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Siblings

Rough?


Posted in: Dublin, Siblings

My brother tackled me last weekend about where we live. He has concerns that my children will end up wearing track suits all day every day and on remand in the district court. We had a robust discussion on the influence of parents versus that of peers, the nature of the local peers in what I would call a mixed area and whether it was fair to visit your social notions on your children which ended with one of us flouncing out of the room and banging the door. Isn’t it great the way when you are at your parents’ house you can revert to behaviour that was last given an airing in your teens?

Still, it all gave me pause for further thought. Our parish newsletter this week led with “The Gospel to the Gangland” which didn’t help. Then I went to a local park where F often takes the children. There were a bunch of Slovakian children there who seemed to know mine well. They were nice children and my boys were clearly delighted to see them. They were accompanied by a pleasant man (you know, not let out on their own running wild or anything) but I couldn’t help noticing that he had a tattoo on his neck. Did I not read somewhere that this is an invariable sign of gang membership? Or is it just a sign of a fondness for pain? In short, I feel that I am in territory where my mother never had to venture.

Torturing my brother


Posted in: Siblings

Me: You are the most argumentative person I know.
Him: I am not.
Me: Pregnant pause.

Instructions for a virtuous sister


Posted in: Family, Ireland, Siblings

Firstly, we left her kit:

kit

Then we gave her instructions:

Friday 18

Come to the house for 6.30, if you are running late, call babyminder.

You may wish to call Domino’s or dine from the richness of the fridge. DVDs under the telly.

Try to get the boys to bed about 8. They need to go to the toilet and wash their teeth before bed. They also normally get a story. Suggest you neutralise M with a book from ENVELOPE. Boys will likely reappear. Resign yourself to ensconcing them in your own bed. They will eventually fall asleep. Do not hesitate to move them – once they are asleep, they’re asleep. They may wake up wet in the middle of the night but it’s not very likely. They are likely to be wet in the morning. You will be very lucky, if you do not have to strip a bed while we are gone. Spare sheets in the hot press – you will need a waterproof one and a flannel one. The boys’ pyjamas are in the bottom drawer in their room.

M same routine (apart from bedwetting) but she will probably be happy to read to herself once safely in bed. You can let her read herself but try to get her light off by 9.30.

Collapse.

Saturday 19

Morning

You have four options:
(a) Go to GAA
(b) Go to library
(c) Go to park
(d) Something else

Options (a) to (c) are described below.

(a) If you decide to go to the GAA (car key in ENVELOPE), it starts at 9.30 and the drive is about 10 mins so you will need to set off at 9.20. Bring their hurleys which are in the round plastic white container in the shed that doesn’t have the washing machine, some water (flasks in kitchen) – should they be thirsty, and some sustaining liga – should they be unhappy. The boys’ kit should be in the drawers in their room (socks top drawer, t-shirts below and shorts third drawer). Michael is Lions and Daniel Barcelona. M can wear her tracksuit which is on top of her clothes on the wardrobe and boasts a picture of Ben 10. Everyone’s runners should be in the hall.

The boys will be playing on the grass pitch near the road and M on the all-weather pitch near the club house. If you do go, call M’s friend’s mother H. I primed her that you might be coming (she is about my age with brown hair in a bob – v. nice). Drop M with her and proceed with the boys to their pitch – you will need to put on helmets – it’s straightforward. If I were you, I would beg the trainer to make sure that, in the football match, they both get to run with the ball, otherwise they will howl. It should be over about 11 – they will all be given lollipops and the like after.

(b) If you don’t go to the GAA (and who could blame you), you might like to try the library. Library cards in the ENVELOPE – library books to be returned on the hall table. Again a driving adventure. One is nearby and small. You turn left down an alleyway immediately beside it and come out in a small on-street car park. When leaving you have to take your life in your hands and go back up the same small alleyway. They like to run up and down the ramp outside the library and I let them. V. important this library closes for lunch (1-2). Bigger library is a little further away. I have never been but parking is free and I understand it’s bigger and better. In my experience, bigger is not always better.

(c) Park: the closest is a tiny bit too far to walk so we would usually drive. However, the park is just grass so you might prefer to go to the other park which has a good playground. There is ample parking and the playground has lots to amuse the kids. Even better, there is only one exit so you can sit on a bench beside it and let the children play. Beside the playground, there is a cafe (though it’s a bit slow).

Lunchtime

The kids may eat tomato soup (in Knorr packet) and (if you’re lucky) sandwiches – cheese for Michael, ham for the others.

Party: The party is at 2.30. Presents will be wrapped and up on the bookshelf – invitation in the envelope. House is about 10/15 mins drive from us. Do your best to make children respectable but do not kill yourself. Go in with them and ask parents what time you should collect. Enjoy your freedom. Collect them and go home.

Evening as per Friday but you may wish to vary the diet. Almost certainly they will eat nothing due to a surfeit of junk in the pm. Do not be downcast if they ignore your offering.

Sunday 20

Strongly suggest that you go to the esteemed parents-in-law.

Will try to be back by lunch time. Will call you when we’re on the road. Feel free to call us any time. I probably won’t notice the phone ringing but B is usually reliable.

Good luck.

We went to a wedding in Donegal with our time off. The sun shone. The bride was beautiful, the groom handsome and the guests interesting. What more could you ask?

gweedore

errigal

Really, it will be hard to be grateful enough to my loving sister…

Exciting neighbourhood


Posted in: Dublin, Ireland, Siblings, Travel

My brother, driving me home from dinner, said “I know you’re a great believer in the classless society and all that but, for the sake of the kids, would you not move somewhere more normal?”

It’s not rough here, it’s just very…urban.

Films


Posted in: Reading etc., Siblings

My sister goes to see a lot of films and her return to Ireland has meant that I too am going to a lot more films.  Here’s a pretty unsuccessful batch

Waltz with Bashir – Ari Folman

The best of the bunch.  I saw it in the Kino in Cork and was able to take a snack bar and a cup of tea into the auditorium which alone would have justified the price of admission.    The last film I saw in Hebrew was Kadosh, true, that was a long time ago but that experience has kept me away from Israeli films for a while.  This was really very good, if somewhat disturbing.  It’s an animated film about a former  Israeli soldier’s experience at the Sabra and Shatila massacre.  I went with my younger sister and her friend and I was astounded that neither of them had ever heard of Sabra and Shatila.

The film did get me thinking again about the state of Israel.  It is the most extraordinary thing.  If you made it up, no one would believe you.  A state founded largely by central and eastern European intellectuals; people who had been in hiding; in camps; fleeing for their lives; people whose relatives had been killed in vast numbers.   They go to a patrt of the Middle East where the climate is a bit different  from say, Odessa; revive Hebrew (very guttural language and that is the least of its challenges); win wars against their Arab neighbours; and go about building and protecting their state with a stubborn single mindedness. You cannot but gasp at the improbability of it.

The tale of Depereaux – Sam Fell and Rob Stevenhagen.

This is an animated story of a mouse who rescues a Princess.  I didn’t think much of it myself but I wasn’t the one to be pleased.  The Princess and Daniel found it middling but Michael found it absolutely terrifying and watched it sitting on my lap while  sobbing in fear and peering through my fingers at the scary cat.  At the same time he refused to leave.  He is still traumatised.  Not recommended.

Twilight – Catherine Hardwicke

Now that my sister is back, I don’t have to drag my unfortunate husband to this kind of film.  There aren’t so many people in their 30s who are in the market for teenage vampire flicks.    I must say that I quite enjoyed it and am now toying with the idea of trying the books.  Does anyone have views on the books?

The Spirit – Frank Miller

This is a beautifully shot film with a hilariously over the top performance by Samuel L. Jackson.  It mixes real people and animation very cleverly.  It is therefore a pity that the plot is atrocious and the dialogue worse.   After about 10 minutes I begged my sister to abandon ship and a stream of wiser people left the cinema.  We stayed to the bitter end.  It was, undoubtedly one of the worst films I have ever seen.  Wikipedia quotes Robert Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times on the film, “There is not a trace of human emotion in it. To call the characters cardboard is to insult a useful packing material”.  Mr. Ebert is spot on.

Credit Worthy


Posted in: Reading etc., Siblings

My sister has pretty much always earned more than the rest of us.  And she’s good at saving too, she probably still has her first communion money salted away somewhere.  When we were little she always had her sweets after my brother and I finished ours (then she would share them with us – she was the youngest, we were bigger).

She has, however, not borrowed much and travelled around a lot.   When she lived in England it took her months to get a bank account. When she lived in America, she was refused a store card for some big department store.  The guy in the shop said that this was the first time this had ever happened. When she moved back home, for a long time the bank wouldn’t let her have cheques.  Now that she has her own little business, they have reluctantly allowed her to have the odd cheque but they continue to be suspicious.

My sister is the most solvent person I know.  She likes to have six months’ living expenses in the bank in case of an emergency, yet she has consistently had difficulty with banks due to living all over the place.  Meanwhile, the world’s economy is going belly up because of the  sub-prime mortgages.  Oh God, why did we decide to give our economic well-being over to the banks?  I mean, really, the banks?