NiallOK’s Blog

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On Friday night, I was DJ’ing for a wedding and never have I seen anything like it in my life!… a fancy dress wedding party where practically no-one out of the 150 to 200 guests failed to show up in costume. It was a great party - complete with two Pope Benedict’s, a female monk, two of the three musketeers, Elvis Presley, Snow White, jivers from the 20’s, swingers from the 60’s, loads of pirates, Al Capone, ‘Cilla’ from Coronation Street, Ozzie Osbourne, Jesus Christ himself, and loads more - with the bride and groom being a well-dressed sailor and his mermaid. Only in Co. Meath, eh?

Only a couple of hours earlier I had the pleasure of interviewing Rebecca Hart for my radio show. She’s an incredibly talented performer and the interview itself went on for a full 40 minutes without a break - during which she played a couple of her own songs and a cover track. The show is repeated on Wednesday at 2pm with her interview repeated at 3pm - the station is streamed at www.dundalkfm.com.

Here’s a snap of myself with Rebecca in the studio:

Oh, and while I’m at it,… here’s a picture of Pope Benedict and one of his monks givin’ it loads on the dancefloor at the wedding I was DJ for on Friday night:

The weekend just gone was a blurry haze of Guinness, Guinness, more Guinness, some pizza, chips, more Guinness and then some … eh… Guinness.

The party I went to on Saturday night was an insanely silly explosion of booze and mirth and didn’t end until after 5 in the morning. It was the going-away party for the proprietor of our department in work. My partner and I went along to it, and she proceeded to grumble at me for being the only “other half” there. Of course it turned out that she wasn’t as other partners promptly turned up. Well… two of them did. Anyway, after a nice champagne reception, we watched a “before and after” DVD which we’d made (showing what we all did before working there and what we’re doing now), and listened to a few standard “you’re all wonderful, I’ll miss you terribly” speeches, ate some expensive tasting food and belted into the drink.

About 10 drinks later, she-who-must-be-obeyed was exhausted and had to go home and hit the sack, so I grudgingly got a cab back with her. This was at about 2am and I, in my wisdom, decided I hadn’t had enough and after tucking her in, I WALKED back into town, (well - walked along the full length of the Point Road and got a taxi from there back to the bar… but close enough) for more late drinkage. After knocking on the door for about a minute (I’d left my damn phone in work), I got back in and got a lovely pint of Guinness placed in front of me. It was a wild night - great fun - but one of those nights where you really should realise well in advance what a brain smashingly head-thumpingly nasty hangover was lying in wait for you the next day. The beer was flowing freely - LITERALLY - I didn’t have to put my hand in my pocket once all night. That was probably not a good thing as it made it easier to just keep on drinking. One great sing-song and copious pints later I stumbled back out the door, along with the workmates that live near me and got a taxi home… and did I EVER pay for that night the next day. I was shattered!

In other news, after my show on Friday night, in which I interview New York singer/songwriter Rebecca Hart, I’ve got a gig out in Drumconrath - and not just any gig… I’m DJ’ing for the fancy-dress wedding party of a couple from the area. That’s right.. you misread me not. A fancy-dress wedding party. The music starts at 11.30pm-ish, and finishes at god-knows-when.

And I’ve got work the next day. Oh joy.

On a boards.ie thread, the question was posed: “if you could ‘off’ (kill) three people, who would they be?”

Why oh why did I go for the obvious ones…? … (They being Ian Paisley, Queen Elizabeth II and George W. Bush).

My explanation for Paisley was..: “No one man has done more to stand in the way of peace, democracy and unity on this island. “Reverend” me hole. One of the most ignorant, bigoted and self-centred bastards it has ever been my severe displeasure to be aware of the existence of.” I stand by that. Mind you, the man still manages to surprise me by regularly plumbing further the depths of his ignorance and bigotry and repeatedly further displaying his utter incompetence at being a regular, compassionate and upstanding human being.

As for the Queen, I said that it was “nothing personal,- I just think it would be a massive event - and an interesting one to be alive for - if she were to be assassinated (and not replaced). Everyone would know where they were *THAT* day!”. It’d be one of those things, wouldn’t it? Where were you on 9/11? Where were you the day Diana died? Where were you when Whelan scored for Ireland against Italy in Giants Stadium, NY? Where were you when the bombs went off in London? Where were you when the Queen was killed? … Hell, yeah.

And when it comes to President Bush, while my “reasons may be obvious, unlike many people I know, I actually don’t believe that the American people do deserve to have this unfortunate cretinous bottom-of-the-gene-pool chimp-like waste of DNA of a creature as their supreme leader… plus again, it would be an interesting event to be alive for - the assassination of an American ‘president’.” It’d be our JFK. Hopefully it’d be as controversial too. Although… Feckarse! The FBI are probably keeping an eye on this site now for further updates on my Bush assassination “plans”… Hello agents. Please look here first. Thanks.

(Jesus, I really shouldn’t have put “American”, “President”, “Bush” and “assassination” so close together in a page on the Internet.)

(…Actually, thinking about that, I shouldn’t have put the words “President” and “Bush” next to each other,… anywhere.)

I could have given my reply more thought though. I could have, as Repli did, mentioned Dr. Rihab Taha (a.k.a. Dr. Germ), who is one of the most dangerous people alive, what with her fine collection of “19,000 litres of botulism toxin; 8,000 litres of anthrax; 2,000 litres of aflatoxins, which can cause liver cancer; clostridium perfringens, a bacterium that can cause gas gangrene; and ricin, a castor bean derivative which can kill by impeding circulation. She also admitted conducting research into cholera, salmonella, foot and mouth disease, and camel pox, a disease that uses the same growth techniqes as smallpox”. I could have given an honourary deathwish mention to a certain unnamed shithead lorry driver, who’s drunken motoring directly caused the death of my girlfriend on an English motorway, just over 11 years ago.

I could even have wished a swift life ending administering of a mighty boot to the “bollix” region of Mr. Osama Bin Laden or Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and his associates for their various crimes against humanity, a spine-crushingly deathbringing walloping with an anvil to the body of most of the Big Brother UK contestants (especially Maxwell and Saskia from this year’s ‘event’ and Jade Goody), along with, of course, the shows creators, for their crimes against entertainment, or a skull-shatteringly corpse-creating vice-job on the head of Paris Hilton … - for basically being a twat… but no, I chose the obvious targets of Paisley, the Queen, and Bush. What’s up with that? Where’s the creativity? Bah!!!

If I had to whittle it down to one though…

Ian Paisley.

Although, mind you, at least he does provide us with the odd laugh

…”Rarr Rarr Rar!… No! No! No!… Rarr!”

Disclaimer: The above, while being all in good fun, is just that - fun. I’ve no intention or desire to kill anyone, much less the three named above. Look up sarcasm, if you must.

Well!

Much time has passed since my last blog entry… *checks* … nearly 6 months in fact! Wow…

Loads has happened in that time.

I now enjoy minor celebrity in my new home town of Dundalk (well… I like to think so) - with my own weekly radio show “The Wall of Sound” going out for 3 hours every Friday night. I interview bands, I play the charts, I do live competitions (which embee does all too well in winning), I do a chart run-down, I go live to local footie matches, … I do it all!

It’s great fun having my own local radio show… It’s been running since July 15th and already I’ve given away Oregon and iRiver MP3 players, a Hewlett Packard scanner with a Compact Flash memory card, a Mercury digital camera, and some CD’s as prizes, and I’ve had live acts like “Down And Out”, Alan Anderson, “The Get Well Incentive”, “Cosure” and “Sunscarred” live in studio. New York singer/song-writer Rebecca Hart will be appearing on the show on Friday week (Sept. 23rd), and local band The Realm a week or two after that.

Apart from the “Wall of Sound” show, I’ve also been doing other shows, such as “The Rude Awakening” - which I did twice - on the May and June bank holiday Monday mornings, and the main magazine show on Dundalk FM 100, “Dundalk Daily” - where I filled in for their usual presenter Harry Lee twice recently. This Friday coming (Sept. 16th), in the place of the “Wall of Sound” show, I’ll be producing a live sports show in which we’ll be broadcasting coverage and commentary of the McConville Cup Final from Oriel Park here in Dundalk - as well as some music and topical chat. On top of all that, I’ve now got a second weekly radio show of my own which goes out on Wednesdays from 2 to 4pm. At the moment, this second show is called “Back Room Beats”, because I pre-record it in the back bedroom of my house. It tends to feature more laid back tracks and stuff you don’t normally hear on the radio (B-Sides, etc.). I’m going to have to record this weeks one late tonight after dropping my partner down to work (she’s got the incredibly nasty midnight to 8am shift this week…). Next week I’ll be filling in for Paddy Mac on the “Good Morning Dundalk” show twice - on Tuesday and Thursday. Then, of course, there’ll be my normal shows on Wednesday and Friday… Like I said … I do it all!… I kick broadcasting ass!
Now if only I got paid for it…

Apart from the radio, I’ve been keeping busy in my job in Harvey Norman. We’ve a new proprietor now in our (Computer) department and this Saturday coming we have a going-away party for our old proprietor who is heading to Cork to be the proprietor of the new Harvey Norman store down there. We’re all dressing up as different Australians for the going-away party… I get to be Steve Irwin, the crocodile hunter. Oh joy.

I have the shorts. I have the boots. I even have the hat. Now I’m just looking for a good khaki shirt.

Just tonight I made arrangements to start a new 2 day a week part-time job in a local pub. The extra dosh will come in handy from that … as will the extra dosh I’ll be getting from various DJ gigs I’m getting at the moment. I’ve one coming up in Drumconrath - a wedding party for a lovely - and very different couple. Rather than have the standard church wedding, they’re having it in a registry office and following it up with a piss-up of the highest order, with a fancy-dress party, live band and DJ (me) to follow. I’ll be starting at 11.30PM and not finishing up until the wee smalls. Next month I’ve a gig in Blanchardstown - which is a fair distance to travel - but hey - in this case, it is very fair to say … the money’s good!

Not that I’ll see much of it though. *Shakes fist at VISA card* … ah well!

Until next time, here’s a picture of me, looking “mean”.

Take care of yourself, kids. And each other.