Final Results

I had spent the last week chilling with my folks and bro in hot and sunny Barcelona. Upon arrival home in Dublin I was greeted by my exam results. Although the results were ones to be pleased about, the week of debauchery in Barcelona left me with feelings of fatigue and not wanting to go out. I reluctantly took up Aideen’s invitation, via Fi, to her party (The reluctance was on account of my aforementioned fatigue rather than any lack of will). I presumed that once I got there and cracked into one or two brewskis I would liven up as is usually the case however I still only planned to stay for a couple of hours. I should never have expected to get away with not going out on the night of getting our exam results and it wasn’t long before I was getting calls from multiple members of my class insisting that I go out. Far be it from me to disappoint and so I caught the last bus into town from Aideen’s.

The first stop was in Hogan’s on George’s St. to meet Claire and Lis. By the time I had arrived they had already been approached by two blokes! Unfortunately it seemed the blokes weren’t making much headway because as soon as I arrived, the two girls jumped at the opportunity to run out to the atm and leave me all alone with the two random blokes. This wasn’t so bad since they were both good craic however this trip to the atm turned out to be a half an hour sightseeing tour of Dublin! In the end I had to call them and tell them to get their asses back to the pub. In the meantime, I had discovered that one of the fellas, an Americano-Italio, was a jazz guitarist. Being in a slightly less than sober state I was seriously impressed and after showing great interest in his gig on Monday I gave him my number. He promised he would text me to remind me the whereabouts and time of his gig because as we all know memory isn’t my strong point! So the guys got bored waiting for Claire and Lis and headed off before they got back leaving me on my own for a few minutes. During this time I spotted a girl behind the bar who I was sure I had seen somewhere before. I approached her and asked her had she been to any Present Arms gigs since she looked like the ska type. The answer was no. Just then, Claire and Lis returned. After a while chatting to the girls I felt a tap on my shoulder. I looked around and who do I see? None other than Colleeeeee! Amazed that he would coincidentally turn up at the same pub as me I asked him how he knew I was in Hogan’s. It turns out, rather embarrassingly, that I had texted him not 10 minutes earlier telling him we were in Hogan’s and completely forgotten! Oh Dear. It was at this point I got an inkling that the night might not be the short couple of drinks I had originally intended. More evidence of memory loss presented itself when my phone alerted me to a new text message. It was from JennieFlynn and although I could remember texting her a few minutes previously, the body of the message was beyond my memory recall abilities. Thanks to a further inability to access my sent messages folder to see what I actually had written, I was forced to simply reply and admit that I couldn’t remember my original message.

Unfortunately Col wasn’t in a position to hang around and so as he left, the two girls and I headed for The Palace *groan* to meet up with more MSISS heads. As usual, going to the palace resulted in nothing but bother and agro. For a start it was full. Then Lisa’s sister was passing cloakroom armbands through the fence to us so we could try and get in. I was extremely against this as The Palace is never worth arguing with a bouncer for. Still we tried and Lisa got in but Claire and I were not so lucky (or unlucky if you ask me). So Claire and I were off to down under and for a while it seemed like the night was going nowhere. Just then we bumped into Clare and Mark and after a good chat with them, Lisa called advising us to return to the palace. Since down under wasn’t letting any more people in either we figured we had nothing to lose. Amazingly, this time it worked! All of a sudden we found ourselves upstairs in the palace with Si, Redser, Derek and Rob. Despite a severe lack of respect for The Palace it was good to see come of the class. At this stage it was close to closing time and it wasn’t long before we were kicked out by bouncers. Not a minute to soon if you ask me!

After a long time arseing about on Leeson St, I decided that I was going for the 4am 84N and I was taking the girls with me. At first they were reluctant but I soon won them over with my boyish charm ;) We only just made the bus and on it we met Cakes and Zoe on their way back from a night in Fitzsimon’s. When we got off the bus we dropped by the Esso. Lisa picked up a pack of Phileas Fogg and was at the counter when she decided she needed dip. Mild salsa dip. Aware of causing a scene I quickly located a jar of Phileas Fogg mild salsa. “No No No!”, Lisa exclaimed. “Take it back! I don’t want it.” I tried reasoning with her that it was mild salsa dip just as she had requested but it was no use. Lisa only wanted Doritos brand salsa. Sheesh! I never knew she was such a salsa connoisseur. I reckoned it was time to get her out of there ASAP and after grabbing a couple of pizzas we departed for my gaff. On the way we bumped into Cakes again having a ‘moke outside his gaff and took him along for the ride too. On the walk to mine, Lisa entertained us by talking about her Chinese colleagues. The conversation was too funny yielding such quotes as “They’re deadly at cleaning in Taylor’s. They clean under the floorboards because they’re so dedicated to Taylor’s” and “Chen is lovely but Ying has acne!” Obviously I can’t remember their real names so just replace Chen and Ying with arbitrary Chinese names.

Back at mine, I scoured the house for beer. I managed to rustle up 8 bottles and together with the pizzas and phileas fogg made a nice snack. The most logical thing to do seemed to be to call everyone in our class even though it was well after 5.30. Only Ronan answered (tit!) but was happy enough to engage in lengthy talks with myself, Lisa and Claire, possibly even Cakes too (unconfirmed). I do feel slightly bad about calling Rob’s house phone though knowing him he some tracking satellite and knew it was us calling even before we dialed the number. After watching VH1 for a while we put on Shaun of the Dead. At this stage it was late (or early!) and very bright and we were all fading by the end. At 8.30 it was bed time so I kicked Cakes out, put Lisa up in the spare room and left Claire on the couch. Graham Thomas, B.A. (Mod) :)

Now away with ye…