You know you're really Irish when...

[Gossipyfishwife]

...you tell the barman to put the change in the poor box.

Zig and Zag and Dustin! Required student viewing. What was his 'ballyer song? My friend snogged Zag in Lillie's one night. We were scarlet for her

Ray even announced the cancellation of my friend's 21st due to snow one day. "Now, we never do this, so don't be calling in again!"

^may have been Renard's either!

Fortycoats made guest appearances on WanderlyWagon, then went on to have his own show with Slighly Bonkers and a mime artist (name???).

Our school trips were a two mile walk to St Patrick's Well, paddling in the perishing water, and walking home again.

How come no one has mentioned being chosen (forced) to do the reading at Mass, with "expression", and looking really holy?

My mother's reaction to any enquiry about how I looked, was always "sure, who'll be looking at ya". Kinda lost its impact when she muttered it when I showed her my wedding shoes!

At said wedding, when forced to pose for the photos, she declared that she'd rather "be facing a firing squad".

Whatever it is it is not cheese. I think it can be moulded into balls and bounced.

PaulaPantsDown -- Carlow, Westmeath, Leitrim, Louth, Cavan, Monaghan and Offaly are counties nobody can place. Maybe Roscommon too. And Monaghan.

I remember going on one particular junior school trip (I went to a convent) to some spot in Kildare on the Grand Canal. We floated on a barge for a bit, looking over the side at all the fridges and rubbish, and then had a plate of sausages and soggy chips in a very plain and not very clean restaurant near the locks. Memorable for all the wrong reasons. In first year in secondary (community school) we went to Holyhead on the ferry, looked at Holyhead (which is nothing to look at), shopped at Woolworths, and then went back to Dun Laoghaire. Some of the year spent the return trip in the brig for unruly behaviour involving smuggled bottles of vodka and that was our last trip until sixth year.

45 here too, or the 84, a rare breed.

Yep mathanxiety I'm a bit vague on all of the middle and know it only as somewhere you pass through to get the west or the north. In fact Cavan is probably I could place, only from years of trekking to Fermanagh from Dublin as a child.

Gossipyfishwife, you've spawned a thousand copy cat threads

I rang my mother for a chat yesterday as this thread was making me homesick and no word of a lie, the first ten minutes were spent telling me who had died. "You do know her, the big house with the avenue on the way into town!" And then threw in another few randoms followed with "February is a desperate month for it. January too"

Brilliant Whodat

Did she do the full lead in?

"You know John McCarthy's father's SIL"
No.
"Ah you do, you know, with the hair"
No Mam I don't
"Ya do of course. Her son has the bakery in Patrick street"

No Mam, I really don't.

"Ah listen, you were in school with her grand niece. Her father had lived on that bad bend."

Oh yeah I do, I remember now. What about her?

"She's dead."

My mum is a member of a retirement group that has a lovely time partying and going to the races, etc. They do lawn bowling and lots of competitive baking and comparison of ailments, and gossiping about each other's atrocious driving, deafness, dotheryness, and general signs of getting old. There is a committee position for the sending of cards, keeping track of birthdays and golden wedding anniversaries and that sort of thing. Naturally this has been my mum's job for many years now, so I get the low down on whose name is getting crossed off the list and whether it was sudden or long expected.

I did get the full lead in encylogirl with every protestation I hadn't a clue who she meant swiftly rebutted. "Never married", "Lovely family" "Family had a shop" "Her cousin was in bookclub"

math that there is a full time job for your mammy right enough.

In another only in Ireland, was listening to Joe Duffy over t'internet (fancy!) and up pops legendary country stroke showband singer Big Tom as he's the favorite singer of some poor housebound biddy. "Howay're doing Tom?" says himself. "Not great, not great. Going through a bad patch at the minute right enough". Thanks for cheering her up there Tom

On a lighter note we used to have these ridiculous "arguments" on the last day where various relatives would give us money. We'd go back and forth trying to refuse but always came back with some money.

Ah that brought tears to my eyes.
Without fail my Galway Grandma would give us £20 each. God I miss her.
On a lighter note, my Dad's embarrassed to this day, that she gave us so much!

We always end of leaving with the petrol money, a sack of potatoes, multipacks of tayto and a packed lunch for the ferry. Love it.

Ah I forgot about the sack of potatoes

Oh and the Galtee cheese

I loved it back then, mind.

This thread made me go and bake buy some soda bread. Not as nice as me Ma's though

For peace sake, I always thought it was Pete's sake scarleeee or scarlet for anyone outside the Liberties. Maths I pissed myself at looking at the fridges from the barge, there was a bit of a water theme going on for your tours.

Big Tom -- that man has a face only a mammy could love.

Definitely a water theme. I think the idea was to corral us and prevent running off. Though we once went to some place in Cavan and wandered in some woods. Then we had a picnic lunch on the wet grass -- we had to bring our own lunches. We had to wear our school uniforms on all primary school trips but about half of us managed to get lost on that one.

math whenever I say I'm from Westmeath I always get faces, mainly assuming it's a town or something.

I would ask my ma 'what's for dinner?' and she'd say:

'A kick up the arse!'

She would also describe someone she didn't like as 'standing round like a feckin' gom.' Or 'a big feckin eejit.' Or 'he looks like a thick' (pronounced 'tick')

When I was 'bold' my ma threatened to sell me to the tinkers!

'Jesus Mary and Joseph!'

'God love her!'

Ach! I'm so feckin hongrey I could eat a baby's arse through the bars of a cot.

Finish your plate.

Brilliant frizz.

I love this thread

Happy Paddy's Day. May your parade be full of lorries pulling trailers of Irish-dancing children. May your lemonade be red xx

VanGogh my da used to say: 'I'm so hungry I could eat a nun's arse through the bars of a convent gate!'

My granda:

'Ah sure drink is a terrible terrible ting. Sure it makes y's shoot yer landlord. (pause) And it makes y's MISS yer landlord!'

This needs to go in Classics!