Pretty Hikers

Midweek in Tralee and we're settled in for the night. Ruby on her blackberry whilst also watching Friends, Freddie watching his DVD player and Lisa, well tidying up as usual and making herself a cup of tea. Lucky to be home tonight after my van broke down. Simon, the guy who helped me out when I needed the new shop decorated, had the van yesterday shifting some rubbish from the old house when the clutch gave out. Should have guessed I suppose as it was making such a screeching noise all weekend. Luckily he'd made it home to his own place before it gave up the ghost. So I was stuck in Dingle with Ruby and no way home. A quick call to my GOOD friend Siobhan and she'd offered us her car for a few days, she's off to the sun, poor thing. Ruby and I weren't stuck in Dingle, not that would be a bad thing except when your home is in Tralee. At least we didn't have to hitch in the rain...

Which brings me to my third hitching story of the Summer. After I'd dropped my pineapple and aubergine man I headed off to Cork. Coming out of Killarney  I spotted two hikers standing in the rain, in all-in-one kagool type raincoats with big rucksacks beside them. Over I pulled and got out to open the boot. As they walked towards the car I noticed it was two females, as they took off their raincoats I noticed they were two beautiful females and not just that they were only wearing shorts and tshirts. This looks great I said to myself, someone who knows me will pass and all of Dingle will be talking about John Verling picking up two young, beautiful, scantily clad hikers with his wife and son in hospital in Cork. The dirty looks, the furrowed brows, children pointing in the street.The nice man tag would be gone once and for all.  Anyway the two, Anna and Maria, got in the back and with big smiles thanked me for stopping. "Where are you going?" I asked, "I'm going to Cork."  "Oh we were going to Mallow but now we'll go to Cork" they said laughing. Great. Well I have to say they made the journey go very quickly and their happy outlook on life helped lift my mood. Of course they had perfect english and despite talking via the rearview mirror all the way to Cork, we got on well. One of them fell asleep, guess I'm not as interesting as I'd like to think. In fairness it was only for twenty minutes or so. We spoke of life and what they planned to do with theirs, after all they were just beginning I tried giving some sagely advice. They explained how being from the old east Germany they had a better sense of humour than those from the west. we did laugh a lot and the hour or so to Cork was probably the most fun I've had with two Germans in a long time. As I had to go straight to the hospital I dropped them at a bus stop near the entrance. More funny looks were given by those at the bus stop who were watching a middle aged man drop two young women and saying goodbye with a hug and a kiss. Ah whats a guy to do?

Heard today that my friend Dave Walsh lost his final appeal for disability payments from the Dept of Social Protection. The reason given  was that his Parkinson's meant he wasn't sufficiently disabled. As I've said before what the fuck is "sufficiently disabled"?  According to the OED sufficiently means "as much as is needed". I know Dave and he certainly doesn't need to be as disabled as much as he is! Just keep working those two jobs Dave you're doing fine...makes me angry just thinking about it! A society is judged by how well it looks after those most in need. The Dept of Social Protection ain't painting a pretty picture of Irish society at the moment