Marty

Oddly enough, although I considered myself at least half-Irish (dad was from Ireland) as a child growing up in the north of England, I never actually managed to get to Ireland until 1979 when I was almost 32 years old. There simply hadn't been enough money in the house for distant holidays like that. Most years the best we could hope for was a week in a cramped caravan at the seaside in north Wales. Mind you, dad did take two of my older siblings to Ireland in the summer of 1956. I would have been 8 at the time, but I still felt jealous not to be going with them. Apparently dad's brother (my Uncle John - whom I sadly never met) only had room to accommodate dad and 2 children, as he had 4 kids of his own. Initially it was to have been the 2 oldest who would go, but my oldest brother wasn't keen on the idea for some reason. So dad invited the next in age, my older brother. Had he declined, I would have been next in line. But he accepted, and he and my eldest sister had the holiday of a lifetime (their words - even to this day). Mum and dad split the following year, and I didn't actually see dad again for around 10 years (but that's another story). So my dreams of visiting Ireland were put on the back-burner. Sometime towards the end of 1971 a girlfriend and myself were talking about having a holiday in Ireland the following summer. (Yes, I was 24 years old and still denying my sexuality, even to myself.) I'd written to Bord Fáilte (the then Irish Tourist Board) and they had sent me a large thick envelope with brochures and information about campsites and hostels, and other cheap forms of accommodation. I was even planning to contact dad and get details of where my relatives actually lived, as all I knew was that he was from a farm somewhere outside a certain town in County Roscommon. As 1972 ushered itself in, I was getting more and more excited about the idea of fulfilling my dream. And then, on the 30th of January 1972, British Troops shot 26 unarmed civilians in Derry (aka Londonderry) in Northern Ireland during a protest march against Internment Without Trial, which had been introduced in August 1971. Fourteen civilians were killed by British Soldiers on that day, a day that is still remembered as "Bloody Sunday". Things rapidly went downhill in Northern Ireland as a result. And, even though we had no plans to go anywhere near the North, my girlfriend decided she didn't want to go ahead with the holiday. I was devastated, but had no-one else who wanted to go with me. So I was forced, one again, to shelve my dream of seeing Ireland. Fast forward to 1979, and myself and my then boyfriend (although we never admitted that fact to anyone else) decided to spend two weeks in Ireland, mainly climbing mountains (which was our big passion at the time). We did worry as to whether we might experience any problems over the fact that we had English accents and were driving a car with English registration plates, as "The Troubles" were still raging in the North. But we had none whatsoever. I even visited my relatives, again worrying that they might not make me welcome, due to the fact that my Protestant English mother had divorced their Catholic Irish relative. They welcomed me with open arms, with the first words from my Auntie Maggie (a sister of my dad's) being: "Welcome home!" And the rest, as they say, is history! There's actually a short story of mine here on GA, that is basically an account of that first visit.

I'm suspecting you meant strong thighs in kilt's there, clo... Kilts are not really worn nowadays. Not by guys. Just for formal occasions - weddings and the like.

Me too, initially. I finally assumed he'd either floated in a swimming pool, a lake, or the sea. It'll probably turn out that none of us have guessed right!

Thanks @drpaladin, but it doesn't really make feel me any better. If there were only one nuclear weapon in the world today it would be one too many, in my opinion.

Hi, bro!

Oh, dughlas... I'm at a loss for words.

Sweet dreams, B.

Keeping my fingers crossed here for you and dad, bro.

Yea... And like most films made from books, I wasn't totally happy with the result. Hey, Albert!

Today marks seventy five years since an atomic bomb was detonated over the Japanese city of Hiroshima, followed three days later by one being detonated over Nagasaki. No-one will ever know how many tens or hundreds of thousands died as a result. I was born just over two years after these horrific events, and grew up in post-war England where I remember a constant national worry about a possible nuclear war. The term "four minute warning" still echoes in my head to this day. That was considered to be the length of any warning we could expect to have between a long range nuclear attack being spotted, and the bomb actually reaching us. Politicians tried to assure us neither side in the Cold War would dare use any of the vast amounts of nuclear weapons they were aiming at each other, because of what they termed the Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) that would cause. The world seemed to stand still when the Cuban Missile Crisis occurred in 1962. I was just 15 years old. For two weeks in October it seemed that the end of the world was about to happen. A little over two years later I was seventeen years old, and still at school, as the twentieth anniversary of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki atrocities arrived. (I make no apology for calling them atrocities, because they truly were atrocious.) Here's a poem I wrote at the time: https://gayauthors.org/story/marty/martys-poetry/3 Many years later, the Cold War eventually ended. And suddenly the world felt a much safer place. So when I read this morning, 75 years to the day since Hiroshima was obliterated in one blinding flash of light, that there are apparently still "more than 13,000 nuclear weapons in the world, many on ‘hair-trigger’ alert status, ready to be launched at a moment’s notice" my heart feels heavy.

It's probably around fifty years since I read Wyndham's The Day Of The Triffids but, if I remember correctly, I think if I had triffid mint it would just climb out of the container and take over the garden anyway...

So was Thistle in the last gif you shared... Well, apart from the collar...

Let me echo all the thanks others have given, to @Myr for starting this site, to whomsoever asked the question, and again to Myr for his detailed and informative answer. I've just realised that only few days ago marked the fourteenth anniversary of me joining this site (on 2nd August 2006). I'm not 100% sure how I found out about it, but I think it was due to it being mentioned by a few of the better authors on Nifty. As Myr says in his reply, it was a fairly different beast back then, but it felt like home to me. The quality of the writing was definitely of a much better quality than the vast majority of what Nifty had to offer. Apart from a couple of attempts at writing - an anthology piece, and a short opening chapter to a novel that I have never got back to (I may do eventually) - I tended to mainly lurk on the site. Around 2010 I basically dropped off the site, as there were other things going on in my life at the time. But, getting on around 2 years ago, I decided to check in again, and was amazed that I could actually remember my login details! I found the site quite confusing to begin with, as it had changed so much over the intervening 8 years or so. Once I got used to it, and started commenting on stories and in some of the forums, I found myself thinking of it as my new online home. So much more refreshing than the likes of FaceBook or other social media type sites. People are actually friendly here on GA! And, although it's highly unlikely that I'll ever meet any of them in real life, I feel I have made some lifelong friends. My return prompted me to try my hand at writing again. I added some new stuff, and I know that it's a good while now since I updated it, and some readers may be anxious for me to actually do so. I promise to try to get back to it just as soon as I possibly can. Great blog entry! Thanks @Carlos Hazday! (And @Myr)

Oh, I'm definitely outstanding!

Went okay, thanks. Although I won't know the results for a few days. Doctor also wanted a urine sample. That was embarrassing, as I just couldn't wee! (I think I may have been dehydrated due to fasting.) After about ten minutes of me locked in the toilet, desperately trying to get a flow going, the doc knocked on the door and told me to take the container home with me and bring it back later. One cup of coffee at home and I was pissing like a racehorse! So he has his sample now. Fortunately the health centre is just around the corner from me.

Hi, Abert.

Yay!

Grrrr.... stop it, you two! I'm currently fasting for these blood tests in the morning!

To be honest, I haven't got a clue what variety of mint I have in the garden. It's one a friend gave me a number of years ago. I'll ask her if she knows next time I'm talking to her. I actually have it growing in a large container, because it would try to take over the whole garden if it were planted in the ground.

Hi, young 'un!

And we just call them "jacket" potatoes.

Woke up to continuous rain and fairly heavy wind this morning. Been like that for most of the day, and the forecast suggests it will last until at least tomorrow morning. So I met up with a couple of friends and we went for a socially distanced lunch. I should really have done some more wallpaper stripping type work, but couldn't find the motivation. Coming up to 7pm here, and I really need to do some preparatory work, putting together a document needed in advance for an important Zoom meeting tomorrow evening, so I doubt if I'll do much housework for the rest of the evening, if any at all. If it's still wet and miserable when I get up in the morning, I'll try and force myself to get on with the inside work. And I'm just about to start a minimum 13 hour fast before I call into the local health centre at 10 o'clock tomorrow morning to have blood samples taken...

Hey, bro! I hope your pessimism proves to be misplaced. And you, my friend.

Glad to hear that, bro!

While I usually sprinkle fresh parsley on potatoes, I prefer to use freshly harvested garden mint for the smaller ones.