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Reading etc.

Arts etc.

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Posted in: Reading etc.

I went to see Prima Facie in the Gaiety with Jodie Comer. I was not Jodie Comer conscious before this but that was a quite extraordinary one-woman show. I think it was honestly the most impressive acting I have ever seen in my life. Difficult themes though – sexual assault and how it is treated in the courts.

I saw Eureka Day in the Gate. Philippa Dunne who plays Anne in Motherland was in it. She was good and somehow like her character in Motherland and also not. It’s set in a very right on school community in California and that provides some laughs. It was not entirely a comedy but enjoyable overall.

A colleague recommended Chengdu hotpot restaurant in Capel Street as a dining experience and I was curious. Mr. Waffle, middle child and I went along to investigate. The food was delicious but I thought I would like cooking my own food but definitely not. Also the table was like a crime scene by the time we had finished. Middle child said that we were the least adept people with chopsticks on the planet. Possibly true.

Mr. Waffle and I went to Newbridge House where we used to go a lot when the kids were small. The house tour is entertaining. The outdoor attractions were slightly waterlogged. I felt very sorry for these llamas.

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I offer you Mr. Waffle’s witticism by way of caption, “Alpaca raincoat next time”. Mr. Waffle also dug out this picture from our time in Argentina of where the llamas should be enjoying themselves.

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We saw Twinless in the cinema. It’s about the death of a twin. It’s supposed to be funnyish but it was a bit excruciating. Interesting in places and also funny in places but I wouldn’t totally recommend. My enjoyment was not helped by forgetting my glasses. Even though we were in row 2 and the director favoured an in-your-face kind of shot, I can’t say everything was as clear as I would have liked. And then a very smelly man sat in front of me. The blind, malodorous viewing experience may have affected my overall rating here.

Mr. Waffle booked us tickets to see Fair Deal in the Peacock. We went on a Monday. As we cycled in dolefully, I think we were both wondering why on earth we were going to this on a Monday of all days. I had understood it was about the fair deal nursing home scheme (you don’t need to know) and posed complex moral questions. It was, at a headline level, about the scheme but no complex moral questions were posed. It was a farce, it was hilarious and I loved it. So did all the pensioners in the audience (Monday night appears to be pensioners’ night in the theatre; we had a significant impact on the age and gender balance in the theatre). If you’ve watched the Walsh Sisters, the actress who plays Rachel in it is a woman called Caroline Menton; she’s in this too. And very good she is too as are the two other main actors (there’s a fourth actor who only has a bit part who’s a bit weaker). Highly recommended.

We’ve started watching How to get to Heaven from Belfast on Netflix. It’s been the subject of mixed reviews but I’m really enjoying it. There was a Slate podcast on it and because I’m watching it, I thought I’d have a listen. The American host referred to the actresses Sinéad Keenan (Shinaid) and Caoilfhionn Dunne (Keelan) and pronounced their names perfectly. I was pretty impressed, in fairness to him. But then he mentioned Roisin Gallagher (Rosheen Gallaher – the g is silent, I promise you, never mind what you know about Oasis) and called her Roy Sin Galla Ger. Two out of three ain’t bad, I guess. It’s funny though because in the show Roisin Gallagher’s character is called Saoirse (pronunciation varies but Seersha would be pretty common) and there’s a joke where an English woman addresses her as Srshly and the character says, “Really, Srshly?”

Last night Mr Waffle and I went to a supper club in a big house in north county Dublin. It felt slightly like a work dinner – nice food, beautiful setting, beautifully laid table with a centrepiece involving, inter alia, two taxidermied pheasants, but a lot of mingling and chatting to strangers. If we went again, we’d bring some friends. But overall an interesting and broadly positive experience.

And finally today, I saw these bronze heads that are installed on Grand Canal Quay. You really have to see them to appreciate them but I thought they were fantastic. Strongly recommended.

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Posted in: Princess, Reading etc.

I listen to a podcast called “As the Season Turns” which I enjoy in a mild way. It comes out on the first of every month and talks about what will happen over the month (nature wise not events). It’s sponsored by Ffern perfume and as I listened over the years I became more and more curious and eventually signed myself up to the “Ffern ledger” (I am alarmingly susceptible to advertising). I had to wait to get on the ledger, mind. Notions: queuing to buy something. But I did get on and eventually I was able to get my own barrel aged, small batch, whatever you’re having yourself, perfume made in Somerset. It comes with various small items and, unboxing, as I believe the expression is, is a joy. There’s also a short film every quarter. I don’t how much they pay the likes of Ruth Wilson and Bill Nighy for the slightly twee English material but there must be money in flogging stuff to me and my ilk.

I quite like the perfumes (they come quarterly on the 21st of the month) but to me they are heavy very adult scents like my mother used to wear. The first time I wore one, Herself said, “Is that your Ffern perfume – it smells very young!”. I guess everything is cyclical (insert your own joke here about the turning of the seasons).

Be Thou My Vision


Posted in: Reading etc.

This blog is turning into “Analysis of Hymns Old and New”. Thank you for your support in these trying times.

We had “Be Thou My Vision” at Mass on Sunday. I was belting it out without aid from the hymnal but I found that these lines:

Thou my great Father, and I Thy true son/
Thou in me dwelling and I with Thee one

Had been changed to these:

Thou my great father and I thy true heir/thou in me dwelling and I in thy care

On balance I approve the change but I found it slightly disconcerting on the day.

*Updated to add: Mr Waffle has pointed out to me that heir is not necessarily a gender neutral term. I’m just baffled.

Supporting the Arts


Posted in: Family, Mr. Waffle, Reading etc., Twins, Youngest Child

Our beloved youngest child was in two plays back to back in college last term. With terrifying frankness he told us not to bother with the first one as it wasn’t any good. But we dutifully went along to the second; say what you like about the beloved youngest child but he loves an audience and speaks loudly and clearly which are enough to make you the star of a college production. Inspired by this, he has decided that next year he might direct and star in a production of “John Bull’s Other Island” by Shaw which is out of copyright. He has decided to adapt the great man’s work for a modern audience and has been sequestered in his room for several days on this work but I think we’re nearly there. He has time.

In other student production news we went to see my niece’s school musical where she was the star. She has actually been in real films with famous people that had a cinematic release but I think it’s fair to say she has never been more excited to be in a production than this one. She was fantastic.

Mr. Waffle and I went to see Marty Supreme. Normally we go to the cinema on Mondays and have it to ourselves but we were home alone and decided to scamper out on a Thursday. On Mondays when the cinema is largely empty I lament the decline of cinema as a medium; on Thursday it was a full house. On the one hand, do I want my local cinema to close down? I do not. Does it need punters to remain open? Yes, yes it does. However, it was all very annoying, people were talking, checking phones, in and out to purchase popcorn; I think we’ll be sticking to Mondays. “The film?” you ask. It was alright, a bit long. I only went because I heard it was funny. Not hilarious now. Raised a smile occasionally. It’s the story of a table tennis champion/hustler set in America in the early 50s. The caper like nature of the plot reminded me a bit of Anora and the aesthetic was a bit Wes Anderson.

Last but not least we went to Collins Barracks over the weekend to see an exhibition on modern Ireland. Very right on and a lot of focus on the North (there was a lot of Dublin and NI and a certain amount of we lived in a repressive theocracy- was Ireland perfect? Nope. Were we operating under the ayatollahs? You might have thought so). Nevertheless I found it enjoyable. The only actual Cork thing I found (aside from a bit about lace making in Youghal, grand, I suppose) was this poster.

I very much enjoyed the “ over 6,000 in Cork alone”; they know how to appeal to the Cork punter.

I also liked this crisp related poster. As regular readers will know the island of Ireland is divided by two unrelated crisp providers with the same name. See below Mr Tayto, North (right) and South edition.

A classic poster.

I was less familiar with this one.

This open letter below is worth a read in its entirety. But here are some standout lines:

Here in Ireland there are on sale certain magazines which advocate pre-marital intimacy and which set forth chastity as an outmoded convention. Such magazines have been brought to our notice. We have actually seen them.

It’s the “We have actually seen them” that I particularly enjoy.

Also:

Many of these publications are on PUBLIC SALE. It is not always a matter of surreptitious, under-the-counter trading.

And furthermore:

IN view of these genuinely alarming facts, one may ask: Isn’t there a literary censorship operating in this country?

An explanation follows leading to the conclusion that “In practice, therefore, a considerable volume of printed material remains completely uncensored.” So now so.

It finishes on a very stern note:

Finally, it need hardly be stressed that those who, knowingly and deliberately, expose for sale such evil printed matter are guilty of mortal sin-the sin of corrupting innocence, of pandering to passion, of directing souls to Hell.

Here are some slippers Michael Collins wore; whether just once when he stayed over in someone’s house or for a prolonged period is unclear.

Pro-Home Rule mug and anti-Home salt cellar. Eggcellent.

The Gladstone chamber pot: a tasteful addition to any anti-Home Rule household. I was sorry not to see any products marked “Home Rule is Rome Rule” but you can’t have everything, I suppose.

Elsewhere in the museum, I was taken with this cartoon.

The perennial question: How Ya Gonna Keep ’em Down on the Farm (After They’ve Seen Paree)?

I went to see the annual Turner exhibition in the National Gallery as well. A mild January treat.

How are your own cultural outings going?

Projecting an Image


Posted in: Dublin, Ireland, Reading etc.

In the Irish National Gallery there’s a portrait of Joseph Leeson, later first Earl of Miltown, bigwig, painted by Pompeo Battoni who seems to have made a great living from painting grand tourists. Looks good, if a little portly, right?

In the same room, the authorities have chosen to hang a picture which is a parody of Raphael’s school of Athens by Joshua Reynolds. It was commissioned by Joseph Leeson’s nephew. It features the great and the good including Joseph Leeson, later first Earl of Milltown, bigwig. I am unclear how he felt about it but he is entirely recognisable and it somehow undercuts the adjacent formal portrait.

Truly, image management is a tricky issue.

Random Thoughts from the Aged


Posted in: Cork, Family, Ireland, Reading etc.

My father used to call those grey trousers he wore with a blazer his flannel bags. Does anybody say flannel bags anymore? I tried my children and they looked baffled.

When leaving the dinner table, the expression, “May I be excused?” was widespread in my youth. Has this too gone the way of the dodo?

At mass this morning, they said that the exit hymn is “God’s Spirit is in my Heart”. “What on earth is that?” I thought but once they started singing I found I knew all the words. I was sure, sure, sure that I hadn’t heard it since I was a teenager but the internet seems pretty firm that it first came out in 2002. I am baffled but maybe I did learn new hymns in my 30s? This seems very unlikely but who can say? Then Margaret Atwood was on Desert Island discs and she picked Beethoven’s pastoral symphony as one of her 8 discs. “Ho hum,” I thought, “I wonder what that is?” Yet another musical number Mrs. O’Shea taught the school choir, that’s what, though we learnt it with the following words which I feel Beethoven wouldn’t have approved of: Now winter is passing and soon it will be spring/with daffodils and tulips and birdies on the wing. I also recently heard for the first time in about 40 years “In an English Country Garden” – yet another number Mrs. O’Shea brought into our lives. It’s funny how these songs one learnt as a child can be really evocative.

I’ve been looking at slides from my childhood and although it is a pain to set everything up the images are so much better than the faded brown snaps from photo albums and I now respect my father’s commitment to slides though I was dubious for many years. When I see myself I recognise every single thing I am wearing and I know what feelings it evoked in me, what I loved, what I hated. I am fascinated by this as I am not very interested in clothes now. I wonder what happened to that youthful clothes lover.

I had lunch yesterday with my oldest friend, our parents were friends and as she is a year older than me (something she used to enjoy pointing out to me when we were little, but now, ah, how the tables have turned), I have known her since I was born. Anyway over Christmas she went to a 40th school reunion. “40, 40 years!” I screeched in horror. “That’ll be you this year,” she pointed out tartly. I am shocked. How did that happen? But also, perhaps it’s not as big a surprise as all that.