A game of two halves

The mere mention of football to someone as soccer-phobic as me has always resulted in symptoms not unlike the onset of a coma. My hearing goes, my eyes glaze over and even my limbs feel heavier than usual.  You could say I'm not a fan. 

Unfortunately, I happen to live in a country where 'ole ole' is the unofficial national anthem, the mention of the name Roy Keane can divide families, and the scoring abilities of 11 men can have a drastic impact on the national psyche. Not that I pay the slightest bit of attention to any of this. 

Living with my sport-obsessed better half, this is quite a feat. Our home rings with the sound of Match of the Day, Sky Sports News and testosterone fuelled shouts at the hapless commentators/referees/innocent bystanders. Depending on how benevolent I'm feeling, I swing between feigning interest and outright belligerence.

However, a conspiracy between the man of my dreams and a WAG friend found me at a League of Ireland game recently. It's impossible to remain dispassionate when your seat faces the stand of die hard supporters (they kill people apparently) and you have a connection to one of the players, even if it is the most tenuous of links. 

Since joining the masses that night, I don't immediately protest when Rockbottom v Isle of White takes over the TV at home. It's not beyond the realms of possibility that I may stay in the room the next time the dulcet tones of Eamon Dunphy begin. Most of all, there will be another match. 

And maybe next time I'll inch a bit closer to the die hards.  

The Book of Face

It was always going to happen - more a matter of when than if. 

Carefully edited facebook photos mean nothing when you are weaving your way through a club, having just gone 12 enthusiastic rounds with Kayne West, what's left of your make up smudged around your face and the responsible limit for alcohol long since passed. 

And then you hear your name. 

My eye/brain co-ordination not being what it should have been, my face went into default 'huh?' mode. It took me quite a few precious minutes to arrange my features back into something that did not resemble a bloodhound, and focus attention on the hottie that had called my name in the first place. 

And then I realised, the curse of Facebook had caught up with me. 

It's all well and good to have five thousand friends and for them to see you in poses that would make Tyra Banks proud, but when you are confronted with the reality of this - and you can bet your life that it will at the pinnacle of your attractiveness, sweaty and glassy eyed from too much dancing/drink/Saturday night fever - it won't be pretty. 

In my case, the lovely boy in question is a primary school classmate that I haven't set eyes on since the heady days of bowl haircuts and questionable knitted jumpers. A genuinely nice bloke, he erred on the side of caution and refrained from mentioning the disparity between Facebook me and the grim reality.  

So I am now left with two options. I can do a Harper Lee and disappear from public view, sporadically releasing a tantalising picture  in order to keep everyone interested. My social life will be somewhat curtailed with this option though. Do I want to wear a fake moustache and glasses for the rest of my life?

Or there's option two - I can remove all of the airbrushing and replace my photos with the warts 'n all version. Come clean and expect to see my friend list plummet to family members and hardy friends only. 

Time for a disguise then. 

The wrong trousers

...I mean, really. 

I'm as much of a celebrity googler as the next person (the next person being Perez Hilton), but I draw the line at randomers. Why would I care what some badly trousered office worker thinks about... well, anything?

But Ireland is clearly running out of famous faces - horror of horrors, it's a recession of the worst kind. 

I was reading one of our beloved national papers to occupy myself on a train journey last week (a rookie mistake; confined spaces are not clever when a rage could be instantaneously  induced by the turning of a page), and came across the standard fashion feature. So far, so fabulous. But then, boys and girls, I turned the page. 

I'm all for vox pops on fashion - get the regular Joe to tell us that they bought the dress in Zara and their style icon is Victoria Beckham. A perfect opportunity for scorn, no harm done. 

But there is NO NEED to have a sockless man with terrible shoes spread across the page. Male ankles should never be exposed to the nation. Think of the children. 

And not even a famous face to dress up the fashion train wreck. 

Apparently this 'style icon' (ahem) has a band that is storming the charts in Dublin 14, but this was not a person whose style advice I would ever take. 

Harem pants don't look good on anyone, but dear God, if you are 90% elbow/knees then these are not the trousers for you my friend. 

Get some fame, go before the jury, and then we'll see. 

A bad day for fashion, ankles and the male population in general. 

The Crying Game

I'm not a big cryer.  And by that I mean I don't cry at Eastenders. 

Unless it's particularly sad. 

Last night, however, I was put through the emotional wringer at the behest of "My Sister's Keeper". For the blissfully unaware, this is the story of a girl seeking medical emancipation from her parents for the rights to her body, even though her leukemic sister and 'genetic twin' may die as a result of it. 

In keeping with the theme of the evening, I tripped along to the cinema with my sister. She has previously cried at the trailers for this film, so I knew enough to bring the tissues. I knew even more when I entered the theatre to find a room populated only by women, with large amounts of ice cream on standby. 

It was not looking good. 

Don't get me wrong, I wasn't entirely naive. I'd read the book. I knew it would not end well. But who could possibly expect the gut wrenching kill-me-now-and-make-it-stop sadness of it all?

I cried for 90 minutes. 

Each time I thought I might be have stopped leaking enough to see without blurring, those wily directors sensed it and threw in another gratuitous shot of a bald headed child hanging on to a hospital bed and bravely comforting an adult.  

By the time the credits rolled, you would think my nearest and dearest had passed away. 

To make matters worse, the Cineworld staff actually congregated outside the doors when it was over just to laugh and point at the tear stained fools leaving. Or maybe it was the unrestrained sobs of 300 women that drew them to check on the safety of their patrons. 

I am not a pretty crier. No single Johnny Depp-esque tears for me. 

No gracious black and white Hollywood starlet tears that run but don't take your make up with it. 

Not even a Dawson of Dawson Creek sob with one eye on passers by. 

We're talking blotches like third degree burns, Shroud of Turin makeup and a very unbecoming redness added to the whites of my eyes. 

My delicately skinned sister brushed away a tear or two and was fine. 

I wandered home like a madwoman. 

24 hours later, I STILL look like a madwoman. With conjunctivitis. 

Word to the wise, sometimes you should know your limits and get a DVD. 

When an article is an incendiary device

As we have already established, I am quite the moaning Michael. But this week, I have finally joined the ranks of the complainer. Or the ranter, at the very least. 

It all began with an article by a certain Ms Brenda Power in last Sunday's Times. If you have thrown even a passing glance at the interweb this week you will know the one I mean. For the blissfully ignorant, Ms Power dared to question the issue of gay marriage. 

The ensuing fire and brimstone response from the gay community has been enough to drive me to write to the Sunday Times in support of the beleaguered journalist. 

I didn't mean it as something that would be printed. 

But it seems my skill and talent has won out. Either that or they are chronically short of support for a woman under siege from a couple of thousand angry LGBTQs. 

And along comes me. 

The article was a comment piece, penned by a columnist. It is her job to be subjective. I am a news junkie, and devour all of the Sunday papers on a weekly basis. I always read Brenda Power's column - sometimes I agree and sometimes I disagree with her point of view. In this instance, my agreement or disagreement with her viewpoint is irrelevant. 

What is relevant is the magnitude and vitriolic nature of the response to the article - testament only to the thin-skinned and paranoid nature of some members of this community, who feel threatened by what was a relatively light hearted and (no offense to the journalist) inconsequential comment piece. It should be recognised that this was not a news story. Columnists are paid to give their views - it was a subjective piece, exactly as it should be.

I fear I may have signed my death warrant, but at the moment I am seeing nothing but red, making it hard to see beyond the here and now. 

I have both gay  and straight  friends and like to think of each of them as reasonable, rational people. Those who have seen fit to respond with such hate and vitriol using the relative anonymity of the internet are a breed apart. I shudder to think that they actually represent the gay community. Things have even progressed to a quasi-scientology level where pictures of Brenda Power have been posted to Facebook groups with captions encouraging harm. 

These are not actions that will empower the community. 

They will only serve to reverse years of work and communication by gay representatives over the years. 

I fail to understand the desperate need by anyone - gay or straight - to rush to the alter and participate in a religious ritual that, let's face it, is outdated and whose principles are ignored by the majority of society.  We all need to foster understanding and tolerance, but there are many more important issues that the gay community could communicate to progress the acceptance that they rightly demand. 

There, rant over. 

 

Calling Gloria...

The arrival of my 30th birthday a few months ago was quickly followed by some frantic self improvement as I realised that old age is not just for other people - it could happen to me.

The denial is still strong, so I refuse to say for sure if I too will fall victim to wrinkles, grey hair and a penchant for Midsomer Murders. You just never know when it will creep up. 

So, in order to try and beat the odds, I decided to attempt to beat my (admittedly squishy) body into submission. Before this, I hadn't run since about 1998. 

And even that was a case of utmost urgency.

(I was warned on pain of death not to miss that bus). 

I tried walking to work, but the passing buses just taunted me. 

I tried not taking lifts and using stairs instead, but seriously. That's what lifts were invented for. 

I even tried a weight lifting class but all those musclebound men just scared me. 

But joy of joys, then I found the holy grail of exercise - combat training. Each week, I get to imagine the face of whoever is currently grating on that last nerve of mine, and throw lots of punches in the air. Instructed by the happiest little chappy you could ever hope to meet - and Brazilian to boot! - this class makes Tuesdays so much more bearable. 

Until this week.

It's Thursday now, but I haven't been able to bring myself to speak about the trauma since it occurred two days ago. Rodrigo went on holidays.  

The resulting class was what I imagine hell to be like. 

A tiny blonde girl (I swear she was about 8 years old) on springs (I hope to God she was on springs anyway, otherwise I fear for her knees) filled in. 

She barked instructions. 

She let no desperate, purple-faced unfortunate pause to take a drink. 

She interspersed all sentences with - I kid you not - "Whoop whoop". 

If she wasn't on some form of amphetamine, then she has the worst case of ADHD I've ever seen.

But that's not the worst of it. 

She played that ear withering song "Gloria" over and over. 

And over. 

If you're not familiar with it - and who could blame you for having the good sense not to enjoy terrible 80s pop - you'll probably recognise it from the "Gloria, Gloria, I think they've got your number... calling Glor-i-aaaaa" sample.

The horror. 

I entered the class a normal, relatively well-adjusted person. I left with a face like a blueberry from all of the blood bursting under my skin; traumatised and beaten by an hour's worth of what can only be described as Chinese torture. Although I imagine the Chinese would recoil in fear from this woman. 

Bring on the wrinkles, the expanding waistline and the farm-based crime dramas. 

Exercise is far worse.

Religeratti on the prowl

Just because you're paranoid, doesn't mean they're not after you. 

Like the majority of Irish people, most of my life defining moments before the age of 13 took place in or around Holy God's house. Once teenage years hit I went from the pew to the back door and have been getting progressively further away ever since. 

Now, I am firmly and happily atheist - with a touch of tree hugging Pantheism thrown in. But it seems that I can sidestep the swerving cars and dodge the bullets, but the Religeratti are not giving up that easily. 

And they're not above a bit of blindsiding either. 

What started as one or two followers on my Twitter page with 'kooky' names like 'John the Baptist', has now turned into an avalanche of chanting, psalm quoting followers. I can't block them quickly enough. If I didn't know better, I'd swear (though probably not on the Bible) that someone has issued my photo and details out to the men in the cloth to try and win me back, scientology stylee. It may be easier than ever to 'follow' Jesus via the internet, but as the antichrist herself once said, I'm not for turning. 

Maybe they have a daily target for conversion, maybe they're trying to redress the porn balance with a bit of an aul pray, or maybe tweeting sermons is the only way anyone will listen nowadays. Who knows? They can count me out of their redemption mission though. I'm off to worship at the feet of the god of confectionary.