Jah Lush

An Irishman walks into a bar in Dublin, orders three pints of Guinness and sits in the back of the room, drinking a sip out of each one in turn. When he finishes them, he comes back to the bar and orders three more. The bartender says to him, "You know, a pint goes flat after I draw it; it would taste better if you bought one at a time." The Irishman replies, "Well, you see, I have two brothers. One is in America, and the other in Australia, and I'm here in Dublin. When we all left home, we promised that we'd drink this way to to remember the days when we drank together." The bartender admits that this is a nice custom, and leaves it there. The Irishman becomes a regular in the bar, and always drinks the same way: He orders three pints and drinks them in turn. One day, he comes in and orders two pints. All the other regulars notice and fall silent. When he comes back to the bar for the second round, the bartenders says, "I don't want to intrude on your grief, but I wanted to offer my condolences on your great loss." The Irishman looks confused for a moment, then a light dawns in his eye and he laughs, "Oh, no," he says, "everyone's fine. I've just quit drinking."

Crocs are so last year my little darlings.

Yes please. Yum yum. Best of luck to you.

Nonsense. It's the one day in the year when we should be able to celebrate being English. And I for one feel that we should have a bank holiday to be able to celebrate all that is good in our country without getting all jingoistic about it.

Oh! Tillie is my cover blown? Drat! Anyway, the book is good. I read it again last week just to make sure.

A woman stopped by unannounced at her recently married son's house. She rang the doorbell and walked in. She was shocked to see her daughter-in-law lying on the couch, totally naked. Soft music was playing, and the aroma of perfume filled the room. "What are you doing?" she asked. "I'm waiting for my husband to come home from work," the daughter-in-law answered. "But you're naked!" the mother-in-law exclaimed. "This is my love dress," the daughter-in-law explained. "Love dress? But you're naked!" "My husband loves me to wear this dress," she explained. "It excites him to no end. Everytime he sees me in this dress, he instantly becomes romantic and ravages me for hours on end. He can't get enough of me." The mother-in-law left. When she got home, she undressed, showered, put on her best perfume, dimmed the lights, put on a romantic CD, and lay on the couch waiting for her husband to arrive. Finally, her husband came home. He walked in and saw her laying there so provocatively. "What are you doing?" he asked. "This is my love dress," she whisphered sensually. "Needs ironing," he said. "What's for dinner?"

Only read one of his books before which was My Other Life, thoroughly enjoyed it too, so must seek out some more.

No, but I am a lush. Well, I have been in the past and seeing as it's Friday I probably will be tonight too. You're not really Ratty either are you?

Yes, good service Jeremy. I've been going to Le Chardon for years and they've always looked after me very well in there.

I've had a copy of Parade's End for a number of years now and still haven't got around to reading it, maybe I'll give it a whirl soon. Just started Paul Theroux's Picture Palace this morning and I think I'm going to enjoy it very much.

Personally I'd take her to Le Chardon. You can't go wrong in there. Lovely grub and good service.

If you want something quick and easy to read in your lunchbreak I'd like to recommend to anyone who's interested Joseph Roth's "The Legend Of the Holy Drinker.":)-D

I sense the start of a book club here. Nice one Polly.

You need to read some Milan Kundera then Keef, who often starts in the middle and goes off into other tangents back and forth betwixt the beginning and end. Try "The Unbearable Likeness of Being." It's absolutely brilliant.

He did indeed Hugenot with illustrations too and the worse case of that was in his first one, The Pickwick Papers. Apropos of nothing I grew up in Pickwick Road in the Village.

This is true Keef. I can barely move in my flat for books, records, CDS and tapes, the place is overflowing and I need to move to bigger premises as to throw any of them out would be like losing a limb.

A home is not a home without bookshelves loaded with good books Keef.

Well, basically I had a lousy education and came to them later on in life and perhaps that's why I have enjoyed them so much rather than have had them ramned down my throat at school. And, no I haven't or is there a punchline coming there Hugenot?

Camp as a row of tents he may be but it doesn't make him funny either.

I stopped reading Iain Banks's stuff after the The Crow Road or was it Espedair Street and I've never been into his science fiction stuff as most sci-fi bores me to tears, besides I prefer to read the classics from the 19th century whether it be English, French or Russian, for example, Dickens, Hardy, Baudelaire, Zola, Du Maupassant and De Balzac, Dostoyevsky, Gogol and Tolstoy. I read voraciously and obviously I enjoy a lot of more contempory stuff too and there is a lot to recommend but maybe I'll get back to you on that at another time.

"Outside of a dog, a book is a man's best friend, inside of a dog it's too dark to read." Groucho Marx.

Have you Tillie? That's great. What do you mean by whether Steve can hold his head up? Have you got a copy yet? I've just finished reading it again. Have you checked out the website? Sorry, this must seem like the Spanish inquisition.

Alan Carr is about as funny as cancer.(td)

Cheers Keith, point taken but check out Dylan, I didn't get into him until I was 32 and, I just love the Stones even if they have turned into parodies of their former selves but they still cut it live.

I think Keef, if we were to write all the lyrics out to our favourite top ten tunes it would take all day to read them. But I would suggest perhaps is to maybe just list the songs. Also, I can't believe theres no lyrics on here by the likes of Bob Dylan, Nick Cave, Lou Reed, Jagger & Richards, Lennon & McCartney all great lyricists but then I guess your demographic is for a younger generation than an old git like me. Cheers :)-D