Irish Facts Without Wikipedia

I'm not generally a major Twitter fan. There does be some interesting stuff but for the most part, I find it tedious and there is just too much crap! Occasionally though, you find some gems, like today. Rick O'Shea of 2fm started a trend by asking people to post #IrishFactsWithoutWikipedia, basically overly false 'facts' about Ireland. I spotted the trend and clicked through....and promptly nearly fell off my chair laughing. Someone had tweeted Rick suggesting that somebody should post it in a blog as they were too funny not to be published. Things are quiet in work right now so I decided to take it upon myself to transfer some of the ones I found most amusing here. Some of them are proper Irish universal truths, the others are pure hilarious. Enjoy!!

• If your Granny doesn't light a candle for you before an exam, you're going to fail
• You must say 'goodbye' at least 3 times at the end of a phone conversation or the phone won't actually hang up
• Bono can shoot beams made of Tayto crisps out of his wicked uniglasses
• In Ireland, Father Ted is seen as a hard hitting documentary
• If you're sick, you don't need a doctor. 7up and toast will do the job
• Abrakebabra have 2 Michelin stars but don't like to advertise it
• Jackie Healy Rae is only man to hold the Irish, European and World Combover of the Year titles
• Not turning off the immersion leads to a fate worse than death (classic)
• Cork is actually only about half the size of the Phoenix Park but we let them draw it bigger on the map just to keep them quiet
• If you say 'Gay Byrne' 3 times fast, Uncle Gaybo will appear and give lollipops to everyone in the audience
• It's an old Irish custom to declare your intent to marry a girl by draping a large raw steak over her face
• Iceland used to be a county of Ireland before it broke off in 1941. Nobody noticed because of the war
• We are all fluent Irish speakers but we don't want to get stuck talking to Daithi O Se in a bar
• Bono can hear a hungry child's tear hit the dust from 100 miles away
• All toastie specials served in Irish pubs contain molten lava
• There's no money resting in ANY Irish bank account anymore
• 'An bhfuil cead agam dul go dti an leithreas?' is the most used phrase in the Irish language
• Vincent Browne had a successful acting career as Worzel Gummidge
• In Ireland, it's widely accepted by the Vatican to break Lent on Paddys Day for crisps and chocolate
• The tallest mountain in the world is actually Muckish in Donegal. It's just lying down, so you can't tell
• It is compulsary to say 'aahh' after the first sup of tae
• Members of the Irish Parliament use croissants as emergency sideburns
• If you die of alcohol poisoning, you're considered a lightweight
• Contrary to popular belief, Jim Corr wrote the Irish National Anthem
• Our blood is 90% tea
• We're obliged to have a pint or 2 at the airport before getting on a plane - even if it's 7 in the morning
• Red lemonade is the reason we are all mental because the chemicals used to make it are banned in every other country
• By law, you are only allowed to worship Premier League Foottballers until they put on an England shirt
• Honda Civics, Subarus and Mitsubishis are not as preferable modes of transport as horses
• Dublin Zoo is running a captive breeding programme of leprechauns to replace the current government
• If the perpetual lamp under the Sacred Heart picture goes out, all members of the household die that instant
• Shortcuts always involve fields
• St Patrick actually smuggled snakes over by accident, though diligently rectified the problem himself
• Anne Doyle is completely octopus from the waist down
• Starving is a word used by the people of Ireland when they haven't eaten for a minimum of 2 hours
• To be considered truly Irish, the wooden spoon must have been a fundamental element of your childhood
• The Vikings originally introduced the battered sausage to Ireland in 956 AD as building material for huts
• The mass decline in population in the mid 1800's was actually caused by a zombie apocalypse

Moral of the Story - Irish people are great craic. Our sense of humour will get us through anything.

My Birthday in Toronto

I wake up, yawn and stretch and realise 3 things in quick succession.

1. It's my birthday! I'm 26 now, better get my shit together and become a responsible adult.
2. My arm is asleep. I reach up to scratch my face and poke myself in the eye. Not nice.
3. Where the f#@k am I?

I was confused for about 12 solid minutes. I looked around and I spotted my suitcase on the floor and pictures of Gillian's twin on the walls. Oh right, I'm in Toronto in the Plummer family home with my one year working holiday visa to live and work in Canada for the year. But all of that serious stuff later. Let's get on with the birthday first! I had one card already from dear Helena and Brian (the new Mr & Mrs Byrne!) who had given me a card when I met them in New York. How sweet; on their honeymoon, they remembered to get ME a frickin birthday card. Super special people (in a good way, obviously).

I made my way to downtown Toronto to meet Gillian from her office before we headed off to St. Lawrence Market for lunch. There is so much there, my head was practically spinning. Gillian kept asking me what I wanted; I'm terribly indecisive when it comes to food choices, especially when there were so many delicious things to choose from! I ended up getting a veal sandwich (I think, I just ordered the same thing as Gillian). Looking forward to going back again and spending some time there and maybe actually buying some stuff for home cooking next time!

After that, we took a stroll through Union Station and over to the Steam Whistle Brewery to take a tour. Can you think of many things that I would enjoy more than going to a brewery for my birthday? The tour was great, short enough so you don't get bored and the story of how the brewery started is really interesting. The brewery was started by 3 guys who were fired from their jobs working at another microbrewery in Ontario. They were initially going to call the company '3 Fired Guys' but later decided that this was not an ideal marketing tool. They went with the name 'Steam Whistle' as an homage to the 1950's when the blowing of a steamwhistle at 5pm signalled the end of the work day and meant that it was time for a nice cold beer. They still have the logo '3FG' on all of their bottles though! I could go on and on about the virtues of this amazing beer and the company's innovative green initiatives but you should check out the website for yourselves. Or better yet, just fly on over here and visit - I'd have no problem going again!
Because it was my birthday, they gave me a free bottle of delicious Steam Whistle beer (not that I needed it with the copious amounts of free samples that we were getting!) Invited the nice Scottish guy that we met and his Brazilian girlfriend along for dinner. He was all for it, she didn't seem so eager though. He argued with her about the fact that she wanted to go home and get changed first and said that they would meet us later. They seemed like good fun - unfortunately, the Brazilian chick must have won the argument as they never made an appearance :(

We went for dinner in Earls Restaurant with Gillian's twin Kate and a friend of theirs Amy (another Irish girl, surprise surprise). There was obviously only one thing that I was going to order - fillet steak with pepper sauce. Mmmmm. Cooked to perfection, served with crispy shoestring fries. I was happy. Henry was particularly happy when the sticky toffee pudding came out and Kate let him have some of it!

Moral of the Story - birthdays are fun in an international setting, especially when they're not fake birthdays (only had one or two of them in my life). Also, Steam Whistle beer = delicious!

Things I Noticed & Things I Learned This Time Around

3rd time in New York, some things still stand out to me.....

• The gaps between the bathroom doors. Usually less than a centimetre wide but still rather unnerving, you can see people washing their hands and hope to God that you don't catch someone's eye.
• The traffic light system. There's no such thing as a 'filter light' for drivers to turn and even when the pedestrian light says 'walk', it is still perfectly legal for cars to turn in your path. They're not trying to kill you as such but it kinda feels like they are.
• In a city of over 8 million people, it still amazes me how easy it is to bump into other Irish people and establish random connections.
• Despite people thinking that New Yorkers are rude, I still find them to be among the most delightful people that I have ever met. Brash and I love it.
• As per my last blog entry. I still haven't been to a single museum or gallery. You could spend 4 months straight only doing tourist activities and still not see everything that there is to see. Always an excuse to go back though!!

I also learned some really interesting things this time around;

• In Central Park, the reason why all the pathways (and the 4 roads that pass through) are so convoluted is because the architect and designers wanted to give people something different to the block-like grids on the rest of the island of Manhattan.
• There are more sweet potatoes grown on one farm in North Carolina than in the entire country of Australia (this was courtesy of one of the girls in my dorm room who had spent 3 weeks leading some sweet potato farmers around to different farms in America).
• You will not fall asleep on the trains after a few drinks if you stand up instead of sitting down. You can also get security to let you out for a cigarette when you've realised that the train isn't for another half an hour or so by claiming you're trying to put a phone call through to Ireland.
• American Football is officially the worst game in the world. I might even hate it more than cricket. Those of you that know me, will know the emphasis of this statement. I hate cricket more than I hate Linda Martin. 

Moral of the Story - I think it's fairly self explanatory from the above don't you? I love New York. I love New Jersey , well, Hoboken.