Once, in high school, I was sitting in class when my history teacher said, out of the clear blue, "pogue mahone, ogged." "Mr. Smith, I know what the means."
'Tis a beautiful sight to see your middle-aged history teacher turn beet red. I don't think he ever got over it.
I was in Ireland once with my brother and we ordered a budweiser by saying "bud". People at the bar asked us to repeat the word multiple times. I find out over ten years later that the word "bud" means penis in gaelic. Sometimes band name trivia fails you.
We had a new Irish kid in our grade school and I tried to convince him that "sugar" was an expletive in American English. He didn't fall for it, but I still see him occassionally, and he totally deserved it.
Even Tom Waits likes the Pogues. Its the sort of statement that could get you put away in the Maze.
And Winston Churchill, who once wanted to name a battleship after bloody Oliver Cromwell only to be slapped down by the Royalists before the IRB could start a gelginite letter writing campaign, had some issues.
Although he also had a savoir faire not to be denied and that WW II thing was good and he had a big hand in the creation of the actual Irish Free State, so ultimately I agree that he was a'ight as well.
Irish slang for giving someone a lift is also appropos.
News flash (from a few days ago, anyway): Former Pogues front man Shane MacGowan plans to spend most of a recent windfall on dental work. At least one of the tabloids here said so.
The Pogues did a reunion tour in Britain around Christmas, which caused me to look around the net to see if they were coming stateside. And i found a sociologicaly and anthropologically intense store of Pogue fandom, which included a story about Shane's dental work. He tried on a pair of false choppers as a lark on a talk show and thought he was quite handsome.
And his girlfriend left him. And his family thinks his manager is stealing his money in some sort of Irish Colonel Parker thing. The Internet is odd. But I love it so.
Quick, can anyone name that album?
Posted by Kriston | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 2:55 PM
Er, that band?
Posted by Kriston | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 2:55 PM
They were at the Mineshaft, weren't they? That's where you swapped cards.
Posted by Austro | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 2:56 PM
Pogues.
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 2:56 PM
Original full name, and translation from the Irish?
Posted by LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 2:57 PM
BAD visual, Ben, I mean REALLY Bad!
Posted by Austro | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 2:57 PM
The title, of course, being a reference to a remark of Winston Churchill's.
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 2:57 PM
Pogue Mahones, meaning "kiss my ass".
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 2:58 PM
Who as an ex Harrow boy, would have been placed to criticise.
Posted by Austro | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 2:58 PM
Of course the post title refers to the Churchill remark as well. Ah well.
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 2:59 PM
Yeah. I really can't stand the Pogues. Churchill's aight though.
Posted by Kriston | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 3:00 PM
Once, in high school, I was sitting in class when my history teacher said, out of the clear blue, "pogue mahone, ogged." "Mr. Smith, I know what the means."
'Tis a beautiful sight to see your middle-aged history teacher turn beet red. I don't think he ever got over it.
Posted by ogged | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 3:01 PM
Douglas Hoffstaedter would have been proud of you.
Douglas?.. yeah, Douglas.
Posted by Austro | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 3:02 PM
Your teachers called you "ogged"?
Posted by Joe Drymala | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 3:04 PM
No one can resist that joke, Joe, but I can't find the links to your precursors at the moment.
Posted by ogged | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 3:09 PM
And had that much pent-up hostility toward you?
Posted by LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 3:10 PM
And had that much pent-up hostility toward you?
Well, you can see why.
Posted by Joe Drymala | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 3:11 PM
You can? I'm hurt, Joe. Actually, his was one of the few classes in high school where I almost never talked. I guess he took it personally.
Posted by ogged | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 3:13 PM
It was the thought of ogged having been consistently like this since high school that was giving me pause.
Posted by LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 3:15 PM
I remember once someone asked you if your ex called you by "your blog name".
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 3:19 PM
Just trying to cover up my shame for chasing the low-hanging fruit after claiming the moral high ground earlier today.
Posted by Joe Drymala | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 3:19 PM
Covering one's shame is traditional after eating low-hanging fruit.
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 3:20 PM
whereas we have already established today that you have no sense of tradition.
Posted by Austro | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 3:22 PM
We have?
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 3:24 PM
i think so
Posted by Austro | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 3:25 PM
I recant: It was Apo!
Posted by Austro | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 3:27 PM
Ben at 20, good call.
Posted by ogged | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 3:33 PM
So THIS is what blogger fame is all about. Have you ever slipped up and revealed the truth?
Posted by Emily | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 3:35 PM
I usually cover my shame only after exposing my low-hanging fruit.
Posted by tweedledopey | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 3:44 PM
If your fruit actually hung low, I don't think there would be quite so much shame.
Posted by SomeCallMeTim | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 3:48 PM
There are possibly 200 people biting their toungues just now.
Posted by Austro | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 3:49 PM
I was in Ireland once with my brother and we ordered a budweiser by saying "bud". People at the bar asked us to repeat the word multiple times. I find out over ten years later that the word "bud" means penis in gaelic. Sometimes band name trivia fails you.
Posted by joe o | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 4:03 PM
We had a new Irish kid in our grade school and I tried to convince him that "sugar" was an expletive in American English. He didn't fall for it, but I still see him occassionally, and he totally deserved it.
Posted by ogged | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 4:07 PM
That reminds me of the Simpsons where Lurleen calls Homer a "big sack of sugar" and Homer says "Hey! [pause] You did say sugar, right?"
Posted by eb | Link to this comment | 03-23-05 4:28 PM
Sorry to report, Joe O, that if you ordered a Bud pretty much anywhere in Ireland today, the barman's reaction would be simply to pour you a Bud.
Ooh, I can't resist a chance to be pedantic to Wolfson, and about Irish Gaelic, even: It's actually Pog mo thoin.
Posted by peter snees | Link to this comment | 03-24-05 6:43 AM
Duly noted, peter.
I was wondering how that parsed.
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 03-24-05 8:12 AM
Kriston, how can you not like the Pogues.
Even Tom Waits likes the Pogues. Its the sort of statement that could get you put away in the Maze.
And Winston Churchill, who once wanted to name a battleship after bloody Oliver Cromwell only to be slapped down by the Royalists before the IRB could start a gelginite letter writing campaign, had some issues.
Although he also had a savoir faire not to be denied and that WW II thing was good and he had a big hand in the creation of the actual Irish Free State, so ultimately I agree that he was a'ight as well.
Irish slang for giving someone a lift is also appropos.
Posted by benton | Link to this comment | 03-24-05 8:12 AM
News flash (from a few days ago, anyway): Former Pogues front man Shane MacGowan plans to spend most of a recent windfall on dental work. At least one of the tabloids here said so.
Posted by peter snees | Link to this comment | 03-24-05 8:19 AM
Okay, what possible options can he have beyond dentures? There's no way that can cost all that much.
Posted by LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 03-24-05 8:20 AM
Maybe it was a minor windfall.
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 03-24-05 8:23 AM
I'd charge him untold thousands just for having to look at those brown stumps he's got now.
Then again, Shane MacGown with decent teeth would be sort of like Sinead O'Connor with a full head of hair -- just not right.
Posted by peter snees | Link to this comment | 03-24-05 8:24 AM
They are both just not right just the way they are.
Posted by Anthony | Link to this comment | 03-24-05 8:49 AM
The Pogues did a reunion tour in Britain around Christmas, which caused me to look around the net to see if they were coming stateside. And i found a sociologicaly and anthropologically intense store of Pogue fandom, which included a story about Shane's dental work. He tried on a pair of false choppers as a lark on a talk show and thought he was quite handsome.
And his girlfriend left him. And his family thinks his manager is stealing his money in some sort of Irish Colonel Parker thing. The Internet is odd. But I love it so.
Posted by benton | Link to this comment | 03-24-05 9:25 AM