Fionn Butler was born this afternoon.

First Son to Caitriona and Aonghus

First Grandson to Martin, Sile, Paul and Noirin.

All doing well!

Yay Hay!

As James Joyce said in

Ecce Puer;

Young life is breathed
On the glass;
The world that was not
Comes to pass.

Treasure it Mr. O, it is not easily won, especially from daughters.

with Tramore town behind

from this mornings London Independent

I just saw that the nominees for the Irish Blog Award have been listed here.

I was extremely gratified to see that all of my nominations were listed .

They are all so excellent I am also really hopeful that they will all win in their categories.

My nominations are :

Best Photo Blog : Veni Vidi

Best Food Blog : Bibliocook

Best Humour Blog : Well Done Fillet

Best Personal Blog : English Mum

And if I had to pick Best Blog of the Year from that lot I would give it to Veni Vidi
(as his is the one I go to first each day)

Good Luck to you all !

(or the man from Lough Ness comes to Tramore for a winter break)

Now if we could lure this fellow up the River Orb for his summer holliers and persuade Notre Dame de Thezan to move a little, I think we could ride out the recession in style in Thezan.

1.
Be Flexible (if possible) book your holiday after you have booked the flight. Sometimes a single day can make a difference of €100 in the cost of a flight.

2.
Check-In on line, not only does this make boarding quicker but I have yet to see anyone having their bags weighed on boarding.

3.
Do not have any hold luggage, not only does this make everything cheaper (a bag in the hold can now cost more than the flight) but it means you can check in on line and not have to wait for the Carousel (and therefore avoid queues at the car rental)

4.
Don’t wear anything which will set off the metal detector- sounds simple doesn’t it -yet every time I fly I see people having to take off jewellery, belts , shoes, under wire bras in the most embarrassingly open position.

5.
Invest in a waistcoat with big pockets which will take your cash, keys, spectacles, book and newspaper. This you can put through the scanner and then wear on the plane. Everything to hand without scrambling into the locker.

6.
If you have difficulty fitting everything you need in the on-flight bag wear some more.
OK I know this means you will be roasting alive on the flight but it may also give you a crucial change of underwear.

7.
Give yourself a choice of things to do on the plane e.g. have a novel and crossword.
Attention span seems shorter at altitude.

8.
Buy water in the “duty free” this is much cheaper than on the plane.

9.
Go into the boarding area early and find a seat near where the head of the queue will be, that way you can sit down until the last moment.

10
Board at the back of the plane, most go in the front so this gives you a greater choice of seats and a better chance of getting off faster.

Bill Bryson, polymath author and a onetime American in London, is a master of the comic anecdote.
In his book, Mother Tongue, a scholarly but lively telling of the story of the English Language, he tells one of his best without telling it at all, and leaves it to ourselves to fill in the blanks.

He is talking about the differences between American and English;

“…….whereas a reference to a woman’s fanny – which to an American is an innocent synonym for the buttocks – would at a British dinner party provoke an embarrassed silence . (You may recognise the voice of experience in this.)”

As I listen to my two new Thomas Fersen CDs I am struck again by the amount of times it appears that he is inspired by food, in fact by the amount of times a lot of modern French singer songwriters write songs about food, people like Benabar and Tryo ;- to mention but two more in my very limited knowledge of modern French chanson.
This got me thinking on songs, pop songs particularly, which had been written with food as their theme.
Strangely enough to start with I could think of very few.
I know that we have had groups which called themselves by definitely culinary names such as: Jam, Marmalade, Hot Chocolate, even dance crazes called after food like the Mashed Potato.

Now there wasn’t a shortage of nursery rhymes themed about for foods, take Little Jack Horner and his roaming thumb, Pat a Cake, Pat a Cake,- even Christmas is Coming is all about the foodie treats ahead.
In fact Children’s songs are more likely to be about food, Animal Crackers, Lollipop Tree , I Scream for Icecream,and Big Rock Candy Mountain are some that come to mind.

But then , the more I thought the more foodie songs crept in, some folkie ones from the sixties, Judy Collins singing I always cook with Honey, Joni Mitchell’s breakfast in Chelsea Morning must be a classic with the appetising lines:

There was milk and toast and honey and a bowl of oranges, too
And the sun poured in like butterscotch and stuck to all my senses

But Arlo Guthrie did write the long and rambling (and endearing) Alice’s Restaurant without mentioning food at all.
A lot of times it was like that, a so called foodie title turned out to be something else altogether. The Mamas and Papas Sing for your Supper (and you’ll get breakfast) was about sex, Donovan’s Candy Man was about drug dealing.

The Beatles are a bit of a disappointment, all I could think of to start off was I am The Walrus, but lines like I am the Eggman could hardly be mistaken for praise for the same food.
Then I remembered Savoy Truffle, An anthem of praise for desserts:

Cream tangerine and montelimar,
A ginger sling with a pineapple heart,
A coffee dessert, yes you know it’s good news,
But you’ll have to have them all pulled out after the Savoy truffle.

But I will leave you with one of my favourite songs about food which, funnily enough, has no words; Brooker T and the MGs, Green Onions.

(btw there are 10 links in this piece, a new world record for me!)

Can anybody think of any more?