The Village of Expletives<\/p>\n\n\n\n
During my travels in the West of Ireland, whilst I was looking for evidence of the creature known as the giggling bure, I had an interesting encounter in a pub, which I must here relate. I had not stopped in for a drink: that\u2019s not the right way to put it. Nobody \u2018stops in for a drink\u2019 in that country. Neither had I \u2018decided to wet my whistle\u2019. Whistles do not, and cannot exist in that land on account of the constant screaming of the wind through improbable cracks in the limestone hills. No. I had arrived at this establishment in the manner of most outsiders, that is, I was catapulted therein by the obstreperous weather. I was compelled into the establishment by a desperate surge of self-preservation; I am convinced that had I spent one more minute embroiled in those tumultuous gales, I would have been viciously dismembered and would have breathed my last breath wondering why the hell I had decided to step out into it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Not a soul in the bar remarked upon my panic-stricken entrance. I shook myself off in the doorway and bolted the door behind me. I went to the bar and ordered a Guinness. The barman, a man with more wrinkles than face, poured me the pint and judged me for the amateur traveller that I was.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
After I had composed myself with a long sip of my beer, I turned in my seat to find a solemn stranger sitting next to me. He was a skinny fellow, clearly the product of some genetic splicing that had involved a human and an elastic band.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI almost died out there,\u201d I said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This elastic band man turned his head slowly to regard me. I looked into his eyes and he into mine. In those eyes, I saw a backstory full of long nights at sea and so many near-death experiences that he had figured out the meaning of life by experience. He didn\u2019t answer me at first, so I tried again to engage him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIf I had known it was going to be like that, I would have stayed in Galway,\u201d I said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
My companion moved his face in a way that indicated he was listening to me, but that also said he had no need to reply. I tried again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cMy name is Hassleforth Gingerberry,\u201d I said, and extended my hand.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cFuck Off,\u201d said this man and accepted my handshake. As you can imagine, I was taken aback.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cExcuse me?\u201d I said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cFuck Off,\u201d he repeated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cFuck off yourself,\u201d I said. \u201cI was only trying to chat with you!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cNo, no, no. You don\u2019t understand,\u201d sighed this rude man as if he had had this conversation a hundred times before (I was soon to learn that this was in fact true). \u201cThat\u2019s my name. Fuck Off. My name is Fuck Off.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I was taken aback in a different direction. What was this nonsense? I demanded an explanation. My unfortunately named drinking partner gave me one.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He came from the village of Capalle, in County Galway, which today bears the linguistic heritage of a terrible, historical misunderstanding. For it was in Capalle, (from the Gaelic for \u2018horse it\u2019), that there was formed, in the 1630s, an intense cult known as Leant\u00f3ir\u00ed<\/em> na<\/em> Gaoithe<\/em>, which in English means \u2018Followers of the Wind\u2019. The Leant\u00f3ir\u00ed na Gaoithe believed that they were the recipients of messages from the otherworld, which they received through interpretations of the howling of the wind. A charismatic holy man, whose name has gone unrecorded, would stand at the edge of the cliffs, cock his ear into the winds of the Atlantic, and return with advice and instructions for the people of Capalle. Though we know not this man\u2019s name, we might deduce something of his personality, since the messages he imparted have been recorded in a book the Leant\u00f3ir\u00ed na Gaoithe regard as their sacred text. The book is entitled \u201cThe Howl of Alan Ginsborg\u201d. Some verses (I have translated, badly probably):<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cNay shalt thou not in any way impede the progress of thine leader in the summer dusk. Shalt thou be smote from the face of the Earth shouldst thou walk to his fore in a meddlesome gait!\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cBringeth thee to thine holy man many fair maidens! Question not what happenth in the tent!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cSupply thine hearts with the ambrosia of servitude. Act according to command and think not what thine life would be like if thou saidst no, or perish for all eternity in the bog!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cGive unto he that speaketh to the wind many fine foods! Question not the quantity! Think only of his hunger and not your own!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cFind for thine leader his missing cup! He cannot enjoy his wine in the cup of a pleb! Go on now, hurry up!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cBestow on thine holy man many spuds! Bestow on him many sweet things for after dinner, and maybe in the morning if he so desires, and question not or perish!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n And the enigmatic:<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI saw the best minds of my village destroyed by madness! Starving, hysterical, spudless, dragging themselves through the boglands of Galway looking for a missing horse!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Of course, it wasn\u2019t long before many of the maidens of the village were found to be with child. A great deal was made of the fact, with many celebrations and much boiling of spuds. The holy man insisted he would be the one to name each child, and rumors circled excitedly as to which names he would chose, and why he was so insistent on this course of action. We can only now guess the answer to these questions because the day came when our holy man was found clinging to a crag of a cliff one hundred metres above the ocean, having cocked his ear just that little too much and fallen over the edge.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The villagers in panic shouted down to him:<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cHow can we save you oh holy man? What can we do?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n But our holy man was beyond help, for the rock crumbled under his slipping fingers. The villagers knew this was the end for him, and the most pregnant of the women screamed desperately down to him:<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cBut tell us oh holy man what I should name my child!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n At this moment, the rock gave way, and the holy man, realizing his imminent death, said:<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cOh shite!\u201d and then fell to his demise.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Thus, the first child was named Oh Shite. The other many expectant mothers followed suit, and soon there were children named Feck It, Bollocks, Sweet Fuck, Ara Come On Now You Big Eejit, and the enduring Christ Almighty. Why this tradition of naming children after expletives has survived to the present day has been the subject of much research, but the most plausible explanation I have come across is that solidarity trumped embarrassment \u2013 you don\u2019t feel so bad about your name being Fuck Bastard if your friend\u2019s name is Bastard Fuck.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I thanked my new acquaintance for this history. We spent a good evening speaking about the advantages and disadvantages of his name. I had expected him to be pessimistic, but he informed me that it was most useful. If he didn\u2019t want to talk, the name was an excellent get out, and if he did, he explained the situation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We are in contact to this day. He sends me letters which are brilliantly concluded with the closing: \u2018Yours sincerely, Fuck Off\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n THE END<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Village of Expletives During my travels in the West of Ireland, whilst I was looking for evidence of the creature known as the giggling bure, I had an interesting encounter in a pub, which I must here relate. I had not stopped in for a drink: that\u2019s not the right way to put it….<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-289","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/chadeastwood.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/289","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/chadeastwood.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/chadeastwood.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chadeastwood.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chadeastwood.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=289"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/chadeastwood.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/289\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":290,"href":"https:\/\/chadeastwood.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/289\/revisions\/290"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/chadeastwood.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=289"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chadeastwood.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=289"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chadeastwood.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=289"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}