'Like Doing Your Communion Every Wednesday’

Ah Wednesdays, Wednesdays, Wednesdays…….

The week is broken, we’re over the hump, on the run into the weekend – but for me it’s when work begins and quite frankly, ends. Payday – well for those of us on the scratcher that is. The mornings where the toaster pops like a pole vaulter, the rolling boil of the eggs looks like a stormy Atlantic swell and the rashers sizzle like a portly Irish teenager in the sun.  A day of elation and prosperity that’s embraced each and every week of the Gregorian calendar.

But it doesn’t just happen? – well, it sort of does.

June 2022; no bleep test, no entrance exam just an extraordinarily bang average man in the depths of his twenties after handing in his badge and gun (swipe card & laptop to be precise) – more than enough to satisfy the requirements from the Department of Social Welfare to cash in the Marxist golden ticket (shout out to Leo Varadkar and the complete incompetence of all involved to get this over the line). A summer of live, laugh, lasagnas in store – or as it soon became apparent, life on the Rock ‘N’ Roll.

With my LinkedIn profile updated to something along the lines of ‘Civil Servant 3-month initial contract with a view to permanent, it was time to make the Camino to the local Post Office. My senses were molested as I arrived to a myriad of knock-off Balenciaga & Canada Goose clobber accompanied with a chorus of ‘Alright Pals’. Before long I was giving my details to Margret (the An Post stalwart) who as cool as the underside of a pillow ripped me off four of the crispest brown cows she had. Margret the magician wasn’t done, she stuck her hand in to what as might as well have been the Trevi fountain and laid out my winnings in full. Two Hundred & Twelve Euros for an autograph - work is most definitely for those that knew no better.

Nevertheless, akin to most things in life it’s the triumphant walk home where the true fulfillment & satisfaction slaps the frontal cortex clean and hard. Nods to strangers, foolhardy firing of finger guns and unquestionably the pillage of the local convenience store. Armed with only a pocket full of taxpayer’s money and a body full of slow metabolites it’s always the large and lonely starter pack of: Milka Oreo (Comfort), Kinder Egg (Mystery), Monster Munch (Reassurance), €6 Euromillions quick-pick (Hope), four pack of Karpackie x 2 (Relief) & off-brand Durex (Essential) (Emergency).

So there you have it - if you thought having a belly full of chocolate and receiving a fistful of €50 notes off some middle-aged lady you are vaguely familiar with for doing absolutely nothing ended at 11/12 years of age - it doesn’t. Collecting the dole is like doing your communion every Wednesday.

‘A rich man wants a thousand things; a poor man only wants one’ – next Wednesday.

Quit the day job, start daydreaming.

Time is precious waste it wisely.