Clonlara

Delicious dancing.

That's all you're getting out of me today, after 3 whole minutes of sleep in the past 24 hours and more. The Jetlag gods are tossing me like a baby seal between the noses of playtime whales. Too many trains (2) planes (2) airports (3) cars (2) and now, a bed I can splay out in. Tar is playing it cool. I will try to bribe him with great big American chewtreats. Meanwhile, he licks pee with great tenderness, so tender and loving I cannot stop watching him. He knows.

The jetlag roadshow rolls on

The jetlag show is the longest running musical in town, this week. This morning I awoke at 3.30 am, so now I'm on Moscow time, or something. I'm having all sorts of strange combinations of feelings, today, too. A little earlier it was despondent and fine. I've just been experiencing loss of faith in good things. It's such a pity when that happens.

A cringe ricocheted through the afternoon like a bullet of lightning.

I saw an excellent band last weekend. They're called Fly Ashtray, they're from the Bronx and they've been together for years. They make a gorgeous fat harmonic rocknroll sound. A love vibe composed of the orgasm bits of classic 70's rocknroll, mixed together with a little avant garde kick to the left, and delivered with a kind of expanded punk soul. And I've got to mention them, because they've just emailed me to say they're going to fill up my iPod with free cds. And they rock. Truly.

Anyone got a joke?

Jetlag hell on wheels

I'm having the jetlag horrors. Have you ever had the jetlag horrors? Are you having the jetlag horrors somewhere in the world right now, dear reader, and sending out thoughtwaves that I am all too susceptible to picking up, strongly suggesting that LUCY TAKES OFF transforms your jetlag feelings into words, and liberates you from the pain of your jeglag aloneness? Well, I'll do my best, dear reader. And bookmark this page for future reference. I'd rather not have to go through this experience again.

I'm in Ireland, and my body is fully and entirely on new york time, while still being subject to the normal human daytime demands of this strange new timezone. There was no other option but sleep when my plane got in at 6 am, and when I heard my dad play the piano downstairs a hundred years later, it was 4.24 pm. Bollocks.

My folks are not much help, having had no experience of this phenomenon, and have been encouraging me to sleep the way my body longs to. I lay in bed awake last night for about five hours, until I finally got up and took my Paul Auster book downstairs to the kitchen to eat some leftover smoked salmon sandwiches and chocolate and tea at 6 am. Got to sleep finally, around 7.30. Mum woke me up this morning at 9 as I asked her to, and I told her, I've had an hour and a half sleep, mum. I'm still on new york time. Well stay there so, answered my accommodating mum; dad will drive you in later. That sounded good to my ears, which were looking for any kind of easy answer that means more sleep. Ten minutes later, she's back.

So, what do you want to do? Um, I say, searching.. I'm thinking of cycling in a bit later.. And when I hear myself saying that I've just got to laugh because although I sometimes expect myself to be capable of Big Things Regardless of Circumstance, the notion of cycling into the city from my folks' country place, and back again, inevitably, later this afternoon, is just a step too far into the lunatic zone. Anyway, I chuckled at the eejit making excuses, and dragged myself out of bed. It's not so bad actually, but it's not yet noon. Limerick city is moving, but subdued. I've been taking a walk.

Visited some backalley backyard parts of the neighbourhood I grew up in, here in Limerick. My folks moved out to South East Clare as soon as they had me reared, and I kicked my own arse off to college at 17 years of age, and so when I go back to Ireland, I tend to spend most of my time out in Clare, and with visits to my nana's house, which has traffic from all the rest of the family.

It's like a play set in nana's kitchen. People show up suddenly, after years of absence, and immediately get offered tea and cake. Since I've been living in fancy cities, surrounded by schedulers, I've developed a lingo. I asked dad last night, so, what's your schedule tomorrow? And caught myself. He said it's okay, I use that kind of language too, now. It's just the way things have turned. But to phone my nana in advance of showing up in her kitchen, through her ever-unlocked back door, would just be the most weird and unnecessary thing to do ever in the history of weird and unnecessary things. I will go there today, when I've finished my city stuff, and sit there in her kitchen, getting fed tea and brown bread, and chatting until somebody comes to take me away.

Right now, I'm sitting in the Marriot hotel, on the site of what was once one of the most beautiful, elegant theatres in Ireland. I was born next door to that theatre. It's been torn down now, to make way for a Marriot hotel and another shopping centre. However, it's a pretty ace spot to work in and I've been here all day with one pot of tea, a massive comfy sofa, relaxed environment and free wifi. Nice. I think I'll be coming back here.