Time-warped pub

Despite only getting to bed at 8.30 am, I was sufficiently awake two hours later for the Hollyoaks omnibus on TV (lots better this week than last). AFter that we took a notion to complete our marathon and watched the last two episodes of the iconic ITV production of Brideshead Revisited. I have to admit to suffering from several long moments of boredom during the experience. It's all very, very wordy, really, and would benefit from a fairly liberal dose of editing. Still, the death of Lord Marchmain was wonderfully well done, with Larry Olivier milking the emotion for all he was worth. All in all, I'm glad we persevered. Watching it again brought back floods of memories of making a point all those years ago to be at home and in front of the television set each week whenever that great musical theme rang out. Like I often say: 'They just don't make them like that any more.'

Brideshead out of the way, it was time to pick u where we left off last week and sort out a replacement for Carl's defective microwave. So, back to Carrickmines we went, and once again (despite having gone through it all a week ago and supposedly only now returning in order to provide a reference number from Panasonic which would allow Currys to hand over a replacement ... despite that, the checkout staff had to go through the entire process all over, scanning barcodes, entering info on their computer terminel, calling over supervisors for help, asking for contact details, scanning in a bar code again but still having to manually enter model reference numbers and all that. The whole thing took for ever, and was ridiculously complex and time-consuming. Anyway, we finally left with the replacement and headed off to find someone to grab a quick calming-down pint.

We couldn't think of anywhere in the immediate area, so headed for Kilternan instead. There at the top of the road was The Golden Ball pub, still looking just as it did twenty years and more ago when I was involved in the national tenpin bowling association and we used put on fund-raising entertainments there. I struggled a bit trying to remember the name of the owner, a shrewd woman who did us no special favours when it came to paying for the room, despite being one of the stalwarts in the seniors league at the time. As we stood at the bar waiting for our Guinness to settle, I looked around me and there she was, small as life, just as she was all those years ago. She didn't remember me when I went over to her and shook hands, but as I walked away I suddenly remembered her name: Ellen Palmer. Sure enough, there was the name 'Palmer's' on the window in the cosy little corner we sat in while we nursed our way through our pints. The whole place really is just the same as it used to be, and it was good to sit there and reminisce about those days when tenpin bowling was the main thin in my spare-time life.

Pint finished, I dropped Carl and the microwave back to Glasthue and made my way back to my place. I didn't last long in front of the TV, but gave up and went to bed to catch up on some sleep.