Sean's Space

Saturday 6 November 2010.

Up 07.40. Ate 9 or 10 slices of buttered baguette and drank a mug of tea. Made bed; washed; dressed the same as yesterday except that I put on heavy boots. Reached Carrickdale around 09.30 and walked under the road in to the lobby of the hotel for a piss. Deirdre Lewis ensconced there drinking tea and nibbling toast with 8 or 9 others. I went back under the road to join Dessie and Dermot in the car-park on the other side. Sloped off to the toilet in the building beside the car-park. Tables laid for a wedding reception. Anyway 2 Blue Anchor buses pulled up around 10.00. I got on the white one directed by Aude Laffon and driven by Tom Roddy. Visited Roche Castle where I pissed on the way in and again on the way out. We also visited a court cairn and a stone-age burial place – somewhere short of Dungooley cross-roads. I lunched independently in Navan Fort exhibition centre. Chips, carrots, 2 sausages, a bottle of Coke, “15” a sweet desert tart covered in coconut. Got the bill off the manager and paid £4.30 with my MBNA card in reception. The others ate soup and sandwiches followed by tea. It cost them over £5 each. Dessie still complaining tomorrow about the fare. Walked up to Eamhain Mhacha. Saw the goal posts on The Polo Grounds. Sat through a bombastic film about Macha and Cuchulainn. Encounter at the gate with a spear-carrying iron age man and woman. Sat for nearly half an hour in the iron age house with a fire lit in the middle of the floor. We were ferried back directly to Carrickdale. “Snazzy car!” Deirdre Lewis remarked when I rolled down the window of my white 2010 Toyota iQ and stopped to ask her how to get out of the car-park. There were two “pads” you had to cross. Fire still lit. Sliced two cold microwaved Roosters into a pot of beef stew and brought it to the boil. Consumed a bowl. Peeled and ate a Valencia South African orange. Tart and juicy. Was there a little decay near the top of the fruit? Put €4 in the yellow envelope “for the priest” (weekly contribution) and €10 in the navy envelope “priests’ dues.” Drove over. Fr. Tom McNulty.

1. Father We Adore You
2. All That I Am
3. Walk in The Light of God
4. Bind Us Together, Lord

Fans back on. Choir good in unfamiliar territory. I was unsure so I sang quietly. Gave some coins to Sheila Reynolds’ collection for SVdeP at the front door. “I suppose I should be at the gate?” she commented with a little laugh. Phil Sutherland told me after mass that Thursday evening mass is being discontinued. Rose McEneaney rang me before mass and I sent her the links to my photos on SkyDrive and also on Photobucket. She is doing some work on the parish yearbook and wants photos she told me. Before bed-time I noticed an e-mail from her with a favourable comment on the photos on both of my sites (which indicated clearly that she had been able to open both sites). I was chuffed and reassured by that and replied with thanks. Ate corn flakes, sliced banana, milk; after mass. Drank a mug of coffee. Tom Roddy leaned over the back of my seat and spoke to me after mass about the trip earlier today. Maybe I thoughtlessly raised my voice too much. Anyway I noticed in paranoid fashion that Fr. McNulty looked disapprovingly at me as he left the church. I had greeted him with a handshake and a few words about his late brothers, Gerry and Eamonn, on his way in. Ireland made a good attempt at a revival against South Africa finishing only 2 points behind. O’Gara struck a post with a conversion near the end and it bounced back. I think Kearney scored the final try for Ireland and received an injury at the same time. “I think Seán Óg is not that well!” Rosanna asserted. When I pressed her she pin-pointed “stress” and commented on Óg’s fidgety body language. Aisling in Inverin, Dorie told me on the phone. Eamonn in Cootehall (Rosanna rang him at 22.45). “You look well for a woman that is 3 000 years old!” Dessie remarked at Navan Fort. I took doubles out of the bin as an alternative to getting coal out of the bunker. Stoked the fire. Cold today; but a colder night expected. John Cunningham and Finbar Oakley pulled out of our line. Paul Smyth pulled in. Finbar pulled back in tomorrow morning. 22.50 (note in my reporter’s notebook where I detailed the day’s events). I washed and flossed my 5 ½ remaining teeth and brushed my dentures before I went to bed. I did not carry out any floor exercises today at all.