Chemi - T and Miss Mercer

[Fjgrogan]

Another thing which springs to mind about Mary Thompson insisting on maintaining standards - when I first visited Kerry Mary would insist that we all sat up to the dining table for meals. Only several visits later did she 'allow' us to sit around the fire and eat from our laps - that was when I knew I was beginning to be 'accepted'! Mary was in charge of cooking, on an ancient Rayburn (forerunner of the Aga) - I couldn't even offer to help because I had no idea how to operate the thing - I think it ran on peat. Anyway Mary would not let me interfere with her range. At the end of one visit she then said that next time I came she would show me how to use it - I was highly honoured! Unfortunately that time never came because Mary had died before my next visit.

[englishangel]

Another thing which springs to mind about Mary Thompson insisting on maintaining standards - when I first visited Kerry Mary would insist that we all sat up to the dining table for meals. Only several visits later did she 'allow' us to sit around the fire and eat from our laps - that was when I knew I was beginning to be 'accepted'! Mary was in charge of cooking, on an ancient Rayburn (forerunner of the Aga) - I couldn't even offer to help because I had no idea how to operate the thing - I think it ran on peat. Anyway Mary would not let me interfere with her range. At the end of one visit she then said that next time I came she would show me how to use it - I was highly honoured! Unfortunately that time never came because Mary had died before my next visit.

Still going http://www.rayburn-web.co.uk/

[Fjgrogan]

Last night I played through a videotape which I filmed in Kerry in May 1999 - it included a shot of said Rayburn beginning to rust because Mary was no longer around to use it. Sitting on top was a very new microwave which Mercer never really got the hang of using. She would insist on leaving food on the kitchen worktop in the sun to defrost - I am amazed that nobody died of food poisoning.

Another stray thought that has sprung to mind - I believe it was Miss Jukes who originally taught Mary Thompson to drive!

[Jo]

Last night I played through a videotape which I filmed in Kerry in May 1999 - it included a shot of said Rayburn beginning to rust because Mary was no longer around to use it. Sitting on top was a very new microwave which Mercer never really got the hang of using. She would insist on leaving food on the kitchen worktop in the sun to defrost - I am amazed that nobody died of food poisoning.

Another stray thought that has sprung to mind - I believe it was Miss Jukes who originally taught Mary Thompson to drive!

I can picture the scene. "You may be vewy good at chemistwy, Mawy, but you call that dwiving?!"

[Fjgrogan]

Re Mary's driving; I have no idea what it is was like in her younger days, but it became decidedly hair-raising by the time I met her. In very rural Kerry we never bothered with seat belts - I once asked her whether or not we were supposed to officially, and she said yes, but we don't bother out here; she would put it on if she went into town. 'Town' in this case clearly meant Killarney, because the local town Caherciveen apparently wasn't large enough to qualify. On the one occasion that I remember being in the car with her in Killarney I discovered why - she seemed to have forgotten that traffic lights existed and blithely ignored them all! On another occasion we were driving down a country lane and spotted the Garda driving towards us. I instinctively (and guiltily) grabbed my seatbelt; Mary pulled alongside the police car, wound down her window (still beltless) and called out 'Good Morning Tom; didn't your lad do well in the Leaving Cert?' - his son was apparently one of boys that Mercer had tutored. He made no comment on the lack of seatbelts! He probably wouldn't have dared - Mary in old age was still a force to be reckoned with!

[J.R.]

Mary pulled alongside the police car, wound down her window (still beltless) and called out 'Good Morning Tom; didn't your lad do well in the Leaving Cert?' - his son was apparently one of boys that Mercer had tutored. He made no comment on the lack of seatbelts! He probably wouldn't have dared - Mary in old age was still a force to be reckoned with!

Slightly off topic but in response.....

A couple of my mates were on a course-fishing holday in Eire a couple of years ago. After a particularly good days fishing, they celebrated rather vigourously in a local hostelry until near to 'official' closing-time.

On driving back to their pub/B&B, they passed a Garda car with two uniformed occupants who immediately pulled out and followed them. Two miles later they saw the Garda car turn down the road that led to their pub, so breathing a sigh of relief, drove on for a mile or two, before retracing their way back to the pub.

On entering the bar section of the small hotel, guess what ??

Yup ! Two Garda officers supporting the bar, sampling tall dark pints of Ireland's finest. A good laugh was had by all.

[midget]

My daughter's ma-in-law always keeps a supply of poteen in the house. You take a clean bottle, put some money in it and put it in a ditch, and sure don't the "little people" come in the night and leave the poteen. She knows it's the good stuff because sure and don't the Guardai get theirs from the same place.

[Jo]

When we lived in Ireland my parents had some poteen that they would have liked to bring when we moved to England. If it had been legal they would have paid the duty on it but of course that wasn't an option. My mother wanted to put it in my baby brother's carrycot as "a bottle of water for the baby" but my father wouldn't let her

Years later though, a friend did bring them some in a glass bottle labelled "Holy Water". I suppose these days you could only do it if it was less than 100ml

[englishangel]

There are always ferries, it can be over 100ml then.

[midget]

Still offtopic, kath's ma-in-law asked if she could make the wedding cake. It was laced with quantities of poten, and I was asked "don't tell me brother, he's one of them ba'hais and wont touch anything with alcohol"