I spotted this street art near the fruit market in Dublin last month.
I was well impressed.
I was well impressed.
 |  |
O.K. – It is just a concrete bollard.
A plain concrete bollard, just like many others that have been used in many towns and cities in Ireland. This one did bring a smile to my face. I think it might be the first bollard to do that. 
 I spotted this headstone last Friday in the graveyard in Kilmihil, Co. Clare and my journey back to Ennis included contemplation on two things on the plaque. I can remember only ever seeing R.I.P. on a headstone – this is the first which registered on my brain with an additional letter. I trust it stands for Rest in Peace. Amen. – but to see it carved in stone was new for me. The second was the use of the word ‘Alias’ which I had filed away (incorrectly as I now know) as an assumed and additional name to one’s given name. ‘Née’ was what I would have expected where the name changed upon marriage. Chambers Dictionary confirmed that it can also relate to a previous name and that it derives from a Latin word meaning ‘at another time’. Collins Dictionary agrees. I suspect my flawed understanding was probably influenced by my childhood television viewing which included ‘Alias Smith & Jones’.
 Ballard Road, Milltown Malbay Logainm.ie has Ballard in Co. Clare translated as An Baile Ard, the High Town.
Logainm does not have any suggestion for ‘Soghmas’ or ‘Soghmais’. Neither does Foclóir.ie. Dúchas.ie is a website/database of translation of surnames and it does not have any name beginning with ‘Sog’ or ‘tSog’. Yet the sign on Ballard Road in Milltown Malbay reads Bóthar an tSoghmais. This is another puzzle which may require a return visit to Milltown Malbay and enquiring of the local publicans – all in the spirit of research…..
  In Ennistymon on Thursday, I spotted this sign on a few fields around the Falls Hotel.
My first thoughts were happy – smiling at the thought of possible danger of a donkey; delighted to have captured a new sign. Donkeys are well up there in the list of animals loved by our nine-year old. With the benefit of a few days, the happiness has receded and has been replaced with disappointment verging on despair as to the litigious and over-protective society we have become. I was speaking with E.T. recently and he was relating the benefits of the Darwin Awards – that if someone was so lacking in basic common sense, then whatever the result was appropriate. We spotted the donkeys in a different field – at least 7 of them. They were grazing away- content and happy with their lot. They posed no danger to us or other users of the road/path. If I had decided to enter the field, approach one of the donkeys and extend my hand towards its head, would it be my fault if the donkey decided to have a bite my fingers? Would this be the inherent danger posed by donkeys of which humans must be warned? Or would I be the ass? Should I have a sign around my head warning fellow-humans of my self-danger?   Yesterday we went for a walk along the Prom in Lahinch – typical Irish bracing walk where ‘bracing’ translates as ‘windy with some showers thrown in for good measure’. I spotted this graffiti at the start of the Promenade near the town. I cannot recall too many incidents of graffiti with a ‘thought for the day’-type message. At the start of the New Year, I thought I’d share. |
AuthorFrom Cork. SUBSCRIBE
Unless otherwise specifically stated, all photographs and text are the property of www.readingthesigns.weebly.com - such work is licenced under a Creative Commons Attribution - ShareAlike 4.0 International Licence
Archives
December 2022
Categories
All
Blogs I Read & LinksThought & Comment
Head Rambles For the Fainthearted Bock The Robber Póló Rogha Gabriel Patrick Comerford Sentence First Felicity Hayes-McCoy 140 characters is usually enough Johnny Fallon Sunny Spells That’s How The Light Gets In See That Tea and a Peach Buildings & Things Past Built Dublin Come Here To Me Holy Well vox hiberionacum Pilgrimage in Medieval Ireland Liminal Entwinings 53degrees Ciara Meehan The Irish Aesthete Líníocht Ireland in History Day By Day Archiseek Buildings of Ireland Irish War Memorials ReYndr Abandoned Ireland The Standing Stone Time Travel Ireland Stair na hÉireann Myles Dungan Archaeouplands Wide & Convenient Streets The Irish Story Enda O’Flaherty Cork Archive Magazine Our City, Our Town West Cork History Cork’s War of Independence Cork Historical Records Rebel Cork’s Fighting Story 40 Shades of Life in Cork Roaringwater Journal 
Best Newcomer Blog
|
