There\u2019s a meeting. That\u2019s the big news of the day.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m like, \u201cWhat kind of a meeting?\u201d<\/p>\n
And Fionn goes, \u201cRoss, you\u2019re not invited.\u201d<\/p>\n
I\u2019m there, \u201cThat\u2019s not what I asked.\u201d<\/p>\n
He tries to go, \u201cSome of the parents are concerned, Ross.\u201d<\/p>\n
I\u2019m like, \u201cAbout?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThat their children are spending all their time on the rugby pitch,\u201d he goes, \u201cand not enough time in class.\u201d<\/p>\n
I\u2019m there, \u201cIs this about me throwing the old jammer in Slippers McCrory\u2019s porking space?\u201d and \u2013 yeah now \u2013 that throws him.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s like, \u201cEr, no, yeah, no \u2013 sort of.\u201d<\/p>\n
I\u2019m there, \u201cSo which one is it, Fionn?\u201d<\/p>\n
He goes, \u201cHe is the deputy principal of this institute of learning. And yes, he is concerned that a number of our irst Years are not taking their academic careers seriously enough.\u201d<\/p>\n
I\u2019m like, \u201cTheir academic careers? They\u2019re, like, 12 and 13.\u201d<\/p>\n
He\u2019s there, \u201cYes \u2013 and the habits they learn now will determine what kind of students they become later on and what kind of careers they go on to enjoy after college.\u201d<\/p>\n
It\u2019s hord to believe this man won a Leinster Schools Senior Cup medal. I\u2019d tell him he should give his back if they weren\u2019t already taken off us for doping.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m there, \u201cYou\u2019re talking out of your orse as usual. I\u2019ll be making that point at the meeting.\u201d<\/p>\n
He\u2019s like, \u201cYou\u2019re not coming to the meeting.\u201d<\/p>\n
I go, \u201cI\u2019m entitled to be heard in my own defence,\u201d then I watch his expression suddenly change.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s like \u201cOh, you\u2019re going to quote the Constitution at me now, are you?\u201d<\/p>\n
I\u2019m there, \u201cYes, I am, Dude.\u201d<\/p>\n
I had no idea it was from the Constitution. I used to hear my old man shouting it in the bathroom when he\u2019d be practising his lines for whatever tribunal he happened to be appearing in front of that day.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m there, \u201cIt might shock you to know that I\u2019ve read that book \u2013 from cover to cover.\u201d<\/p>\n
Of course then I\u2019m thinking, s**t, is it even a book or have I said too much here? But, yeah, no, it must be a book, because he goes, \u201cYou\u2019re not on trial, Ross.\u201d<\/p>\n
I\u2019m there, \u201cWe\u2019ll see what Hennessy Coghlan-O\u2019Hara has to say about that. He can get a High Court injunction to stop this thing from going ahead.\u201d<\/p>\n
It\u2019s a stunt he used to pull whenever I was threatened with detention. But Fionn says something unbelievable to me then. <\/p>\n
He goes, \u201cYou won\u2019t be using Hennessy Coghlan-O\u2019Hara, Ross. He acts for us now.\u201d<\/p>\n
I\u2019m there, \u201cExcuse me?\u201d<\/p>\n
He goes, \u201cWe\u2019ve retained his services. Representing you in this matter would be a conflict of interest.\u201d<\/p>\n
I\u2019m there, \u201cThat focking crook is the school lawyer? I\u2019ll tell you something, Dude, this place is going to the dogs \u2013 and fast.\u201d<\/p>\n
He tries to, like, reason with me then \u2013 never a good option when the argument is about rugby.<\/p>\n
He goes, \u201cRoss, the parents of these students want to able to talk freely and frankly \u2013 which they obviously feel they can\u2019t if you\u2019re present.\u201d<\/p>\n
I\u2019m there, \u201cWhy don\u2019t they just stop sending their kids to rugby? One or two of them are no focking use anyway.\u201d<\/p>\n
He goes, \u201cBecause they want their children to play rugby \u2013 but they also want them to learn something in school.\u201d<\/p>\n
I\u2019m like, \u201cYeah, good luck with that one.\u201d<\/p>\n
He goes, \u201cIt\u2019s about achieving an academic-sporting balance, Ross.\u201d<\/p>\n
And I\u2019m there, \u201cDoesn\u2019t exist, Dude. Not in schools that are serious about being winners.\u201d<\/p>\n
He goes, \u201cThe other thing\u2013\u201d<\/p>\n
And I\u2019m like, \u201cOh, there\u2019s more, is there? This\u2019ll be good. Let\u2019s hear it.\u201d<\/p>\n
He\u2019s there, \u201cA lot of parents have complained that their children have arrived home from school quoting Hitler.\u201d<\/p>\n
I shrug as if to say, \u2018Your point being?\u2019<\/p>\n
He\u2019s there, \u201cYou mean you can\u2019t see why that might be an issue?\u201d<\/p>\n
I\u2019m like, \u201cI sometimes play them Father Fehily\u2019s old records to stir them up before training. It didn\u2019t do us any horm.\u201d<\/p>\n
It probably did, looking back \u2013 there were one or two matches where I was so hyped up, it honestly felt like an out of body experience.<\/p>\n
He goes, \u201cYou can\u2019t understand why, given the current international climate, parents are alarmed to hear their children ranting and raving in their sleep about F\u00fchrerprinzip and Lebensraum?\u201d<\/p>\n
I\u2019m there, \u201cExactly \u2013 it\u2019s all in German. They don\u2019t understand a focking word of what they\u2019re even saying.\u201d<\/p>\n
He goes, \u201cThey might if they attended German classes occasionally.\u201d<\/p>\n
It\u2019s a very, very good comeback, in fairness to him. He debated with the best back in the day, bear in mind. He won medals for it in fact, which he probably still has \u2013 the sap. <\/p>\n
But then you don\u2019t captain the S without having one or two talents in your \u2013 I\u2019m going to use the word \u2013 repertoire? One of my great talents that used to get talked about a lot was my ability to bring people with me.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m there, \u201cYou\u2019re scared, Dude, because you know that when I stort talking, I can bring a room to silence.\u201d<\/p>\n
He\u2019s like, \u201cYes, I remember you crashing one of Sorcha\u2019s book club meetings and saying you thought Wuthering Heights was so good, you wouldn\u2019t have been surprised to find out that Emily Bront\u00eb had a brother who wrote it for her.\u201d<\/p>\n
I\u2019m there, \u201cThat was intended as a compliment to the girl. And anyway the joke is on you because I never even read the thing. But then it was a book club, so I doubt if anyone did?\u201d<\/p>\n
He goes, \u201cRoss, you are not invited to the meeting.\u201d<\/p>\n
I\u2019m there, \u201cI\u2019ll turn up. I\u2019ll turn up like Enoch literally Burke and then you\u2019ll have a problem on your hands.\u201d<\/p>\n
I just, like, storm out of his office and who ends up being the first person I bump into outside? Yeah, no, Slippers McCrory. He has, like, a big smug look on his face.<\/p>\n
He goes, \u201cAh, there\u2019s Coach!\u201d except it\u2019s not intended with any, like, respect. He says coach the way Honor does when she\u2019s told there are no seats available in business class. <\/p>\n
I\u2019m there, \u201cDude, I\u2019ve taken on bigger and better than you. I\u2019m going to promise you this much. If it\u2019s the only thing I achieve in my role as Director of Rugby in this school\u2013\u201d<\/p>\n
Fionn shouts out of his office, \u201cYou\u2019re not Director of Rugby. That title was never signed off on.\u201d<\/p>\n
I\u2019m there, \u201c\u2013I am going to wipe that smile off your ugly boat.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"There\u2019s a meeting. That\u2019s the big news of the day. I\u2019m like, \u201cWhat kind of a meeting?\u201d And…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":144285,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[73],"tags":[79,18,19,17,361,64928],"class_list":{"0":"post-144284","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-eire","10":"tag-ie","11":"tag-ireland","12":"tag-magazine","13":"tag-ross-o-carroll-kelly"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/115433798700278866","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/144284","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=144284"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/144284\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/144285"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=144284"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=144284"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=144284"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}