Irelande Douze Pointe – Eurovision Gets A Proper Hand Up It’s Arse At Last!

I HOPED, I REALLY DID… and tonight it actually happened. Last week I heard about the 6 Irish Eurovision song contest entries and the one that caught my attention was the duck turkey from Dublin with the most outrageous idea yet. I’ve always avoided watching the Eurovision because it’s so campy and crap, but this year when I heard that a hand puppet was being entered into the contest with a song called “Irelande Douze Point” – as a kind of protest vote – I just had to tune in tonight to see what happened in the qualifiers.

And would you believe it… the idiots left it up to the voting public to decide who goes through. So of course the voting public decided to push for the biggest fuck-you act possible; they voted in a turkey for the Eurovision. I’m not talking about a bad song, I’m talking about an actual hand-puppet, fowl mouthed, Dublin based ex-builder Turkey with a hand stuffed up it’s arse!

It was absolutely pure class to see the reaction of the judges in the room after the hand puppet performed what I can only call an abomination of a song, surrounded by some seriously dodgy dancers and what appeared to be some kind of drag act/opera cross. This has literally just happened folks, so the video of this act is probably not yet available on the ‘net, but as soon as it is I will link to it from here.

You have to see this to believe it. Really. Words cannot possibly convey how truely atrocious and outlandish this is… and I just love the fact that the Irish public have voted this forward to the Eurovision competition. How the hell will the other contestants react?

G’wan you good thing!

Update: Here is the link to the video of this insane entry into the Eurovision 2008. Enjoy!

Finally, A Eurovision Turkey I Can Watch!

I MIGHT ACTUALLY WATCH IT this time around, especially if Dustin is on stage!

I refer of course to the ever-present Dustin the Dublin turkey, a famous muppet puppet if ever there was one in Ireland. This turkey has pedigree. He ran for president of the country for a while before being ousted. I think he even got into politics along the way. Rumour has it he has turned down a top job at the Football Association of Ireland (FAI) in order to concentrate on his singing career and more specifically Eurovision 2008.

And why should anyone care? Well you see Dustin is not just a turkey, he’s a hand puppet. That’s right, this stuffed, insane and manky turkey with a hand up his arse is getting almost as much press coverage as Clinton and Obama here in Ireland, it’s even making some international publications and I love it! Really. I mean Ireland has it’s problems these days, but seriously… where else in the world could you get a turkey with this much talent?

The mad turkey – if he makes it to the final stage – will be singing his song entry entitled “Irelande Douze Pointe”. No doubt some sanity will interfere with the plan, but the possibility of having a hand puppet representing Ireland and delivering a truely aweful song in the Eurovision would actually make me want to watch the damn thing, possibly even sober. Can you just imagine the ensuing carnage from the other competitors that would follow, especially if he scored some points in the process? Mmmnnn… fun indeed.

Ah hell, given the state of the political parties in this country I’d even give the damn bird my vote if he decided to run against the Fianna Failers and their bitches the Greens.

G’wan ya mad thing!

Our Cocker Spaniel Story Continues…

IT HAS TAKEN a few weeks, and there were times I thought it would never happen, but eventually Cosmo and Amber started playing together and now they get on like a house on fire. There was a collective sigh of relief when that happened because we were worried Amber just wouldn’t accept him after the death of her sister, Bonnie. A 10 year old Cocker and a new pup is not always the best combination, but in this case we either did everything right, or just got lucky. Either way, we couldn’t be happier.

The house will never be the same of course without Bonnie, and we had forgotten just how much work a pup is and, worse still, the bloody damage they can do in chewing everything that’s not nailed down… but it’s worth it.

Lots of people have been asking us for updates on Cosmo and his progress so for anyone that has been following the Cosmo story thus far I’ve uploaded a bunch of new photos into his gallery. He is now 3 months old and growing like a mad thing. I think he has the longest legs I’ve ever seen on a young cocker spaniel, so it’s highly likely he will be a very big dog when he grows into his frame.

He really is a typical mischievous, shifty and sneaky cocker spaniel pup though, so much so that he has earned the title of ‘silent bu deadly’ around here. It’s hard to catch him in the act, but so far he has managed to eat my telephone cable, kill my PC speaker system, eat some money (notes not coins!), destroy some guide books (he has a fondness for guidebooks about Paris for some reason!), dismantle his bed into molecular form, shred what was left of the carpet at the top of the stairs and much more… nothing is safe, but it’s fun to watch him grow up and I do believe Amber is happier now with the company. Read more

Are These The Actual Options For Famous Guinness Dublin Brewery?

USUALLY IT’S A CASE of the public sampling Guinness, on a fairly regular basis it has to be said, but this evening I took part in a survey – completely by coincidence – where Guinness were sampling their customer base in advance of potentially huge changes for the ailing company.

Things have not been going well for Guinness in recent years. I used to work there, up until 2001, and even then market share was dropping with alarming regularity. Although overall share prices are on the up for Diageo – the parent company – the Guinness brand is in trouble. Drink driving legislation, take home trade market growth and more ‘fashionable and younger’ drinks are all taking their toll on the old diehard brand.

Guinness of course have attempted to fight back with clever marketing campaigns and adverts, with new products and options for the younger and more discerning drinker (Guinness Red anyone?… Meh!), hell they’ve even developed some “Surge” technology to enable the ‘perfect pint’,  but none of it seems to be making that much difference to the downward slide in performance.

Even when I was working there the rumours of the Brits closing down the St. James Gate brewery were always a regular topic of conversation at the lunch table, or indeed over a pint or two. Up to now it’s been speculation, but more recently this particular rumour seems to have gathered some speed and momentum. Back in June this year Diageo confirmed they were looking at options, but remained elusive on what those options actually were. 

The survey I completed online tonight kind of reinforces (for me anyway) the idea that the Diageo management team are serious about taking a long hard look at their options for the home of Guinness this time around, and in particular they seemed to have refined said options down to just a few fairly key ones.

So, what variations are they looking at then? Well, you might be surpsied to know that there are four distinct options on the menu – according to the survey anyway -as follows:- Read more