April, 2012

April Fools

Noel Farrell

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Fools
April 1, 2012

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I know Sonny won't be happy with this description, but I'm get the whiff of human infestation dwelling between my walls again. For a recluse it's never a good thing. Like back in the days when Mattie was here. And Mitch. And Bamber. And Charlie. Even old Mum. A kinda council-estate version of the playboy mansion - without the playboy. Leons three-years gone next week. How times y by. Relations at Sonny's abode have broken down. Sonny's missus, Amanda, wants to give it on more stab. Sonny's decided, after playing the fool for so long, that he's had enough. "We can make this work,' she'd said with one breath - confessing to another affair with the next. He stayed here last night before heading down to the pub around two in the afternoon. For his lunch. He hasn't been back since. He's either over there now on his knees, saying he lost his mind and he'd share her, or he's on a right old Sunday bender. Leon loved those benders. I fell asleep watching Enda's speech at the Fine Gael Ard Theis last night. Hardly instilled a condence in much, did it? Over half the country didn't pay the Household Charge. Alan Shatter told people protesting the charge to 'get a life.' Phil Hogan sounds like a sheriff from an old western - offering rewards to local authorities for collecting the tax off rogue citizens. Frankie Bronson would have loved that job! Debt Collector. Back in his rogue days as a undercover everything. Wonder how he getting on in Oz? Gustav next door called me in this morning. He'd been back up on Haunted Hill doing more shooting.

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'Come. I show you,' he shouted in the letterbox, before leaping back over the wall that separates our front gardens. I was still in my dressing gown - or morning robe, as I prefer to say on a Sunday. After coffee and croissants - and a big dirty fry. I took a wander out into my grounds, hopped the wall, and followed Gustav into his house. 'What you think of this?' he asked, blessing himself. He must be a Christian of some description. I took a close look. Then closer. 'Looks like a bud fruiting,' I said. 'Look closer,' he said, handing me a magnifying glass. I looked closer. 'Still looks like a bud fruiting,' I said. 'You blind Irish fool,' he said. Now hold on a minute... 'April fools,' he laughed. "Look again. We could have new Ballinspittle on our hands,' he said, softening my initial vein-busting reaction to the 'fool' accusation. I may very well be one, but I don't need reminding of it from a foreign photographer on a Sunday morning. Even on the day that's in it. 'You and me,' he continued. 'Partners in crime!'

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It was then I saw the near empty bottle of vodka over by the sink. That was it. He was drunk! Holds it well I must say. There's only a dribble left in the bottle. 'Yeah sure,' I said. ' We'll talk about it during the week.' I told him that I'd to visit me Mum above at her new residence and needed to rush off. 'I come up with a plan,' he shouted after me as I left. Being in that state on a Sunday morning. Really! What's Ireland come too? Still no sign of Sonny. He must have went home. Think I'll lock up for the night. Not that there is much worth robbing here. Back in our day it was an open house. Nobody locked doors. Everybody knew one another. Not anymore. 'Bygone days,' as me old granddad used to say. I do wonder at times how we ended up as we are. How swift we sold Ireland out. Even if we had to bailout the established order - we don't deserve the constant jibes from government ministers as thanks for doing it. There must be a right good sneer going-on somewhere. Maybe over at Phil Hogan's penthouse suite in Portugal? It's like this upcoming treaty. Damned if we do - damned if we don't. Short-term gain for long-term pain or short-term pain for ??? I just can't work out the last part of that equation. I was never any use at Maths. In political circles the gravy train is a national scandal at this stage. The promises of change now just waning whispers of a forgotten general election campaign of just one short year ago. Now drowned out forever under the weight of treaty debate. There's no change coming from that quarter anytime soon.

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'Just get on with it,' as Mum used to say. Frail as a petal now. I'm glad the sun is out. Glad she has a big window to let it shine in on her. Grazing in through those drapes that blend in with those magnolia walls so well. She's being well looked after despite the decor. That's the main thing. She sticks her tongue in and out sometimes when a little bird stops on the sill. I saw a picture of her once as a child doing the same thing. Her and Gerty. Arms around each other. It's lying around here somewhere. I'll give Sonny another twenty minutes. Now, where was I? Oh yeah. Ballinspittle. What was that drunken fool on about?

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Ding-Dong
April 7, 2012

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So there I was. Wednesday night. Clock about to strike another ungodly hour. Finger tips numb from a writing frenzy. Ding-dong. My doorbell hardly rings during the day. It has fallen more and more silent as the years drifted by. So why now in the middle of the night? Ding-dong. After I cleared my throat of the annoyance, I made my way down to answer the door. It was Sonny with a friend. 'We didn't think you'd be up,' he said, brushing past me into the house. The smell of alcohol and cheap perfume made their way into my nose as they swept past. I won't go into how Sonny smelled. I hadn't seen him since the night he stayed over. I'd assumed he got things sorted at home. I assumed wrong not for the rst time in Booker's World. So who's your friend?' I asked, as i followed them into the sitting room where they took no time taking position on the sofa. 'Sorry,' Sonny said. 'This is April, we met down the pub.' April? You wouldn't write it! She smiled nervously at me. Thin as a wisp, her chin touched her shoulder like the shy. She was missing a tooth. Front and center, along the bottom gum. Her hair long and straight. She belonged on a Californian Beach. Without the missing tooth. Not hanging out of Ireland's last great Ray of Hope, Sonny feckin' Strange. 'I'll ll you in tomorrow,' Sonny said, winking me out of the room. I should have stood my ground and not have been so compliant. It is my house. I left them to it. Compliance. I'm used to it at this stage. It must be an Irish thing.

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Needless to say the writing frenzy was over. I returned to the attic and tried to sleep. The laughter bellowed from downstairs, before eventually going quiet. I watched the moon, almost full, make its cycle past my attic window, disappearing at times as the clouds swallowed her, before re-appearing again until it disappeared out of sight altogether. I eventually fell asleep. I slept like Mitt Romney has in recent days, I expect. Soundly. I didn't wake until I heard the door downstairs close over. I jumped up and dressed quickly. I went downstairs. They were gone. I went into the kitchen. It was 10.30. No note. No thank-you. No explanation. Nothing. Just a freezing morning. Like winter was back. I'm not sure if this happens to other people or not. You know, when you hear about something or someone for the rst time, and then within days you hear of it or them again. No? What about a piece of music you haven't heard for years suddenly cropping up again. And then again soon after. No? Maybe it's just me. Anyway, there I was the next night. Tapping away again. Not quite so late. My heroine is beginning to come together. Half American - Half Iranian. She's just taken out one of societies underbelly, when Ding-dong. I couldn't be having this. I wasn't running a half-way house. Had people no consideration for failed writers and the hours they keep. No. I wasn't having this. I made my way downstairs. Running. Bringing words forth from my vocal cords just as my hands touched the door. 'What the fu...' I began. Brakes on vocal cords. 'Expecting someone?' asked Amanda - Sonny's wife. Wrapped in an anorak that obviously wasn't hers.
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No,' I said. 'Is Sonny here?' she asked. 'No. Her arms folded a little tighter as the temperature outside hovered near zero. 'Have you seen him?' she asked. 'No.' I said. She looked at me. 'Not since last weekend,' I lied. What was I supposed to do? Say he was here last night! I invited her in. We went through to the kitchen. I put on the kettle, wished I was a praying man, and hoped that Sonny didn't arrive back. She sat there for nearly an hour, spilling her guts. Chain-smoking. She admitted her recent affair - not that I asked. I almost expected her to say, 'It's what I do.' But she didn't. She said she was worried about Sonny. That he was popping in and out to change clothes, but that was all she saw of him. What did she expect? 'He won't talk to anyone,' she said. She told me Sonny had been like this long before he found out about her latest martial misdemeanor. Oh, I didn't know that. 'He's gone past caring about anything,' she said. I've only known Sonny a short time. I had to agree with Amanda. The Sonny I met rst-time out, was not the Sonny that I knew now. He had tried to get things moving for us in a few ways. For a few months. Until he realized it was no good. Until he stopped believing that shit he was selling himself. Until he realized that Ireland was screwed. Anyway you looked at it. It's not like I didn't try to tell him. I'm sure I told him at least a dozen times that if it was not for bad luck, Don Booker would have no luck. 'Luck's what you make it,' I believe he quoted from someone. How I could laugh now - alas, it's not inside me. Must be the time of the year.
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Sonny headed to Dame St after he nally copped on it was all a pipe-dream, and that becoming a motivational guru was not going to cut it in a country in decline. Every time I'd seen him since, he's a little further away from that breezy version of Sonny I'd met rst. 'If you see him, tell him to come home,' she said, stubbing out another cigarette and getting to her feet. I nodded. She smiled. 'I knew your friend, Leon,' she said, catching me by surprise. A lot of people knew Leon. 'Did you?' I said. Never would have thought,' she said, the corner of her lips tightening somewhat. Never would have thought, or never took the time to think? I asked myself that as I followed her to the door. 'Just tell him to come home if you see him,' she said, putting the anorak hood on to cover her head. 'I'm worried about him.' 'If I see him...' I said, as I closed the door over. I didn't feel much like sleeping so I went into the kitchen and made a big fry-up before wrestling with words until well into the morning. I slept like Romney again, dreaming of government ministers granting meetings to Michael Lowry, while poor Irish home owners of rogue developments were not granted the same privilege. Ding-dong. I was dreaming. But there was no door. Ding-dong. No way. Three nights on the trot. This was too much. I stumbled down the stairs still half- asleep. I opened the door. Who the hell was it this time? Gustav. With a rather large bottle of vodka. 'Happy, Good Friday,' he said, not waiting for the invite to enter. At least it was a reasonable hour. It was only 9-30 in the evening.
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I needed to eat, so as Gustav rummaged through my meager selection of TV channels, I delved into one of Leon's old recipes for the man on the run. Fish Fingers Ala curry sauce with rice. Fried egg on top. Pepper. It was enough to numb the hunger pangs and line whatever needed lining for the bottle ahead. 'I do not understand why the pubs are closed today,' Gustav said, as we tucked into a few Vodkatae's, before dispensing with the tea for a more honest, white and raw, stomach-burning approach. I wasn't absolutely positive of the answer, so I didn't give him one. Conversation can be like that at times with Gustav. I'm sure it has something to do with the church and the day that was in it, but I'd become engrossed in documentaries about different tribes of people scattered all over the world. People who have never seen a material thing in their lives. They certainly haven't heard the word 'bailout' and that's for sure. It was another world. It's a small box I live in. Wish I'd seen more of the world. Might have made it further than a mountain top in Mayo then! Might have suited me better. A bit of wanderlust. Might have opened my eyes a little more to things a lot earlier. We don't have real problems up this side of the world really. Not in comparison. Things pale into insignicance when you see children hunt spiders in tropical rainforest's, before toasting them for supper. Or hunters, who's only means of meat is stealing it from the hungry mouths of a pride of lions. Or a man climbing a forty foot tree with nothing more than a vine and an axe for company to raid a bees nest, so his family can have all the sugary delights of the honey. Or a village coming together to build the mother of all tree houses. One big enough to house them all. Using nothing but the raw material around them and a little thing the narrator, John Hurt, called ingenuity. I doubt adrenalin like that exists in the real world either.
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Gustav dropped off as the bottle caved to emptiness as usual. Another dosser in my house. Not that I minded. Can't be easy being away from his own at Easter time. I'm just glad he didn't mention anymore about that Ballinspittle thing he was mulling over. I do love that entrepreneurial spirit in people - I've dabbled when sought but you have to admit, there's one or two that take it a bit too far, and for no other reason than to prot well from the hard work of others. You know - like the government. What was Gustav thinking of doing anyway? Building a shrine above on Haunted Hill so people could watch a bud become a leaf. 'Stranger things have happened,' as Leon used to say. I must drop by and see him one of these days. Maybe Monday. After the Masters.

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Musty Edges
April 15, 2012

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I was beginning to think I had to get out of town for a while. Many callers. Many faces. Too much life going on. The idea of taking a trip had me sweating a little. Like after a walk. On a rare hot day. Luckily for me, karma combined with events, which meant cancelling the trip. If only in my head. Turns out those intruders had plans of getting out themselves. For real. The sun shone in through the attic window for most of the week. It usually appears mid-morning around here. Depending on the cloud cover, it throws the old space new shadows to wear before she sets down again for the night. Even a sunset or two off their in the distance, through those power lines and over the rooftops, I imagine. Apart from the tapping of keys and the odd hum of a passing car snailing its way through the estate, there wasn't much else to be heard this week, except perhaps for the odd caw from a drifting crow. I was lost in the middle of no-where, in a small Texan town - trying to put a jig-saw together. 'You should get out a bit,' Sonny said, before he left for Italy. Over to his brother for a 'time.' I told him Amanda had called. He'd popped by the day after she had been here. As soon as I said she was worried about him, he was out the door like a thief being shot at, and off into her arms. He popped in again the next day to break the news. 'To see if me and her can't sort it out,' he said. Well, isn't it well for some? Sonny's not going under. He's gone under. Has been for a while. Toast. Any mortgage relief that may be coming people's way isn't coming to Sonny Strange. He must be running away. From his problems. Oooh - the freedom! 'Luke's putting us up for a little bit. Until we can think of something,' he explained. Visions of Don Corleone entered my mind, before departing again.
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Sonny had lobbed the keys of his house into a bubble wrapped envelope earlier, addressed it to his provider with a note that said 'Sorry' and sealed the lid on his Irish nancial cofn. 'I'll post it on the way to the ferry,' he said, saying they were driving south with what they had left that was of any value, wasn't nailed down - and luggable. We shook hand and away he went. I usually close the door over pretty quickly when someone leaves - like they might take a subtle hint or something - but I stood there leaning against the frame of the door, lit a cigarette and watched as the sun began to fall. It turned Sonny sepia for a moment. He was a shadow by the time he rounded the corner. Gone. The sun began to give me a headache after a few minutes. I was just about to go back inside when around the corner came Gustav's head. 'I leave for home tomorrow. Two weeks,' he said, with another Irish oddity - the smile. 'I come in few minutes. With bottle. I leave instruction for you.' His head disappeared back around where it had come from. Instruction. For what? Turns out it was just three things. Feed the snake next Monday. Feed the dog, Trigger, twice a day. And open the windows every other day. To let the breeze through the house. So when I come back - it not smell like feet,' he said, when he came in a few minutes later. It felt like I'd got the bad end of the deal, as I accepted the gift of the bottle from him. 'I leave it with you,' he said. 'I not like ying with hammer pounding on my head.' Off he oated. 'I'll send you a postcard,' he promised. Way-hey. The excitement. The anticipation. How am I going to stop myself from jumping out of bed in the mornings?
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Now, I could have drank the bottle, and disappeared quickly into another world for a few days, but hell, it was only Monday. Not the best way to be starting the week. Even for a writer. No, I needed to get out out of town, but I needed to remember where I was going. This called for a more measured approach. Daily doses with tea. It felt right. I didn't even have to hide it from anyone. This is what it must have been like for Leon. Back in the daze. I went to a small American town in Texas, a place that resided no-where else but in my head. It's there I've been for the last six days. Locked away from the Irish scene. The one going-on outside my window. Playing with people's lives. Dogging them daily through no fault of their own - mostly. I missed it all. From Ricky Santorum ending his vile campaign in America to protesters high-jacking Gilmore's party conference in Galway. Did I care? Not a hoot! It was a while since its been this quiet and I took advantage. Apart from excursions next door to feed Trigger - a friendly beast - and the occasional nap, it's been bum-row. A smelly, gown- wearing, hairy wastage, xated with words on a screen in front of him, throwing conversations into a silent void searching for voices. At 6am this morning came the words The End. I highlighted them, made them bold - then decided against it again. Sleep deprivation can do things to the mind. Nope, I'd highlight them later. I shoved the script into a drawer for a few days. It's smothered in dust and cobwebs. I keep meaning to clean it, but it gives the place a musty edge. I know the script is nished - for my part anyway. I'll let it breath in mustiness for a few days. Just in case! I decided to set about cleaning up the Ollie Reed that resides inside me - after I'd slept. I kept that promise to myself 17 hours later. When I woke. Shavings always the worst part of letting yourself go for a few days. I'm sure that's the case for both sides of the species. Except perhaps for those who see grooming as a lifestyle. I never seen much of a point in that.
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Lord, but you're a dreary fucker in every way,' as Leon used to say. I remember taking offense at the time. I'm not so sure I could anymore. I think Ireland can do that to people at times. I'd imagine at many times through her history it 's happened. Weary from dreary. Just when people think they have it - that something - whatever that is for individual people - off it goes again, off in yet another wayward direction. Funny how that can happen. How people can go some of the way - and still manage to undo it all again. No. Funny's the wrong word. Yet, by times it has to be funny - 'for a life without laughter is like a life with drink.' I'm sure there's a point to that - one of Leon's many life philosophies. I might stumble across it someday. We liked our funny in darker measures. The same way as Leon liked his liquor from the top of the shelf. I re-drafted a script I'd been writing for a few years now. A pretty dark comedy set around murder in a quiet Texan town. A bit of who-dunnit. I had to cut it to pieces rst. Hence the abandonment. Things needed to change. They say it's all about story - so I let that be the guide on this one. As I read, I realised my mistakes. Naming the protagonist a Japanese name for a cheap sushi-joke seemed a little juvenile upon reection - but that was the point, was it not? Who'd be a damn writer? I ploughed through it like a eld on a wet day. Digital page after digital page. Cigarette in mouth - window open. A commoner. Turning it in. Then out. Then back in again. The dialogue was heavy. The plot - 'thick.' The style - 'commercial.' I questioned it all as the conversations played out - helped on by cheap coffee after the bottle had died - each black mug darkening my teeth a little more. Picturing each scene in my head - in-caffeinated by the cheapest of beans. Laughing at things I shouldn't have been laughing at. Bad boy, Booker. Bad boy!

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I sent chunks of cheap talk screaming to dialogue hell and replaced it with some more. The plot tightened - losing none of its absolute ridiculousness - aiming squarely as an off-the-cuff swing at modern contemporary society. And Bruce Campbell, of course. You can't take a swing without Bruce. The style - to my eternal shame - I left alone. Visions of seedy daytime LA bars, with dimming neon, seen through shades. Deadbeats lining the bar. All with a story to tell. But no-one to listen. Those swaying efgy's of Harvey and Bob Weinstein. Bruce Campbell. Tequila slammers. Harvey: This world's not for savin' Bruce: We gotta try. Harvey: What you think, Booker? Booker: I'm with you Harve. All the fuckin' way. They say entertainment is something that helps get people through recession. That things like bums on cinema seats go up and the such. We've long been fond of our entertainment - us humans. If there is an almighty he has to be saying that we are, at least, an entertaining bunch. Never a dull moment to be had. Stuck in the headlights of capitalism gone skew, blind to the stark realities of potential eventualities. So consumed are we with the consumption of everything, the possibility of consuming ourselves becomes more the reality with each passing day. I think I'm beginning to under Zombies more these days. Perhaps humankind has peaked - like that oil we obsess over so much. Who knows!? I've always hated that. That strain on the jaw from a constant yawning that's continually ignored. I guess normal folk just answer that call and sleep. I've known lock-jaw. I think another coma is on the cards. If the quiet lingers on this week, who knows, the writing mojo might hang around for a while longer. It felt like it was gone there for a while. It's a funny thing. Like thunder in an alley. I must open those windows.
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Flags
April 20, 2012

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If I remember correctly the last few April's have been belters when it comes to the weather. Maybe it's all the talk of water charges about the place, but its been downpours here for most of the week. Sporadic outbursts like those from government quarters. A new opinion poll out tomorrow has satisfaction with the government down 14 points to 23% percent. People will make varying arguments about it, but to the ordinary spectator it means just one thing. Bad news for Enda Kenny. Alex Ferguson once called this time of the year 'squeaky bum time.' With the referendum debate about to get into full swing, Enda might be saying the same. The honeymoon for me was over the day they made the rst payment of an unsecured bond. For others it would have been a bit longer. All will agree though, it is now rmly over. Another poll out today has the 'Yes' camp ahead in the referendum debate by 7%. The surprise was the massive 39% of undecideds. I expected this 'treaty' to sail through in a fog of fear. Maybe I jumped the gun a little. I'm not saying it won't pass - but there's a lot of hearts and minds to be won, and if popularity has anything to do with it, the government in the present moment look shaky. There will be plenty of the fear-mongering. It's that age. Talk of the inevitable second bailout will sound more. The repercussions of not being able to access that? What will government advisers and health service executives do? From where I'm sitting, old loyalties to old friends might come back and haunt our current taoiseach. With so little power to wield, I'd have expected Enda to manage the bit that he does have to manage just a little better. He's stood by as an air of arrogance set into his cabinet, and by doing little about it, he has opened that old accusations of weak leadership again. If that arrogance is bedded now, and comes through during this treaty debate, then who knows what way the vote will swing.
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Today's opinion poll suggests Enda has a little bit of work to do to get back to his 'Daddy' status amongst a disillusioned people, with little to sway them with, except the promise of further waves of austerity to come. 'What will be, will be...' as Doris Day once sang. That's my attitude to things now. I think I was at that disillusioned phase before. It's like a bad headache that doesn't go away. Like after a good Saturday night. Hard to shake. Where it weighs you down. Until it traps you. Its not the place to be. With a bit of Irish luck, people will tune in more to what's going on, and demand a little more from their elected representatives. I'm sure quite a number of them are Trojan's when it comes to the work they do. Once under the snap of a whip however, there is no real inuence. Just a cog in the wheel of a ride. No mechanism for shifts in thinking that might be worth an ear. Very little unity and even less direction. It's a poor state of affairs to watch it all slowly crumble into a country with more empty houses, than people who share a common-sense. It may be because of that failing that we end up eroding a democracy hard-fought for at the end of the day. These right-left alliances just don't work. Though it's hard to take Labour for the left anymore. There's a few whipper-snappers in Dil Eireann that could make themselves heard a bit more. Start speaking up and out for the country a little more. Has the lure of bailout money cost people their voices. It's not like keeping quiet has served us well as a nation. Sorting things out decades after the fact leaves a hole that just is not going to be lled again. Or have we learned nothing from our past mistakes as a young country? I went for a ramble a number of weeks back. Came across some old ruins with three European ags swaying under a stiff breeze. No tricolour. I thought to myself that was strange. Ah, maybe it was away for a wash. But the following week it was the same. And the week after. Now I know we're all Europeans and all, but it did still seem odd.
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It was sad to see all the same. Be it a slip of the mind or the like. I hope we discover a bit more of our Irishness over the Summer with the European Championships. They were always the best of times. 'Twould be a shame to lose all that. Especially here. On the island itself! Back to Seattle.

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Tangled Webs
April 30, 2012

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On this the last day of a wet and windy April, the referendum debate goes into full swing. On the corresponding day next month, we Irish once again go to the polls to decide on something of national importance when we decide whether to ratify the Fiscal Compact Treaty. Less than 24 hours thereafter the result will be known. If I were a betting man, I'd expect it to pass by at least 3%. For the electorate to opt for a measured approach to austerity as opposed to one swift shot. It seems like an eternity since the Lisbon 2 referendum. When we chose to ratify that particular treaty - having rst rejected it in the early days of Brian Cowen's calamitous reign. Our bargaining chips to secure obedience on that occasion were only cashed by the bureaucrats two week ago in Brussels. Better late than never I suppose. If those concessions had somehow not been ratied and that then came out during the 'debate' it wouldn't have looked great for the 'Yes' camp. No concessions like that time around. This time the wording of the treaty leaves nothing to the imagination. It's a case of gun-to-the-head decision-making. Vincent Browne on his show last week even suggested to Leo Varadkar that it was they, the government, who asked for the clause to be written into the treaty. Varadkar denied it. By choosing 'Yes,' and signing away controls over how we run our affairs, we will have access to the ESM, (European Stability Mechanism) when we need another bailout. The ESM is a fund pulled from the sky aimed at appeasing market hostility toward nations. It is secured by the European tax-payers - even though none of them get a voice on that much. The choices for those who practice democracy in this era are extremely limited when it comes to caliber of politician. More and more parties embrace this heist taking place. Yet, in a recession-ridden continent, the gap between the wealthiest in our society grows by considerable percentage points with each passing year.
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Those prepared to lie to voters - excel. In large part they are chosen from within a party structure. All seemingly willing to go along with this despite the facts speaking loudly for themselves. What they have done is not working. The lack of accountability speaks for itself to many Irish people. Conditions attached to accessing the ESM are designed around the economy-imploding concept of Austerity which is already causing social devastation across Europe. Greece has seen a 40-fold increase in instances of suicide as a direct result of austerity. Spain has unemployment in the region of 20%. Youth unemployment stands at 50%. Of course there is rarely an account of that within the mainstream media. Here in Ireland the 'Yes' camp are already eating up most of the column inches. The government are in a mess. Though on the same side, they don't hymn from the same sheet. It becomes more apparent each week. Little niggles setting in. Eamon Gilmore has said that even if we vote 'No' Ireland may still be able to access more funds from the world-renowned state-asset stripper, The IMF. In contradiction to that, Michael Noonan has said that is not the case - that during negotiations with the IMF he was assured Eurozone countries could not access additional funds from the organization. Even if people had a fair chance at weighing up their options, if the government of the day can't get their mantra in tune, what chance for the rest of us? Simon Coveney - Fine Gael election director has voiced that he hopes to get the treaty passed by being nice - but is willing to 'put the frighteners on the electorate'' if necessary. It's hard to believe we elect these people. The government and Fianna Fil are calling for that 'Yes' vote. It does nothing but further etch into the minds of Irish people that Fine Gael and Fianna Fil are one of the same. To have the Labour Party on board is an added bonus for all concerned. Particularly those is the service of self.

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Sinn Fin are the only mainstream party to oppose the treaty as they continue their rise in the opinion polls on the back of a wave of populism in a country beginning to get to grips with the scale of the problem but devoid of any worthwhile idea out of it. Former Fianna Fil deputy leader, Eamon ' Cuiv, has broken party ranks and is also calling for a 'No' vote. He also hinted last week that Sinn Fin would be ideal coalition partners for Fianna Fil in the future. Will he join them? Other left-wing alliances and Independents in the Dil are also calling for a 'No' vote, as are a number of trade unions and social groups. I'd have thought that after three and a half years since that infamous state bank guarantee that Ireland might be in a place where we might have been expecting to 'turn that corner' that the late Brian Lenihan once shouted about in the Dil chamber as he delivered one of his earlier austerity budgets. As I said back then, we indeed turned a corner. Blindfolded. Straight into a brick wall. With an inquiry into that asco under way, the focus in some mainstream media outlets is back on that fateful night - and on that decision which is proving fatal for the country. It has come to light that a series of high-powered meetings took place between major banking institutions in the country and the Department of Finance in the days leading up to the decision to guarantee banking deposits off the back of the Irish tax-payer. Saddled with that we never had a chance. According to the Sunday Independent government ministers were told that AIB, and not just Anglo Irish were in "immediate danger" of collapse and that there was a concerted effort to protect AIB and Bank of Ireland at Anglo's expense. There is also efforts being made now to have Brian Lenihan's personal papers from that time handed over to the forthcoming inquiry. Former Ireland's wealthiest man, Sean Quinn, is also trying to access those papers as he attempts to prove Anglo advanced billion euro loans to him illegally. Are we foolish enough to fall for another tribunal? Another
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few hundred million down the drain with the same level of accountability as those dished out to date by Mahon and Moriarty. None. Where does all this leave any of us? Where we have been for decades on way or another, I'm afraid. In limbo. It would be great to say the worst is over. Unfortunately, it may still have to come. It suits the government parties for this treaty to pass. They can then ride out their terms with their six-gure salaries and ve-gure expense accounts and just proportion blame on the ECB and the IMF. They'd be simple implementers of external policy which we hand over by passing this treaty. Do we really think the majority of politicians care at this stage, when every decision taken by successive governments since that night have seen nothing only Ireland taking huge steps backwards in many areas? Do the Germans or the IMF give a hoot about the Irish people? I don't think so. Even with the security that comes with accessing this fund - the loss of control over scal matters that comes with that decision will have a massive impact on Irish life. Standards of living continue to erode as cuts are implemented to a broad range of services. Trying to meet targets set out in the treaty will be catastrophic for the nation. In this country we put rogue bankers and banks before the education and health of children and the care of our sick and elderly. These cuts also come at a time when the cost of living is going up for most people. It's just a recipe for disaster any way people look at it. Damned if we do - damned if we don't. Capitalism. Glorious capitalism. Where would we have ended up without it? At what cost the stage on which it all plays? The planet on which we dwell in the pursuit of - I'm not sure what if I'm honest.
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And the players on that stage? The actors - as we watch it all. Corruption of the highest order in areas that will affect us all in the short-term. Looking on as climate change occurs before our eyes and we yet we don't insist on it being on our leaders agendas. The rise in fuel for heating and for vehicles has risen dramatically over the past decade. Has oil peaked? Is oil on the decline in a world where the new superpowers are only opening the doors to their own forms of progress. Consuming it as fast as it comes from the ground or sea? What happens when it all runs out or when American have to pay top-dollar at the pumps? It was about a month before the Lisbon 2 run-off that I took to writing seriously. A lot came and went during that time. A postcard from Gustav arrived in the letterbox at the tail-end of last week. I watched from my sitting room through those netted curtains that have hung there for decades as the wind tried to blow the wet-proofs off the postman. Extension to vacation. Be back next week. Gus. I'm not too happy having to fork out for a mouse for the snake and Trigger eats like a horse. I'm sure I'll get a bottle of the usual for my troubles - but we're not that big of mates. Not like Enda Kenny and Phil Hogan anyway.
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Still, every downside can have an upside. Depends on how we look at the glass, I guess. The words are owing to some degree again. Away from this political and national mess. Maybe it's time to leave this political stuff to one side. Just write more books. I wonder how journalists and commentators who have spent a lifetime covering this charade feel. It's not like much ever changes. There's more cahoots than cohort in Irish society. When the cahoots pay the cohorts it drives divisions in society. That's where we seem to be at. A tangled web that there is no getting out of. Unless you can pull yourself free from it. Otherwise, it is there people get caught. Be it debt or head-space. Ones as bad as the other. Having a government fast losing its grip on that mandate they continually go on about doesn't help matters along much either. We'll know in 31 days. I guess I trudge up and cast a vote. One nal time. I wonder if theyll send out Mum a polling card? I'd hardly pull it off this time? No. I better leave her sitting where she is. It didn't work in 2009, it certainly isn't going to work now. I must nip up and see her.

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Bookers World April, 2012 This ebook series cover events as they happen through the eyes of the ctional Don Booker - an unemployed recluse - as he attempts to write himself through personal and social woe in an Ireland in decline. The novel, Booker's World, is separate from this series of ebooks, though both worlds and characters do collide at certain juncture as time goes by. An ebook version of the novel is now available. All ebooks in this series may be used for reference and may be distributed freely once adhering to Creative Commons License and crediting the author.

With cuts to depression & addiction services being implemented in Ireland, please consider these when making a charitable donation in the future.

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Also in this series 45 5 Days in September Deathly Quotes November Nightmares Absurdities Purjurious Times Forgetful Directions Chill Dark The Loaded Taoiseach Independence International Mutha-F*ckrz The Cost of Living Last Daze The Artful Dodger Planet Bonkers
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Visitors Dead Peasants The Great Gas Giveaway Celtic Whine Murder by State Mr. President The Casting of the Dye Three Planks & Ron Paul Escaping The Walls Curiosity

All available to read or download at The Writing Life & Other Absurdities On Scribd

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Other works by Noel Farrell

Bookers World As little old Ireland slides into an economic abyss, workingclass Don Booker slides towards 40. He spends his days caring for his dementia suffering Mum, while coming to terms with the suicide of his best friend, Leon. As Don searches for answers through a keyboard, he walks a path of personal introspection where old memories force Don to deal with the fallout of a life not quite lived. Set against the backdrop of post Celtic-Tiger Ireland, this coming-of-age tale takes the reader on a journey through a character and a country facing up to their personal and social woes. At times humorous, other times, provocative, Booker's World takes the reader into Ireland's social underbelly - exploring strong societal themes like suicide, alcoholism and attitudes. Themes relevant the whole world over. It's what you leave behind...
Click here to purchase

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Sonny Strange A Motivational Memoir

Sonny Strange buys into a motivational guruas Ireland and his marriage begin to fall asunder.

This 12,000 word novellais nowavailable for download on Amazon

Click here.

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Cripple

Ireland. 1984

A childhood incident leaves a lasting impression on Jimmy, until a chance meeting with someone less fortunate makes him confront his past. This novella is available as an ebook on Amazon

Click here

Contact: jasepub@gmail.com (C) JaSE Publishing

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