Will the real Mickey Mouse please stand up. Part 1 of 2.

*long winded ramble*

Did I ever tell you the one about the real Mickey Mouse in our house?

Well it was about 2 years ago now on that fateful cold wintery Friday night when terror in the form of a little field mouse came to visit our calm peaceful house.

Ellie who was only a pup at the time was asleep in her rocking chair and Mia was sound asleep in our bed. It was one of those horrible blustery winter nights that called for a drink and some munchies and a DVD. I was busy as usual rubbing Janes feet and waiting on her hand and foot (literally).We were watching some god awful cop show for the thousand time when I felt Janes legs go solid stiff. She was frozen in pure terror and couldn't scream and covered her face before telling me there was a mouse by the chair. 

I had a look and sure as god the real life Mickey Mouse was peering up at the tv happy as a day is long. He obviously hadn't seen this episode of CSI. Now I panic as well initially in these circumstances until I realise I'm 35 years old and should really have a bottle of cop the fuck on. As I step down the fucker bolts behind the tv.

Jane is now in full stroke and heart attack  mode so I commence CPR on her and clear the foam from her mouth and get her out of the room to safety upstairs away from this vicious killer. I return to find at least the mouse hasn't killed the sleeping beauty Ellie in her chair. Thank god for that! I poke around looking for the mouse but at 11pm on a Friday I'm not overly motivated knowing what will happen next.All four of us stay in the bedroom that night with the door locked and me with the baseball bat to protect my family from imminent death.

Jane obviously couldn't sleep with the trauma and had to be escorted to the toilet and back when needed. She informs me of the survival plan which is basically she is going to go to her mams until I catch the mouse. Going to their mams is the automatic default for any Bennett so this is no shock.

I load up the car at 7am on a Saturday morning and wave them goodbye and start to design my plan to get rid of Mickey. I spend a few hours trying to locate him and see if I can get rid of him without killing him but I realise he is going to have to die. I hate this but draw inspiration from films like Rambo,commando, predator and even caretaker willie in the Simpsons. I need weapons!What would chuck Norris do?

I head to Atlantic homecare and buy an arsenal of traps and sticky paper devices and lay them all out with every type of bait you can think of from peanut butter and chocolate to rashers and jam. At least Mickey will die happy! I spread talcum powder all over the floor to see where the fucker is coming from. Several experts like Johnny the dreamboat and my dad call and we turn the place upside down but Mickey is nowhere to be seen all the while laughing from the shadows.It's like mission impossible at this stage.

I send everyone away and sit there quietly in the house sharpening my hunting knife waiting for the battle. I slow my breathing like a sniper and I wait and wait and wait. No tv on or no food have I eaten for the day. Mickey never shows.This is no ordinary mouse. It's on like donkey kong i tell him. He better be ready.

I go to the Bennett's house to see my children and to inform general Jane Dowling that there is no luck in the trenches with the hunt. She informs me she will not return to the house while Micky roams free and I am destined to spend the night at home.She tells me i will receive a dishonourable discharge if I fail. I pack clothes and necessities for them and bring them to her and I head back to the battle. When I check the traps at home I find the bait gone and no smell of a kill. He is toying with me now.

I decide to make the best of a bad situation and go for a few pints and get a Chinese and watch match of the day in my jocks with no women on my back at least. I briefly toy with the idea of divorce and myself and Mickey living the high life in the house with poker nights and strippers and super sports Sundays but I realise I'd be dead in a week from substance abuse face down in my own vomit.He is trying to get inside my head.The evening is enjoyable but tomorrow Michael mouse must die....... 

Stayed tuned for part two of this epic tale of man versus mouse as its far from over......

The Traveller, Depeche Mode and the snickers.

*long winded ramble*

So one night a few years back myself and my long suffering wife were in town for a night out. It was a rare occasion where I wasn't on the beer but the wife was so I was driving.I have to fill the boredom of no beer always with messing but it had been a slow night. 

About 2am I pile Sheila Joyce into the car to go home and she is happy out singing "you're so vain" by Carly Simon (bless her little cotton socks). She decides she needs chips and I get a handy parking spot by hillbillies on McCurtain street and in she goes to get her chips while I wait with the hazards on. 

While I am waiting there is a knock on the  window and low and behold it's a traveller looking first for a light for a fag and then to know was I going up towards St. Luke's as the hackneys were "fierce busy boss".

I was just about to tell him sod off when I thought of the look on my wife's face if she returned to find yer man in the car. About a week earlier at an underage match  two young travellers were ruining the game and nobody was having an luck clearing them.I offered them 2 euro to go away to the shop and told them they had to fight for it. I wasn't serious but the 11 year old smokey flattened the 8 year old with a punch as soon as the words left my mouth and they left for the shop.I felt very guilty about this and so I felt I'd drop this fella home to redress the balance.

Jane returns to the car to me trying to control my laughter and Billy Bob  in the back smiling away but banned from smoking. He had the fag behind the ear and asks Jane for a chip.She never responded and looked straight out the window. I know I'm dead later but it's just too funny.

At St. Luke's I ask Billy Bob where he is living and he says up another bit. I ask him does he mean Ellis's yard and he says "yes Bigman, thanks Bigman, I won't forget you Bigman.". I turn up the radio and Saturday night by Wigfield is on some channel and Billy Bob tells me he knows all the moves to that one. Poor Jane is ready to gawk as usual from the travelling more than the traveller.

I pull up outside Ellis's yard and Billy Bob asks for a light again but I tell him  the cigarette lighter isn't working. He steps out of the car and it just dawns on me that a new Depeche Mode double CD I bought was on the back seat of the car.

I glance back and notice it's missing and see Billy Bob crossing the road putting it into his jacket.I roll down the window and say: " Where do you think you're going with the CD buddy?". Billy says: "I have no CD bigman". I open the door and step out and call Billy. I tell him in no uncertain terms that if he does not return the CD that I will take it off him and feed it to him. I use a number of other terrible threats (apologise to the wife once more) and Billy Bob realises that I may indeed end up feeding him the CD and decides he was only messing about (seeing as I threatened to burn his house to the axel.)

As Billy Bob is returning the CD and laughing a bit nervously I notice he has a snickers bar sticking out of his top shirt pocket. For some reason (and to this day I dont know why) I tell him I'm taking his snickers by way of compensation for trying to steal from me. He looks on in shock as I take the snickers from him and open it and start to eat it as I get into the car.

I'm awaiting an ear full as I speed off with the poor chap in the rear view mirror but Jane is frozen in shock at the goings on and has lost her tongue.I often think when I hear Depeche Mode of Billy and how he is getting on.I imagine him and his family in the caravan stuck with just Wigfield and Saturday Night dancing around like Graham Norton in that Fr. Ted caravan scene. I feel guilty that I took back the CD as they could all be rocking to Personal Jesus or Master and Servant on the cold winter nights.

Thats the Story of  Traveller, Depeche Mode and the snickers.......

*sorry again Jane.

The God Damn bins.

*long winded ramble*

As requested. An oldie but a goldie.

That moment when you get to bed and realise that you forgot to put the refuse bin out. You lie there thinking somehow it will solve itself and by magic the bin will put itself out dynamo style. You then toy with the Idea that maybe you could survive another fortnight without putting it out. How much is in the bin?How many shitty nappies will Ellie produce in the next fortnight? There is about 5-6 inches of space at the top but will it be enough for 14 days of rubbish again?You still lie there uncontrollably crying and sucking your thumb and hoping your mam might come and rub your face. 

I could easily put it out in the morning as I don't sleep but I know I'll be listening to music when country clean roll up at 6 am. Fuck you country clean you have ruined my life! Maybe 1,000,000 million likes on Facebook will put the fuckin bin out.

Then there is the pain of trying to remember which stupid bin is going out? Obviously they sent me a schedule but its in that drawer that everyone has that is full to the brim of broken pens sellotape and old bits and pieces that you thought you needed to keep. You could go down and search for it but sure then you may as well put out the bin.The shit drawer maybe worth more hassle to you anyway as by now there is almost certainly a family or mice or worse living in there.I wish someone would set fire to that drawer.

I need to go to the toilet now anyway so I may as well put out the bin. Next I decide that there is no need to get dressed as I'm up now and it will only take me 2 mins. I do my number ones and go to the garage and haul the bin to the door. I have an electronic garage door which as a norry I am very very proud of. They said i'd amount to nothing being an idiot yet I have an electronic garage door with a remote control.

As always I put the door up and down a few times as the novelty of having the electronic door never ceases to amaze me.I'm like feckin Mr. Bean standing there in my shorts and barefoot watching the door. Even a NASA space shuttle launch doesn't get me as excited as the door.I focus on the job at hand. I lug the bin up my long drive which is steeper that Patricks hill. It's heavy this week and the smell off it is empty reach invoking. I put it in place and head back down the drive.
                                    
Its about 3am and drizzly so I hurry and then just like that scene in platoon where William Dafoe is running for the chopper and gets milled down with bullets it happens to me as well. I can hear adagio for strings playing in my head as I step barefoot on a medium sized sharpish stone which takes me out like a sniper. I fall in slow motion to the ground just like defoe and again I'm uncontrolavbly crying.Maybe someone will call a nee naw (ambulance) for me. "WWWWWWWWHHHHHHHHYYYYYYYYYY  MEEEEEEEEEE" I shout but nobody cares or is listening. I'm bawling like a two year old again all over the god damn bins.
                                                                       
I hobble inside with a tug in my heart sobbing and asking myself is this what my life is now? Living in fear of the bins every week? There are so many questions! Which bin is going out? Will they ever collect the red bin? When are we getting the new brown bin and what goes in it? I can't do this anymore. I need a bin counsellor and many many sessions.
                                                                                                         
I limp upstairs and throw myself on the bed.I see my life flash before me. Maybe I'm dying from this bin related injury. At least my battle is over for another week but the war still rages on. Ill hear the bin lads empty that damn bin at 6 and then I have a few days before bin fear kicks in again.I start to relax. I start to calm down.

Then as I'm snug as a bug in a rug I go into pure and utter heartattack and stroke mode. I can feel my head going to implode and I cant breathe. I'm in serious trouble. I forgot to close the fuckin garage door...........