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Category Archives: Uncategorized
Lessons in Love
My ten-year-old daughter is home from school bursting with excitement: Conor James – CJ – from her class wrote a letter to Joanne McCaffrey and it had a big heart on the envelope! He sneaked into the classroom in the … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged anxiety, Belfast, Cupid's Arrow, Jason O'Rourke, Literature, love, love letter, obsession, playground, romance, s.w.a.l.k, short story, teachers, Valentine's Day, wasps, writing
4 Comments
Lost in Translation
The crash of the front door being slammed with great force jarred Jim uneasily awake from a pleasant and peacefully-stoned sleep. There followed the sound of running footsteps in the hall and then the thud of the back door; curious. … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged Belfast, Cannabis, drunk driving, fear, French, Guinness, humour, Irish Music, Italian, Jason O'Rourke, Kelly's Cellars, Literature, Ormeau Road, paranoia, Putain de Bordel de Merde, RUC, short story, spliff, taxi, vino, writing
16 Comments
Model Customer
269 Monrovia Street Augusto Maiale Uomo Belfast Viale Primavera 354 BT7 3AR 00172 Roma … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged Belfast, humour, Jason O'Rourke, knickers, letters, Literature, Ormeau Road, Rome, short story, St Patrick's Day, Tailors, underpants, writing
9 Comments
Occupy
My 6 year-old daughter’s birthday present is a new bike. It is pink, of course, with Disney Princess decorations on it, and I have added shiny new stabiliser wheels. She is excited and can’t wait to go out on it, … Continue reading
Gobbet
Gobbet [noun]; /gɒbɪt/; Middle English gobet, from Old French gober, to swallow; 14th century. 1: small piece or morsel (e.g. of meat); 2: lump, viscous mass; 3: short piece, fragment, or extract of text; 4: small quantity of liquid, drop. Example: Walking past Castle Court … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged Belfast, Castle Court, disgust, gob, Gobbet, Jason O'Rourke, Kate Moss, Literature, Marilyn Monroe, phlegm, short story, writing
7 Comments
South Central Belfast
Rare birds have flown thousands of miles to land on the Lower Ormeau Road. It is a glorious summer Saturday and I am going across town to visit a friend who lives on the Antrim Road. They are standing outside … Continue reading
Blue Valentines, Part II.
Looking back, just over a year later, I can still remember it with amazing clarity. It is cold today – as it was on that day, a week after Valentine’s. I am cosy beside a glowing coal fire as I … Continue reading
Blue Valentines
Valentine’s Day didn’t start well: I’d woken way before the alarm, and then been forced to eat an unwanted early breakfast. Still half-asleep, I burned the toast. Before my ultrasound scan at the City Hospital, I was required to fast … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged Belfast, Belfast City Hospital, Billet-Doux, Botanic Gardens, Florentino Ariza, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Jason O'Rourke, KFC, Literature, loneliness, love, Love in the Time of Cholera, love letter, Ormeau Bridge, Ormeau Road, Queen's University, Rugby Avenue, short story, Spring, Valentine's Card, Valentine's Day, writing
10 Comments
The Thing that went Bump in the Night
I was asleep in my bedroom under the eaves of the student house in Rugby Road when it happened. My little bed was lifted clean off the floor, the jolt of its return awakening me. My first thoughts were that … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged 1992, ambulance, anger, Belfast, blood, bomb, Botanic Avenue, curiosity, disappointment, Dole Office, Donegall Pass, Dublin Road, explosion, fear, Fulton Street, glass, injured baby, IRA, Jason O'Rourke, March 24th 1992, Pakenham Street, Police station, Posnett Street, RUC Station, Sandy Row, Shaftesbury Square, shattered windows, WPLongform
14 Comments
Vernacularisms 