Never look a Bird Crap in the Mouth

Quite dashing for a former Bond

One day last week I was walking my dog on the way to visit a friend and bring her some medicine, so far so Florence Nightingale. Said dog and I don't get much in the way of exercise these days so we were killing two birds so to speak. Next thing, I feel this wet plop on my nose, there was no sign of rain, it could only be an aforementioned feathered effluent discharger. I gave out to the dog as the cost centres weren’t about, wiped it with my hand and carried on. There is a certain wanton liberty leaving the house without tissues, something you’d never do while you’re children are under eighteen. 

I carried on and wondered what a scientist would make of it, two objects travelling in different directions at different speeds, one poos and manages to land it on the nose of the other.

I arrived at Racquel’s door with the medicine, she looked at me more pityingly than I thought the occasion demanded, her being the sick one and me taking the air.

‘Oh it must’ve been a bird,’ she exclaimed.

‘How did you know?’

I looked down and saw the remainder of its bowel contents sprayed down my jacket. I couldn’t tarry for coffee or the like, as I had an interview to think about it.

‘You know what this means, don’t you?’ said the non-believer.

I thought of it, but didn’t dare pin any hope on it.

'Good Luck' when a bird craps on you. 

So I walked home, hurriedly of course, keeping my chin in the air and avoiding eye contact with the passersby who clearly thought I’d been in a gutter and vomited down my front. I felt the well-groomed dog lent an air of respectability.

I might add that the rest of my life depended on the success of this interview.

In between keeping landlady house intact, banks at bay, cost centres fed and schooled, I am lucky to have been given the chance to write occasionally for a newspaper, some of this involves reading books I don’t like and some I love. Some ‘opinion’ writing addresses very hard news. Recently, it has been pleasant, a biography of a great man, a novel on a historic figure, it’s sporadic but therapeutic and pays the ESB. The alarming thing I’ve discovered since going back to school is the cost of law books. Crikey. I mean, they only add a few pages every year to bring out a new edition and still charge 158 euro. The teachers say second-hand copies are useless, new judgment makes new law (note I’ve even learned to spell judgment their way).

I washed off the bird crap and went to the interview; as usual everybody else was younger and looked infinitely more qualified. It didn’t last very long, I put my life on pause and carried on to college.

There is one thing you can do, or at least I can do, that has the effect of a two-day anti-depressant, it’s called a blow-dry. I can make it last three days if the tribulations demand it. So it was I returned to my stalwart confidante, Jim Hatton in Ranelagh, on Friday morning for an infusion of feel-good.

Hope 'Penny Dreadful' will be Penny Wonderful

My phone rattled in my bag while the suds were being rinsed. I recognised the number and thought it best to get it over with, I went outside, hair dripping and phoned back. ‘We thought we’d get you out of your suspense’ I'd succeeded at the interview. I wanted to tell the woman I’d kiss her, though that wouldn’t do. Suffice to say now I can pay for my books.

This week our classes are amid a film set, a mini-series called Penny Dreadful with Timothy Dalton (dashing), Eva Green (smokes between takes), Billie Piper and Josh Hartnett (can't comment), I hope it's good, because they are going to incredible trouble and expense transforming Henrietta Street and the King's Inns into a nefarious Victorian corner of London.

After our first class outing at the very cool House on Leeson Street, I ended up in The George with another student, not the yacht club, the other one. I even got in with my new *freelance* press pass, I said I was writing a piece. So this is it: The George was, like, totally strange, but like, fun.

Getting to the Bar

It's all ahead of us .....

The dress code is black, or even grey, knee length. No red shoes or fishnets if you please.

I have eleven black dresses, short sleeve, long, plunge, straight, floaty, then there's the suits, Dolce & Gabbana with leopard print lining, a lucky find in a sale in  my actual size, pin stripe and plain, a fifteen year old John Rocha, well cut and still wearable. I’ve even got a Paulie Costelloe ‘dressage’ look, even though he says Irish women dress hideously. There's only one problem with them, the zip won't go up on anything, repeat, anything.

And that's just the dining code. This is the first thing I learned on day one at school this week. I think the lecturer introduced the dining nights to get us all excited. We're sitting in the vaults of the Honorable Society of King's Inns, below the great hall where, during registration, we were offered cups of coffee and biscuits, welcomed and praised, given piles of manuals so we didn't need to take notes. The room wouldn’t be out of place in The Tudors, in fact King’s Inns dates back to Henry VIII.

Outside, the seniors are languishing in a beautiful garden taking shade from the Indian summer. There's even plenty of parking and you don't want to turn up here in a hoodie and jeans, the staff dress in smart suits and pearls and the women have had their hair done.

I've acquired a very bad habit and it's only night two, we start at 5.45 and at break time I succumb to a double espresso, I'm a woman who doesn't drink coffee after 2pm. It brings on a cracker of a headache by 8 so now I'm carrying panadol in my handbag. The hours in between I'm held in thrall, I can feel the love of learning and awe of law in these walls. The class is small, about fifty, we smile encouragingly at each other, young women, burly men, white haired and glossy maned, bald, Asian and African all with hope of knowledge, advancement and escape, who knows. I’m not even sure why I'm here. The best part is walking out into the night with new stuff in my head, into the cool air and shadows in the arches, street light falling on the cobbles, big black gates, silhouette of oak trees, the north side.