade. Essentially Hitler Youth for the Orange Order. I have no memory of attending meetings but I do retain a strong mental image of the uniform, sash and all. There I stand in the mirror, fat, bespectacled and ready to slay the filthy Micks. Given my outrageous Irish accent and clearly shouldered burden of Catholic guilt one has to wonder why I was even permitted to enter the Parish Hall. And when one wonders, one must inevitably come to the conclusion that they saw fit to use me as the supreme leader of a fifth column, sent back to Ireland as a sleeper agent, to be awakened by a haunting melody in the fashion of the Final Five so that I might bomb the fuck out of Dublin's city centre before going down in a hail of FCA bullets. It's coming folks. And soon. The only question remaining is what tune will set me off?

I'm guessing something from the new Chris de Burgh album, but I'm open to suggestions.

Words don't come easily

I both like and respect my next door neighbours. I do. Krauts to the left of me, woman and children to the right. I especially respect, and indeed like the woman to the right, who, in the face of disproportionately intense, albeit accidental hostility on my part has returned this hostility in a much more measured, though still pretty fucking hostile, fashion. I have taken down the offending, offensive posts and I look forward to us continuing our mutual pretending this all never happened and just getting on with it relationship. Maybe we could progress from an aggressive backwards nod to our erstwhile amiable hello, though? For the kids? No pressure, like. I am without doubt more sinning that sinned against.

Wow. I was just going to bang out another snarky segment about the other next door neighbours, specifically their trumpet playing of Christmas songs at 10pm on an early October evening son and all that came out instead. Oh well. This way I finally get to use a Gately sung lyric as a title.

Outside a glittering building of glittering glass and burning light

In the window of the local pharmacy.

Where to start? With the saddle? Well okay then. Sexy, huh? And a mere €25 in the tiny bike shop in Duras. It was the last one though, so your hastily formed plans of a flight to Bordeaux and a three hour cycle to that shuddering memory-filled castle town are all for naught.

And now. Whiskey. Tango. Foxtrot.

Let us glide gracefully by the sickening deconstruction of the word "vanity" and concentrate on the sentiment. Isn't vanity a bad thing? Aren't vain people cunts? You can rhetoric the fuck out of those questions, folks, because it is and they are. I speak with knowledge. Narcissus ain't got shit on me. If I didn't have so much other dreary dross to do, I would happily spend my days gazing at my stunning visage as self-snapped on my phone, over and over again. And I am bad, I am a cunt, the mitigating circumstances of my intense beauty notwithstanding.

"Organic". Really? You fuckers are trying to make us believe that the colouring of ones skin to a fluorescent shade of Ulster says no is a natural act, perfectly in tune with the concept of Gaia? If it's organic, sure we can spray it in our eyes! My eyes have always lacked a decent tan, try as I might to stare down the sun.

"Make up by Smashbox." Apparently this is a well known brand of cosmetics. Well, fine. But it sounds to me very much like the makeover master intends to lay hands upon a hefty sledgehammer, dab it lightly with foundation and then repeatedly slam said hammer into the lucky débutante's face. Sure, you're choking on cheekbone fragments and the blood is making it difficult to see, but you're nose is a lot smaller and golly but that's the perfect shade for your skin tone.

"False Eyelashes From €15". The "from" is somewhat suspicious, is it not? Are we talking €15 per eye? Per lash? Just how big are these glued on spiders anyway? Were I to be feeling creative might I have them applied to somewhere apart from my eyes? I'm thinking nostrils. There's a beauty trend to be started there, folks. If teenage girls can be convinced of the desirability of a skeletal frame and Uggs, then a bushy nasal hair trend must surely be imminent.

And so to the teeth. What would an eighteen year old have had to be doing with his or her life to be in need of laser whitening? Eschewing brushing? Avoiding all sources of calcium? Chewing baccy? The endless cud churning of gum just wasn't hitting the spot any more? I have no idea what this procedure involves, but I'm confidently guessing that it's intrusive, ineffective and ultimately bad for teeth. I will hear no scientific facts on this point.

In conclusion. What are we? Who has this kind of money to fuck away on such filth? How is this acceptable? By shelling out on all these servitudinal services for one's daughter one is effectively saying "My darling, your skin is the wrong colour, your plain face needs pimping, your lashes are like nasal hairs and Jesus Christ, but the state of your fucking teeth. You ugly, ugly loser bitch." We're all saying it, to all those young women. And by not putting a brick through that window I'm saying it too. You ugly, ugly loser bitches.