Maybe we could save each other (1)

Mam and Dad went to Mayo on Saturday morning, Sis says she wants to go see About A Boy. I wanted to see it, so we agreed that when she got back at around 5pm from…….socialising. I hung around the house in my “pyjamas” (clothes I wear when I can’t be arsed getting dressed properly) til 5pm, when herself and her friend arrive, saying they’re ready to go. So I ordered three tickets and got dressed. Just as we’re about to leave, I go to get the keys of the car and……no, they’re not there. Oh fuck.

Now I would’ve at that stage cut my losses and got a video. Technically I’m not supposed to (most freqeunt phrase in my life) be driving my mother’s car like this. If I’m ever to use it, it is to be on official state-sanctioned business i.e. collecting sister from school, collecting drunken parent from staff night-out etc. Going to the cinema on a whim isn’t really proper usage and is akin to Mary “The Gerbil” Harney using an naval aircraft to fly to Manorhamilton and open an off-licence. It really is like that, except Harney didn’t suddenly realise she had paid for her day out in Leitrim and now couldn’t go because they didn’t have the keys for the plane. I had cinema tickets bought, fecking things cost me €24 and I’ll be damned if I’m just going to leave it and rent out a shite video.

Luckily, I found the bastarding things in the very first place I thought Mam might have hidden them, so off we headed to the Blanchardstown Centre, a big shopping mall in west Dublin for any Yanks currently at a loss. In we went, bought wedges and barbeque dip and sat down to two hours of Hugh Grant being short-haired and smart-arsed, Toni Colette being utterly mingin’ and the afore-mentioned Boy About which the film is doing an impression of Damien, The Son of Satan. Relished in it’s own quirkiness, but rather warm and self-assured which is probably because two Americans directed it. I saw a bit of Bridget Jones today (seen it twice already) and while it’s lovely and everything, the Brits seem to enjoy having tensions between characters as a driving force whereas the Americans (well those that did About a Boy) had tension as simply a quick thing to get over before everyone became best-of-friends. Maybe you like that, maybe you don’t. Maybe I’m wrong. But I liked that aspect of About A Boy. And I’m developing the kind of feelings towards Hugh Grant that many ladies out there feel towards Kylie “The Arse” Minogue. Skinny bastard.

That night, I went over to Emer’s house. Emer and I watched Get Over It last Friday night in my attic. She was utterly absorbed by it, I couldn’t give a rat’s arse. The film sucked gooseberries through a toothbrush, I was like “what the fuck??” the whole time. It had some setpieces that might have worked had it not been for the lazy dialogue, ridiculous characters and insane direction. Martin Short was in it, playing the same camp arsehole he’s played since Father of the Bride, and Sisqo was there too but not so you’d notice. So was Jackie from That 70’s Show, who had around four lines in the whole thing. I was expecting much from here; she’s good in That 70’s Show and but she also did the voice for Meg in Family Guy, which makes her practically royalty in my eyes. But this is off the point; if they were bigger people in the film, it wouldn’t have made a difference. They’d still be part of the damn thing.

Getting slowly back to the point, that night last Friday was weird because I had to stay sober in order to collect the parents from Lucan where they were at a house-warming. Ok so, just sit there with Emer and see how it goes. She didn’t say a word. Huge silences, and when I said something she wouldn’t have heard me. I know, I’m an attention-seeking twat. But she’s completely absorbed by films, even crap ones. She studies film, which makes the whole thing a bit worrying. These awkward moments were plentiful, since I hadn’t had anyone over in my house since “Mate” (friendship now officially decommisioned and secret hope she breaks up with boyfriend and has no-one to turn to now harboured by my evil mind). I’m not good with people. I am slightly sociable after six pints (“six pints” – what a Meath benchmark. Eww!) but I mustn’t depend on drink to get me through these things. That would be regarded as alcoholism. And we don’t want that now, do we?

All the same, I’m worried about my drinking these days. The weekend I met up with the OD “Munster Massive” was a bank holiday weekend and I was, for the most of it, in varying degrees of inebriation. It felt like there was a can of Heineken in my hand the whole time. And on Sunday evening, I just sat at the itchen table with a paper and opened a can. Just out of habit; I hadn’t even noticed how casually I just took it out and opened it. I know it’s only one can, but it’s a major shift in attitude for me. Must drink less.