Fears

[ziggy90]

Good man Larnaparka. Another one for the GAABOARD annals/archives..

Almost

[magpie seanie]

Jaysus Lar, I got a good laugh out of that story. Fair play. Funny story anyway but the way you tell it is magic!

[5 Sams]

Good man Larnaparka. Another one for the GAABOARD annals/archives..

Almost

[Hardy]

Any more like that Lar? If you haven't, make some up - we could do with them. 

[Olly]

Does anyone have any fears that cripple their lives to the extent that they just live in their own beds surrounded by crisp packets, cups of tea and defecation?

Recently I developed a horrendous fear of the unknown. It just happened to be when I was driving the bus down to Carrickmacross and it suddenly hit me that anything could happen right now - i.e a burst tyre that would send me and my fellow inmates spiralling in a towering inferno 100 feet into the air and into the bushes. Or a rabbit or bear could jump from the roadside and I'd swerve and kill some old lady who was going to the toilet on the side of the road. Since then I've not been able to function in trepidation that I'd not do what I need to do.

Does anyone fear anything else?

Ah Jaysus, Olly, you just resurrected an old childhood fear that I thought had long been exorcised from my mind.
Now I know I will never be able to freewheel down Campbell's hilleen again without a care in the world unless I'm wearing kneepads, a helmet and a pair of brown jocks.

One hot summer evening long ago in a more innocent time when the world hadn't yet heard of the Sunday Game, Bertie Ahern or Jedward, my mother sent me off to a relative to help with the haymaking.

Late in the evening I was returning home with a ten bob note in one pocket and a couple of Cadbury's Milk Chocolate bars in another. I pedalled along without a care in the world. As bad luck would have it, I was also given a bag of crisps, which were luxuries at the time.
I decided to cut a few miles off my journey by taking an old lane or boreen that wasn't much used by anyone any more. I had no way of knowing that another person had decided to travel this way also but her reason for doing so was rather different to mine.
Mind you, it turned out that I was to wind up doing the same thing as the old lady I literally came across.  But I wasn't to know this as I started to freewheel down a steep incline that finished off with a sharp right hand bend.
As I swung around the corner I saw a bike lying on the ground blocking the roadway. I had only one hand on the handlebars and I was pinning the crisp bag to the handle grip with my thumb and using the other hand to shovel the crisps into me gob. You could say that my control over the bike left a lot to be desired.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the owner of the abandoned bike, hunkered down at the side of the road. It was obvious that she was doing what a lady got to do but I couldn't help wishing that she had found another spot to do it.
I dropped the crisps and slammed on the brakes so the bike went into a skid and headed straight for the defecator as if it had a mind of its own.
The back brake pads had long since passed their best before date so I went flying over the handlebars and wound up lying halfway across her lap.
(She was fully seated on the ground at this stage!)
Both of us were too stunned to speak. I got up, picked up my bike and resumed my journey without a single glance at the old woman that I had, in a very real sense, landed in the shit.
I knew there would be hell to pay when my mother saw the dented mudguard and my scratched knees. I realised that I had responded to a call of nature while lying across the old dear's lap and that would take some explaining too!

I was more upset by the loss of my crisps than anything else that had happened.
I come from the wild west of east Mayo, where crisps at that time were hard to come by.
I met the original defecator from time to time after and she appeared to have wiped the incident from her mind. If she hadn't, she certainly made a good job of pretending that she had.
As for me, I graduated in time to a more roadworthy bike, learned to poop with more circumspection, most of the time anyway, but I became very territorial when anybody approached me when eating a bag of crisps.
I still am.

That should be published. I'm certainly telling my nephew that story tonight at bedtime.

[Main Street]

Great story Lar.

I use to live about 50 -100km from the centre of an active earthquake zone and strange enough I acquired a chronic fear of the earthquake. On average about 5 noticeable light ones every year  and a whopper every 5 years or so. But nobody could predict whether it would be just be low grade activity or the big one.
The first biggish one happened at the opening game of WC USA 94. I was lying on my back on the floor, head on a pillow watching tv, looking at the pundits in the studio nattering pre game. Then they suddenly stopped talking  and started to look around the studio, there was something really strange going on. Then I felt something, not much, just a sense  of some weird wavy movement. My head  dropped back on the pillow to look up at the wall behind me, and there was the fish tank, the water inside was heaving violently from side to side. I thought 'WTF there's a storm in the fish tank'!! I rolled away just as it crashed to the ground, close enough to where my head was.  At this point I hadn't heard any noise but something weird was going on, everything that could rattle was rattling, anything that could tumble tumbled to the floor. Then I thought, 'this must be an earthquake'.
I had experienced some really heavy thunder and lightening storms in the Black Forests in Germany and they made me feel very small and powerless. I'd sit transfixed looking out the window at them all night long. This earthquake was about 10 times more intense.
Thing is, I couldn't say it out loud that I was reduced to tea and crisps. You were supposed to take these things in your stride.  But I suspect some friends must have detected something.  So on occasion one of them would ring up and say there was an earthquake warning and get everything breakable on the floor. And then without a hint of wind up, call me up the next day and say it's okay, all clear now. If they only knew what went on in my head.
Time passed by and we got a dog. One morning she started whimpering about 8am, she started acting out as if there was some stranger lurking. I looked around the house with her and there was nothing, nada. Usually that did the trick to calm the dog, but this time she continued whimpering and whining along with constant restlessness. Then at 9am the widow chimes started rattling along with a loud noise as if a 5 ton truck had hit the house. My first thought was, 'so that's why the dog was whimpering and acting out', 'it all makes sense now', 'it's just a feckin earthquake' 'I'm glad to have such a smart sensitive dog'
I hardly noticed the earthquake and then I thought, 'hey I'm cured', I'm not petrified, it's just another earthquake.

[5 Sams]

Great story Lar.

I use to live about 50 -100km from the centre of an active earthquake zone and strange enough I acquired a chronic fear of the earthquake. On average about 5 noticeable light ones every year  and a whopper every 5 years or so. But nobody could predict whether it would be just be low grade activity or the big one.
The first biggish one happened at the opening game of WC USA 94. I was lying on my back on the floor, head on a pillow watching tv, looking at the pundits in the studio nattering pre game. Then they suddenly stopped talking  and started to look around the studio, there was something really strange going on. Then I felt something, not much, just a sense  of some weird wavy movement. My head  dropped back on the pillow to look up at the wall behind me, and there was the fish tank, the water inside was heaving violently from side to side. I thought 'WTF there's a storm in the fish tank'!! I rolled away just as it crashed to the ground, close enough to where my head was.  At this point I hadn't heard any noise but something weird was going on, everything that could rattle was rattling, anything that could tumble tumbled to the floor. Then I thought, 'this must be an earthquake'.
I had experienced some really heavy thunder and lightening storms in the Black Forests in Germany and they made me feel very small and powerless. I'd sit transfixed looking out the window at them all night long. This earthquake was about 10 times more intense.
Thing is, I couldn't say it out loud that I was reduced to tea and crisps. You were supposed to take these things in your stride.  But I suspect some friends must have detected something.  So on occasion one of them would ring up and say there was an earthquake warning and get everything breakable on the floor. And then without a hint of wind up, call me up the next day and say it's okay, all clear now. If they only knew what went on in my head.
Time passed by and we got a dog. One morning she started whimpering about 8am, she started acting out as if there was some stranger lurking. I looked around the house with her and there was nothing, nada. Usually that did the trick to calm the dog, but this time she continued whimpering and whining along with constant restlessness. Then at 9am the widow chimes started rattling along with a loud noise as if a 5 ton truck had hit the house. My first thought was, 'so that's why the dog was whimpering and acting out', 'it all makes sense now', 'it's just a feckin earthquake' 'I'm glad to have such a smart sensitive dog'
I hardly noticed the earthquake and then I thought, 'hey I'm cured', I'm not petrified, it's just another earthquake.

Sorry Main Street...doesnt beat the woman having a shite story

[ONeill]

The first biggish one happened at the opening game of WC USA 94. I was lying on my back on the floor, head on a pillow watching tv, looking at the pundits in the studio nattering pre game. Then they suddenly stopped talking  and started to look around the studio, there was something really strange going on. Then I felt something, not much, just a sense  of some weird wavy movement. My head  dropped back on the pillow to look up at the wall behind me, and there was the fish tank, the water inside was heaving violently from side to side. I thought 'WTF there's a storm in the fish tank'!! I rolled away just as it crashed to the ground, close enough to where my head was.  At this point I hadn't heard any noise but something weird was going on, everything that could rattle was rattling, anything that could tumble tumbled to the floor. Then I thought, 'this must be an earthquake'.

MAIN STREET DIARY ENTRY:

I walked doen the stairs and was greeted with smiles and back slaps. They set a cake in front of me and asked me to blow out the candles. Then I had to open loads of presents. My brothers lifted me and gave me 40 bumps. People just kept shaking my hand. I looked around and there were balloons and everything saying 'happy 40th'. Champagne was then popped. Then I thought, 'this must be my birthday'.

[Tony Baloney]

The first biggish one happened at the opening game of WC USA 94. I was lying on my back on the floor, head on a pillow watching tv, looking at the pundits in the studio nattering pre game. Then they suddenly stopped talking  and started to look around the studio, there was something really strange going on. Then I felt something, not much, just a sense  of some weird wavy movement. My head  dropped back on the pillow to look up at the wall behind me, and there was the fish tank, the water inside was heaving violently from side to side. I thought 'WTF there's a storm in the fish tank'!! I rolled away just as it crashed to the ground, close enough to where my head was.  At this point I hadn't heard any noise but something weird was going on, everything that could rattle was rattling, anything that could tumble tumbled to the floor. Then I thought, 'this must be an earthquake'.

MAIN STREET DIARY ENTRY:

I walked doen the stairs and was greeted with smiles and back slaps. They set a cake in front of me and asked me to blow out the candles. Then I had to open loads of presents. My brothers lifted me and gave me 40 bumps. People just kept shaking my hand. I looked around and there were balloons and everything saying 'happy 40th'. Champagne was then popped. Then I thought, 'this must be my birthday'.

[Hardy]

Sorry Main Street...doesnt beat the woman having a shite story

It's still a good story, though. This reads like something from a Stephen King chiller:

Then they suddenly stopped talking  and started to look around the studio, there was something really strange going on. Then I felt something, not much, just a sense  of some weird wavy movement. My head  dropped back on the pillow to look up at the wall behind me, and there was the fish tank, the water inside was heaving violently from side to side. I thought 'WTF there's a storm in the fish tank'!! I rolled away just as it crashed to the ground, close enough to where my head was.

[Main Street]

Sorry Main Street...doesnt beat the woman having a shite story

Not trying to,  just being sociable.

[5 Sams]

Sorry Main Street...doesnt beat the woman having a shite story

Not trying to,  just being sociable.

I know...hence the 

[JUst retired]

 My greatest fear would be meeting Ollie driving that fecking bus.

[johnneycool]

Does anyone have any fears that cripple their lives to the extent that they just live in their own beds surrounded by crisp packets, cups of tea and defecation?

Recently I developed a horrendous fear of the unknown. It just happened to be when I was driving the bus down to Carrickmacross and it suddenly hit me that anything could happen right now - i.e a burst tyre that would send me and my fellow inmates spiralling in a towering inferno 100 feet into the air and into the bushes. Or a rabbit or bear could jump from the roadside and I'd swerve and kill some old lady who was going to the toilet on the side of the road. Since then I've not been able to function in trepidation that I'd not do what I need to do.

Does anyone fear anything else?

Ah Jaysus, Olly, you just resurrected an old childhood fear that I thought had long been exorcised from my mind.
Now I know I will never be able to freewheel down Campbell's hilleen again without a care in the world unless I'm wearing kneepads, a helmet and a pair of brown jocks.

One hot summer evening long ago in a more innocent time when the world hadn't yet heard of the Sunday Game, Bertie Ahern or Jedward, my mother sent me off to a relative to help with the haymaking.

Late in the evening I was returning home with a ten bob note in one pocket and a couple of Cadbury's Milk Chocolate bars in another. I pedalled along without a care in the world. As bad luck would have it, I was also given a bag of crisps, which were luxuries at the time.
I decided to cut a few miles off my journey by taking an old lane or boreen that wasn't much used by anyone any more. I had no way of knowing that another person had decided to travel this way also but her reason for doing so was rather different to mine.
Mind you, it turned out that I was to wind up doing the same thing as the old lady I literally came across.  But I wasn't to know this as I started to freewheel down a steep incline that finished off with a sharp right hand bend.
As I swung around the corner I saw a bike lying on the ground blocking the roadway. I had only one hand on the handlebars and I was pinning the crisp bag to the handle grip with my thumb and using the other hand to shovel the crisps into me gob. You could say that my control over the bike left a lot to be desired.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the owner of the abandoned bike, hunkered down at the side of the road. It was obvious that she was doing what a lady got to do but I couldn't help wishing that she had found another spot to do it.
I dropped the crisps and slammed on the brakes so the bike went into a skid and headed straight for the defecator as if it had a mind of its own.
The back brake pads had long since passed their best before date so I went flying over the handlebars and wound up lying halfway across her lap.
(She was fully seated on the ground at this stage!)
Both of us were too stunned to speak. I got up, picked up my bike and resumed my journey without a single glance at the old woman that I had, in a very real sense, landed in the shit.
I knew there would be hell to pay when my mother saw the dented mudguard and my scratched knees. I realised that I had responded to a call of nature while lying across the old dear's lap and that would take some explaining too!

I was more upset by the loss of my crisps than anything else that had happened.
I come from the wild west of east Mayo, where crisps at that time were hard to come by.
I met the original defecator from time to time after and she appeared to have wiped the incident from her mind. If she hadn't, she certainly made a good job of pretending that she had.
As for me, I graduated in time to a more roadworthy bike, learned to poop with more circumspection, most of the time anyway, but I became very territorial when anybody approached me when eating a bag of crisps.
I still am.

That should be published. I'm certainly telling my nephew that story tonight at bedtime.

It's so good that it couldn't be made up

[Hound]

It's so good that it couldn't be made up

I was expecting (fearing) a more graphic ending.
Thankfully Lar uses "literally" in the Jamie Redknapp fashion