Ing-Ga-Lish ”Set.”

If English is your first language, there’s a massive chance you can’t speak any other language.

Out of the world’s approximately 7.5 billion inhabitants, 1.5 billion speak English – that’s 20% of the Earth’s population. However, most of those people aren’t native English speakers. About 360 million people speak English as their first language.

I don’t know what the percentage of 360 million people out of 7.5 billion is. Because that’s mental maths. Get that shit away from me. But I know it’s not much. So, if so few people speak English, why is it such an influential language?

It’s a complex question. There are thousands of contributing factors to the dominance of western culture as perpetrated by the English language. Many involve pointing a gun in someone’s face.

So I’m not going to try and answer the question of why. Instead, I want to highlight one single word, and talk about how English is so difficult to learn because of that word.

If you only speak English, grew up in a western culture, and then were tasked with trying to learn another language – “fuck that” might be your immediate response. Western arrogance assumes we only need one language, English, and that everyone else should get up to speed and learn English, rather than us learning Chinese or Arabic.

Imagine trying to learn Mandarin Chinese. The way it’s written, the pronunciation of words and the structure seems so alien to anybody who can only speak English. The same could be said for Arabic or Punjab.

The appearance of those languages on paper with their strange – to us – symbols and markings makes us imagine the languages as strange in our heads. It’s like the enigma code and we can’t crack it.

Now, imagine trying to learn English. It’s hard to imagine, but consider it. Just think of how difficult it would be to learn English.

English is a crazy language. There are so, so many ways to say the same thing. It’s a highly expressive language. But we often use the same word and give it countless meanings. For example, think of the word “set.”

“Set” is a deceptively simple word. Three letters, easy to say. But imagine learning English for the first time and trying to figure out the meaning of “set.”

I can speak French, poorly, but I get by. “Livre” means book in French. I know that. It doesn’t mean much else at all. 99% of the time when I hear the word “livre” used in French I know a book is being spoken about. Nobody in France says “livre une table,” when making dinner plans. They say, “faire une reservation.”

But think of “set” in English. There are so, so many meanings.

“Are you set?” (Ready) Adjective

“Set the table.” (Make) Verb

“My daughter has a train set.” (Item) Noun

“Quiet on set please!” (Location) Noun

And so on and so forth. Seriously, Google the word “set” and just have a scroll through how many different meanings come up. And then imagine coming from China to Dublin with little to no English, and then going to a BBQ and trying to understand the following conversations.

“Set the table please. Where’s your Dad?”

“He’s outside showing John how to set the time on the clock in his new car.”

“I just checked the golf. Woods looks set to take it.”

“We should eat outside and watch the sun set.”

“Mary, you have try the new Italian. They do a lovely set menu.”

“The food looks fab, Mary. Great set up.”

“Wasn’t it wonderful news about Jim’s son’s engagement? Have they set a date?”

“Woods just won the golf. And he set a new record.”

“So, Kate, are you all set for your holiday?”

“Ah he was innocent, no? He was set up.”

Just imagine trying to understand that load of shite. You’d be fucked.

What’s interesting though is that if we all just spoke in numbers, like how computers communicate, that Chinese person would understand. Think about it. We all have different languages and forms of writing to essentially communicate the same thing. But when it comes to numbers we only use one language: Numbers. We might pronounce the words for each number differently using our own unique languages, but on the page, we use the same script.

But fuck getting into that subject.

Smoked Salmon Carbonara

This recipe has four ingredients, takes ten minutes to make, and might be one of the easiest dishes I know of. And it’s very delicious. Serves 4.

You will need:

Tagliatelle (or whatever you want really)

Smoked Salmon

A standard carton of Cream or Crème Fraîche

Parmesan Cheese

Salt and Pepper to season

That’s it. That’s all you need.

Put your pasta of choice into boiling water and follow the time instructions on the packet. Most pasta takes between 8-10 minutes to cook. You knew that.

While your pasta is cooking, chop up your smoked salmon into little bits. Or whatever size you want. I like small pieces for this recipe.

Grate your Parmesan. You’ll need two handfuls, and a little extra to garnish.

Now, just wait for your pasta to be cooked. That’s all. This is almost the end of the recipe. Seriously.

When your pasta is cooked, drain the water and leave the pasta in the pot. Or drain the pasta in a colander then return it to the pot. Or else drain the pasta and put it into a big bowl. Nobody cares. You do you.

Then simply mix everything together. Your cooked pasta, your chopped smoked salmon, your parmesan cheese, your cream or crème fraîche, and some salt and pepper. Just mix it all up.

And that’s it. That’s the recipe. It’s crazy quick and absolutely delicious. If you’re feeling mad, throw an egg yolk in as well. Madness. Mental, Fitzy. But don’t go too mad now. Don’t have me worrying about you, like.

Put some of your finished masterpiece into a bowl for yourself and top it off with a little more grated parmesan. And that’s you. Done. Finito. Concluded. Over. Kevin Spacey’s career.

Dinner = sorted. And cheap too. I like this recipe a lot. Great on a damp dark night when your cheeks are still cold from walking home.

Try it. It’s lazy, half-assed, hassle-free but absolutely excellent. Just like this blog post.

Winter is almost here

I’ve been living in fear since 2017, afraid that I’m going to die. The thought of dying isn’t what scares me though, it’s the thought of dying without knowing how Game of Thrones ends. I can’t think of anything worse than dying without knowing what happens in Game of Thrones.

Like any sane person, I’m obsessed with Game of Thrones. Watching the show isn’t enough for me though. I have watched hours of Game of Thrones theory videos on YouTube. I’m also currently subscribed to three different Game of Thrones related podcasts.

But the YouTube videos are my favourite. (I love the illustrated history and lore videos HBO make after every season, narrated by the actors themselves.) I honestly can’t get enough. No matter the topic, if it’s Game of Thrones related, I watch it. You could make a theory video about Jon Snow actually being a cloud of smoke and I’d watch it. (Remember the random black smoke in Lost? What a crap show, after season 1 of course.)

But yeah Game of Thrones YouTube videos are my buzz. Episode breakdowns; Predictions; History and lore; Fight scene montages; Character recaps; Greatest moments; Even script leaks. Basically, anything I can get my hands on. I also read Game of Thrones blogs.

And, of course, I rewatch the series itself like mad.

I read the first five books, but once the show went further in terms of the story, I stopped. I recently bought a hardback book called The World of Ice and Fire. It’s full of highly detailed background histories of Westeros and the major houses. It wasn’t cheap, but it was so worth it.

So yeah, I like Game of Thrones. A lot. And that’s why I hope I don’t die.

Game of Thrones is the greatest fantasy story ever told. No argument. That’s a hill I’m so ready to die on (but not until season 8 is over.) Yes, it is better than Lord of the Rings, George RR Martin’s favorite book. Apparently George RR Martin was pissed off by the ending in Lord of the Rings though.

He wanted to know if Aragorn would actually make a good king. He wondered if being a good warrior meant you’d make a good king. And he also wondered about how Aragorn would have dealt with the politics and power dynamics involved with being king. These questions inspired him to write Game of Thrones, the greatest fantasy story ever.

Don’t even mention Star Wars in the same breath as Game of Thrones. Or the Avengers. And Harry fucking Potter doesn’t even get into the house, let alone get a seat at the same table as Game of Thrones. JK Rowling can stick to retrospectively tweeting about how her characters are all gay and ethnic so as to appear inclusive, even though she never makes those facts canon in her work, because she’ll never write a better story than Game of Thrones. So yeah, Harry Potter can fuck off. As far as fantasy is concerned, there is only one GOAT.

(While we’re here, talking about fantasy authors – how come they all have similar initialised names? J.K Rowling. George R.R Martin. J.R.R Tolkien. C.S Lewis. It’s a mad buzz. Anyway, where was I? Ah yes, dying.

I don’t want to die, because I love Game of Thrones. I need to know what happens. I live in fear. Summer 2017 was the last time I rested easy. The moment episode 7 of season 7 ended, with Viserion tearing down the wall with his blue fire and the Night King his rider and resurrector, I’ve been bricking it. Everything is a potential threat. I know I could go at any moment, without ever seeing Clegane Bowl. I’m terrified.

There’s so many possibilities. Just like your favourite Game of Thrones character, I could die at any moment.

A bus could hit me. That’s too cliché though. I might choke on my next meal, also a cliché. Too Joffrey. Or else it could be something sneaky that kills me, like just dropping dead. Brown bread. Toast. Pat the fucking Baker.

Anything is possible. At any moment. Heart failure is definitely on the cards if I don’t stop drinking like a fish. And I live in Australia now, so snakes have just been thrown into the equation. Maybe I’ll get drop kicked by a kangaroo. (I don’t hang out with many though.) It’s also possible that a shark could eat me. I’m going swimming with them in a few weeks. Awful decision in hindsight, but the deposit is already paid.

Only one thing is certain though: Potential death lurks around every corner. Nothing is safe. I can feel the Grim Reaper’s icy old breath on my neck.

Every time I get on a plane I worry about whether Jon Snow is the prince that was promised, and if Jaime will kill Cersei. Because that metal flying tube could fall from the sky at any moment, and that’s me done, without ever knowing. It’s too much.

But finally, today, I’ll get to hear that wonderful intro music again, knowing something new is coming after “Directed by David Benioff and D.B Weiss.” And then all I have to do is make it through the next six weeks.

It would be hilarious if something actually did happen to me though, now that I’ve written this. (Depends on your sense of humour.)

But I feel like I’ve jinxed myself for making my anxieties public. By admitting my fears I’ve made my own demise inevitable. It’s like I’ve willed my downfall into being.

Or maybe by saying something, I have un-jinxed what I had already jinxed by staying silent, which in turn jinxes me again all over. It’s a vicious cycle.

Do you see where my mind is at? I’m an absolute mess.

OMG. TBH, LMFAO.

Every day more acronyms crop up online that I don’t understand. I’m often Googling things like, “What does SMH mean?”

It means “Shaking my head.”

Others I’ve had to search include: ICYMI (In case you missed it), NSFW (Not safe for work), and TFW (The feeling when).

It’s no revelation that the internet has changed language. The faster our access to information gets, the faster we communicate. Whole phrases become single words. “LOL” being arguably the most famous.

We speak in emoji now too.

🤯. 🙌. 😍. 😜. 😩. 👌. 👀.

Each one of those is a sentence in itself, easily understandable. Emojis are commonly used as reactions. More and more they’re replacing words. Don’t forget that the Oxford Dictionary’s Word of the Year for 2016 was “😂.”

This can either be seen as the evolution of communication or the degeneration of it. In many ways you could argue the latter is true. Humans went from cave drawings, to stone carvings, to Egyptian hieroglyphs, to Shakespeare, to emojis. It seems we’ve come full circle.

What this means for language going forward, in my opinion, is that we’re becoming the same. Indistinguishable. A bit boring.

Languages are dying out at the same rate as mammals. Nobody is fucking plastic bottles into the ocean of communication though. There’s no global warming for speech. If the sun blows up we’re gonzo, but language has no sun. However, something else is already blowing up. Our phones.

The more connected we become the more we all speak the same language, literally. Everyone can understand an emoji. The phrases we use are now born online, instead of coming from regions. For example, “slay bitch, yaaaas” didn’t come from Dublin the way “scarlet for ya!” did. Thanks to the Internet we mimic speech, adopt it, and then it’s ours too. Slang has become universal.

I’ve noticed Irish people saying “y’all” a lot online lately. Particularly on Twitter. It’s strange. When did Mary Murphy become Hannah Montana? When she started following Miley Cyrus et all on social media.

I’m not blaming celebrity culture for this development though. Nobody is to blame. It’s merely a by-product of mass exposure to multiple media platforms that has caused this.

Young Irish kids now have what I call the Disney Channel accent. They sound more and more American by the year. The accents they hear at home mix with the ones they hear on their iPads and come out of their mouths in a mid-Atlantic twang. Irish kids now meet for “play-dates” where they drink “soda” and go online to “hit up” their favourite celebrities in the hopes of getting a “shout out.”

But none of that terminology is new to us. We use it too. And the rest. Think of “Oh my God.” It’s a very new phrase. Also, our parents never said “my bad” after a mistake. And they didn’t punctuate speech with “like” as if they grew up in California. Disagreeing with a point of view didn’t make people “haters.” This is all new.

But even our parents’ generation went through it. Think of the word “cool.” There’s no way your grandparents saw something they liked and called it “cool.” It’s very American. But our parents adopted these phrases, normalised them, and passed them down to us.

Go and listen to any 70s Thin Lizzy lyrics. I doubt Phil Lynott’s mother told him “them cats are crazy,” whenever the “boys” were back in town. She didn’t reminisce about “chicks” who danced a lot “on the floor,” “shaking what they got.” And these chicks weren’t so “cool” that “they were red hot” – “steaming.”

Language evolves. Time goes on. Ob la di, ob la da. Phrases come and go too. Nobody says “groovy” anymore. Nobody did before the 60s, and nobody does after.

Maybe it’s a marker of my own aging that I’m now moaning about change. Perhaps I should just go along with things like most people. For the most part, I do. And I don’t actually care that much at all. But some new phrases need to GTFOOH. (Google it if you need to.)

For starters, nothing is “fire.” Fire is fire. A good song isn’t fire. Your ma’s roast dinner wasn’t fire. (And while we’re here, get that shit off my Instagram. It looks gross. After seeing your ma’s roast I’d rather be in the Manson family than yours.) So, if you think something is fire, then jump into it please. Seriously. Burn alive. For all of us.

Here’s another one: Someone doing something mundane isn’t a “mood.” Behaving in a normal way isn’t a “mood.” Taking a screen shot of a reference to normal behavior you see online, like “Lions sleep 23 hours of the day and only wake to eat and mate,” and then posting your screen shot with the caption “mood,” is lazy banter. “Shite patter” as the Scots say. If you are someone who does this, please go and head butt an oncoming train.

In the remoulding of languages into the same ball of dough, I hope we don’t lose phrases and idioms that define Irish speech. Basic terms like “the head on your man” or “get out of that garden you.”

Maybe we are degenerating. The way we communicate now definitely seems to suggest that. Sending pictures instead of words. A day might come when we all just revert back to grunting and pointing. And that day could be sooner than we thought.

Try and read a book from the 20s. An era that spawned many works of English often regarded as the height of literature, like Ulysses and The Great Gatsby. The language in those works can seem stiff and formal. That’s because Anglophones no longer speak the Queen’s English. Because Elizabeth II has been usurped by Cardi B.

And I’m here for it.

You know the buzz

As a kid, I loved flicking the spring metal door stopper on the wall and watching it vibrate and twang back into stillness.

Flick, boingggg, meeyaaaaaaang, bommmmm, biiiiiiiiiiing, doooooooonggggggg, dun dun dun dun, dunnnnnnn, nuhnuhnunuhnuhnuh, nuhhhhhhhh, duh.

And repeat. Flick, boinggggg….

There has to be a name for that sort of thing – getting sensory pleasure from small, seemingly mundane actions. I’ve Googled it, but I don’t know what to put in the search bar. Most of my Google searches have returned links to cheap door stoppers or medical articles on autism.

There are so many similar little things that give us pleasure. Like clicking the back of the TV remote into place, opening it, then clicking it back in again. Or rubbing your thumb along the teeth of a plastic comb. Popping bubble wrap. Pulling Velcro apart. I love when you need to lock a door and have to pull the door handle up, and the inside of the door handle and lock cracks like knuckles. Even sitting inside the car during a car wash is a buzz. That’s like crack to kids. It was for me anyway.

Have you ever gone to the beach and gone close to the water where the sand is still really wet and tapped your shoe on the sand and it feels almost spongey, like it’s pancake batter? So you just keep patting away with the ball of your foot. Lovely.

Everyone has something strange they do that gives them sensory pleasure. One of the lads loves lying in bed with a hair dryer blowing in his face. It’s mad. I like pressing the “Diet” button down on a plastic McDonald’s drink lid. If I ever see mascara I like slowly pulling the brush out of the tube then pushing it back in.

Girls love popping spots. I think most people do.

Everyone does shit like that. It’s funny. And there’s so many examples of different things that just feel good to do, and look at. I often watch videos titled “Worlds Most Satisfying Video” on YouTube. Try it if you never have. Blissful when hungover.

Advertisers know exactly how these sort of things make us feel. Think of Twix ads. Watching the caramel fold onto the biscuit in slow-mo, then get smothered in chocolate, is close to porn. Lindt are good for a sexy ad. Their “master chocolatiers” always over pour the creamy chocolate inside Lindor chocolate truffles. Gorgeous.

Or what about that satisfying pop sound you hear when someone bites into a Magnum ice cream? Or cheese bubbling on Dominos pizza. Cold milk splashing on golden Corn Flake cereal. Rice Krispies directly play on the nice sound their cereal makes. They have three mascots called Snap, Crackle and Pop. None of this is a revelation. But it’s so good to watch and listen to. American food advertising is full of this stuff.

I recently saw someone refer to ASMR on Twitter. I’d never heard of the term before.

ASMR stands for Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response. Its the tingly sensation you get from something strangely pleasurable. But from what I’ve searched, ASMR seems to mostly define the pleasure we get from sound. Like rain on a window, popcorn popping, or a hot frying pan being put under a cold tap and steaming up.

I don’t fully understand what ASMR is. I think ASMR can encapsulate anything, but from watching YouTube videos with ASMR in the title, it definitely seems more sound related. I don’t think squeezing a ball of Play-doh and feeling it slowly squirt through your fingers falls under ASMR. Or pushing water through the gap in your front teeth. I could be wrong though. But I think ASMR is sound related.

Very often I get goosebumps when I listen to music. It’s lovely. There must be another term for that too.

But I want to know if there’s a scientific or psychological term for getting a buzz off doing weird shit. Like getting the USB cable into its socket on the first try. Or trying to balance the light switch between on and off.

It’s not that important. Knowing the name for those strange sensations won’t affect my enjoyment of them.

Like when the scissors slides and cuts effortlessly through wrapping paper.

What is going on?

Picture the scenario: You’re in the passenger seat of your friend’s car. Your friend starts telling you about something interesting they read.

“Have you heard of the French Paradox?” they ask.

“No,” you reply.

“Apparently France has a very low rate of coronary heart disease, despite the fact their food is so rich. Like red wine, heavy cheese, creamy sauces, pastries and lots of butter on everything. They love a cigarette too. Yet as a country they have a low rate of heart disease. It’s called the French Paradox.”

Cool fact, you tell your friend. You’ve never heard of the French Paradox before. And that’s that, you move on to another topic, like Conor McGregor battering someone in a pub or whether or not Gerry and Kate McCann had anything to do with the disappearance of Madeline. (Of course they didn’t. Cop on.)

But then that night as you’re watching Masterchef or Embarassing Bodies on TV, someone says, “It’s like the French Paradox, chef.” Or “You need to look after yourself, Francois. The French Paradox is a nice idea in theory, but your heart is definitely under strain from all the rich food.”

That’s funny, you think. But whatever. Then, you take out your phone and open Twitter. Uberfacts has just tweeted something about the French Paradox.

What. The. Fuck.

When you woke up that morning, you’d never heard of the French Paradox. And now you’re seeing it everywhere. There’s a name for this phenomenon. It’s called the Baader-Meinhof effect.

Two weeks ago I was drunk at home. I decided to FaceTime my friend Chris in Vietnam. He makes me laugh my bollocks off. Chris was with friends in his apartment and they were having a few drinks too, listening to music. When our call was ending Chris told me to go on to YouTube and type in “Jon Martyn – Solid Air Germany 1978.” He said I wouldn’t regret it. We hung up.

I looked up the Jon Martyn video on YouTube. He’s a singer and I had never heard of him. The video blew me away. The red wine I was drinking added to the experience, but Jon Martyn’s song and performance was incredible. I sent Chris a photo of me watching the video straight away, saying “Holy Shit.” He replied, “Yeah man. Powerful.”

That was that. The next morning I woke up a bit hungover and took the tram to work. On the tram I read my book, Everything I Know About Love by Dolly Alderton. Very good book. Dolly was describing a man she liked and mentioned how she told him her favourite singer was Jon Martyn. Ah here, I thought. That’s mad now.

I took a break from the book and put my headphones on and opened Spotify. I went to my “Discover Weekly” playlist and pressed shuffle. Who came on? You guessed it. Jon fucking Martyn. I nearly looked over my shoulder to see if someone was following me.

This morning on my way to work there was a smelly looking hipster on the tram. He had a pile of old vinyls on the seat next to him. Top of the pile was Jon Martyn. Fuck the fuck off, I thought to myself. Mad buzz.

This phenomenon of seeing or hearing of something, and then it suddenly showing up everywhere, is also referred to as the frequency illusion. But it’s more often referred to as the Baader-Meinhof effect.

Baader-Meinhof were a terrorist group active in Germany throughout the late 1970s. They killed a lot of people using bombs. Baader-Meinhof weren’t linguists or psychologists studying strange phenomena experienced by the human brain. They were pricks. So why is this effect named after them? I Googled the answer.

Apparently in 1994, online, someone posted a comment on The St. Paul Minnesota Pioneer Press discussion board. The commenter mentioned that they had never heard of the Baader-Meinhof terrorist group before, but had randomly heard two separate references to them in the last 24 hours. The person referred to the strange experience as the Baader–Meinhof effect. And the name was born.

Everyone has experienced the Baader-Meinhof effect. If you have just read this, and had never known about the name for this strange phenomenon before, you’ll probably start seeing it everywhere now. Enjoy.

Jimmy Saville’s Lunch Box

The following foods are paedo: Bounty Bars (any coconut chocolate really), Cadbury’s or Fry’s Turkish Delight, black liquorice (Bassett’s All Sorts), Filet-o-Fish, Vegemite, Marmite, Bovril, prune juice and Crème de Menthe cocktails.

If you enjoy any of those foods, your internet history should be monitored by the police.

The following foods are far from paedo: sardines, tuna, anchovies, mushrooms, smelly cheeses (like blue cheese), gherkins, black and white pudding, saurkraut, mustard, oysters, olives and beetroot.

If you think any of those foods are paedo, you need to grow up. Those are quality foods. Granted, some of them do require a stronger pallet. Like blue cheese and oysters. Fair enough. But if you don’t like mushrooms, tomatoes – or worse – mayonnaise, then you are a child.

Not liking those foods is the marker of a bread and butter with no crusts fussy little baby. Ketchup is probably as far as you venture. Well here’s some news for you; your friends’ parents hated when you came over to the house.

Ninety percent of your diet as a child likely consisted of Billy Roll. Even as an adult there’s a chance you consider coleslaw in a sandwich as exotic. Or you don’t like the texture of onions in your curries or bolognese. I’ll bet you order sweet and sour chicken at the Chinese, but ask for it with no vegetables. Tikka Masala is probably your spice threshold.

Branch the fuck out pal.

The following foods are disgusting, but not paedo: BBQ base pizzas, Caramac bars, cream soda, root beer, the strawberry chocolates in a box of Milk Tray, Café Noir biscuits, Rustler’s microwave burgers, any “special flavour” Pot Noodle, Irn Bru, Müeller Corner toffee hoops, meatballs from a can, Fireballs or any hot cinnamon flavoured sweets, spice burgers, Lucky Charms cereal, Orange Viscounts, prawn crackers, marmalade.

If you like those foods you’re a minger, but not a paedo by any stretch. In fact, if you like those foods you’re not a minger. You’re a cretin. There’s a strong likelihood that your friends see your house as the smelly house. But look on the bright side. If there’s ever a nuclear winter, you will survive, along with cockroaches and sewer rats.

Taste is subjective though. I have my own preferences of course. I don’t like gin and tonics. They’re dry, and shite. The best description of tonic water I’ve ever heard is “depressed 7up.”

I’m also not a fan of strawberry jam. Or horseradish. I hate fennel. And grapefruit. I don’t like capers either. And I really don’t like marzipan, that almond-like flavour you find in a cherry bakewell and some other tarts. Wasabi isn’t my buzz either. Unlike a lot of people, I’m not mad on jellies, or hard sugary sweets like Chewits.

Some foods are strangely polarising, like coriander. I like it, but I’ve heard it compared to dish soap. Not liking fish is understandable, but I feel sorry for you. Very smelly cheese is another one I get. I used to not like gherkins, or olives, but now I’m a fan.

Seriously though, if you eat Bounty bars or black liquorice, please stay at least one hundred yards from playgrounds. Your likelihood of being on a sex offenders list is strong.

To be clear, I am joking. Child abuse is abhorrent and unforgivable. I hope there is a hell, purely so the likes of Jimmy Saville can spend eternity constantly feeling the pain of having their skin peeled off and vinegar poured over them.

But if you order a Filet-o-Fish as your go-to McDonald’s – Jesus Christ.

And for the record, pineapple belongs on pizza.

Nemo Can’t Be Found

Finding Nemo is my favourite Pixar movie. Funny fish, vegetarian Aussie sharks, stoner turtles and beautiful animation. As a film, it is everything that’s great about the Pixar studio. However, Finding Nemo is also full of shit.

This is because Nemo the clownfish, Marlin’s lost son and the titular character, is not what you think he is. He is not Marlin’s son. In fact, he is nobody’s son. If you look closely, Nemo doesn’t even exist. He never existed. Therefore, Nemo can’t be found.

I’ve seen this theory being peddled online before, and I agree with it. So here is my breakdown of the theory that Nemo doesn’t exist.

In the opening scene of Finding Nemo, Marlin’s wife and unborn fish eggs are eaten by a barracuda. (It wouldn’t be a Disney film without murder.) However, one fish egg survives. Marlin names it Nemo and promises to always protect it. Heartwarming.

But no, I don’t think any fish egg survived. I think the one surviving egg, Nemo, is a figment of Marlin’s imagination. I believe this because I think the film is an allegory for death and the grieving process. And Marlin’s journey to find his son actually represents the five stages of grief.

The five stages of grief are: Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression and Acceptance.

In simple English, Marlin’s search to “find Nemo” actually represents his journey to get over the murder of his family.

The theory of the five stages of grieving is usually presented as a chronological process. A person goes into denial, then feels angry, then bargains with questions like “what could I have done to prevent this?” before becoming depressed, and then finally accepting the situation and moving on.

I think Pixar distorts the chronology a little in Finding Nemo, but every element of the theory of the five stages of grief is present in the film.

The first clue to Nemo being a metaphorical character is in his name. “Nemo” in Latin means “nobody.” Having Nemo be a physical character also shows Marlin’s Denial stage of the grieving process. He refuses to believe his family have all died, so he creates Nemo, an imaginary son.

Stage two of Marlin’s grief – Anger – manifests itself in many ways. Marlin often snaps at Nemo and generally has no patience for the people trying to help him, lashing out irrationally. Mr. Ray the singing stingray gets a telling off for bringing his class to the “drop off” on Nemo’s first day of school, while Dory constantly bears the brunt of Marlin’s short temper when Nemo goes missing.

Marlin blames himself for the death of his wife and eggs. He tells himself it will never happen again and obsesses over Nemo’s safety. This shows stage three of his grieving – his Bargaining stage.

In blaming himself for not being more careful, and for not protecting his wife and their unborn eggs, Marlin develops a feeling of self-loathing. Nemo even says “I hate you.” But this is Marlin’s subconscious speaking to him.

Marlin’s self-hatred also manifests itself though an extreme fear of the ocean and a lack of trust for anything. He is wondering what he could have done differently to prevent the death of his family. This causes him to no longer take unnecessary risks regarding Nemo’s safety, no matter how ridiculous his over-protective behavior is. And so, Marlin isolates himself and Nemo from the world. Everything beyond their home becomes a threat.

Stage four – Depression – is constant throughout the film, and understandably so. Marlin’s family were murdered. Perhaps the most obvious example of Marlin’s depression is when he gives up the search for Nemo.

When Marlin sees Nemo lying dead in the dentists office after the dentist’s niece Darla has shaken Nemo’s plastic bag too hard, Marlin gives up. Nigel the pelican brings Marlin and Dory back to Sydney harbour and says goodbye. Marlin drops his head and swims away melancholically into the dark blue.

Marlin has no idea that Nemo was actually playing dead in order to escape by being flushed down the toilet, but by this moment everything has come to a head for Marlin, and he gives into his hopeless sadness.

But Nemo, “nobody,” isn’t dead of course. He escapes the dentist’s office and Marlin reunites with his son. They go home with Dory and live happily ever after. This can be seen as Marlin’s Acceptance stage of the grieving process. He has learned to move on.

Despite all the struggles Marlin had to endure to get there, he finally manages to get through it all. And it is thanks to the help of community that he achieves this. Pixar is telling us to reach out to people.

Marlin couldn’t have done it without Bruce the shark encouraging him to open up, Crush the turtle for teaching him how to let go, and of course the amazing Dory for never giving up on her friend.

The moral of the story, and the film’s most quoted line, is “Just keep swimming.”

The World’s Greatest

Muhammad Ali punched me in the face when I was ten. He didn’t actually punch me, he pretended to. But still, Muhammad Ali. In the flesh. Punching me in the face. What a buzz.

It was at the 2003 Special Olympics opening ceremony in Croke Park in Dublin. I had been invited by a family friend whose company had a box in the stadium. The box was on the halfway line so we had a great view of everything. Even better though, everyone who had to get on stage had to walk down the corridor outside the entrance to the box. That’s where Muhammad Ali punched me in the face.

He was coming down the corridor in a wheelchair being pushed by someone. He looked old and frail. Once word had gone around that Muhammad Ali was coming, everyone poured out of their boxes and lined the corridor to catch a glimpse. As he passed he waved and smiled at people. Everyone spontaneously applauded him. It was Muhammad Ali after all.

As he approached us I shook with excitement, like a Jack Russell who has just been told he’s going for a walk. At ten years old I didn’t know much about Muhammad Ali’s boxing record, but I knew who Muhammad Ali was. I had seen the Will Smith film. I knew he was the greatest sportsman to ever live.

He reached the door to our box. I leaned out and put my hand towards him, looking for a high five or a shake. I don’t know why, but I just felt compelled to touch him.

Seeing Muhammad Ali in the flesh, and seeing the look of awe on everyone’s face along the corridor, and feeling the atmosphere in that small hallway was something I had never experienced. It was as if we were all witnessing something divine. Someone holy. My dad was beaming. I had never seen him like that. He was like a thirteen year old girl about to meet One Direction.

I held my arm out and Muhammad Ali put his hand up, indicating for his wheelchair to stop being pushed. Then he turned his head towards me. My arm was still outstretched. He looked me dead in the eyes and began reaching for my hand. I could feel my heart thumping. Holy shit.

Just as he was about to touch my hand, he shuffled both his fists together, as if we were about to fight. Then, quick as anything, he threw a right-handed jab at my face. His clenched fist, the size of a pineapple, stopped an inch from my chin. I flinched and nearly fell backwards. Everyone laughed and clapped and his wheelchair was pushed on. What a fucking buzz that was.

A lot of celebrities walked down that corridor throughout the day. I saw Pierce Brosnan, Sinéad O’Connor and U2 to name a few. Nowhere near as many people waited in the corridor for them though. By the time Ronan Keating walked by I think I was the only person left.

I’ll be telling that story about being punched by the world’s greatest for the rest of my life. People like Muhammad Ali, Marilyn Monroe and Elvis exist mostly in our imagination. They have transcended flesh and blood to become immortal. Almost Godlike. They live in the posters on our bedroom walls. If you can’t name a Buddy Holly song or a Charlie Chaplin film, you still know who is being spoken about. Somebody iconic. Their names have become buzz words and references for influence and fame. Giants of pop culture.

But we can still picture those people as living breathing humans, because we have those photographs on our walls, and film footage online. Also, many people still alive have met them.

It’s harder to imagine historical figures like King Henry VIII, Shakespeare or Joan of Arc as actual people. They’re just characters in the stories we tell about historical events. Lifeless faces on old paintings. Nobody who is still alive has had their life directly touched by such people, simply because they never met them. You might love Hamlet, but Shakespeare himself has slipped into legend. We’ll never know what he was like. He has become the very thing he created, a great character in a story.

But Muhammad Ali really did exist. I know that. Because he punched me in the face.

Wanda, the fish who couldn’t die.

I had a goldfish called Wanda and she lived forever. She was my first pet. I got her when I was two. Lots of my friends had pet fish as well, but they always seemed to die for some reason. Not Wanda though. Wanda couldn’t die. Or so I thought.

Wanda, like most goldfish, lived in a small round fish bowl. All day, she swam in circles. I loved feeding her. Her food was typical fish food – little flakes that smelled horrible and came in a small blue box. Watching Wanda nibble at the flakes once they landed on the surface of the water in her bowl excited me. Wanda, my pal.

I used to press the tip of my finger against the bowl and hope Wanda would follow it. Sometimes she did. I’d even chat to her like she was a dog. For a while I thought she knew who I was. How could she though? She was a fucking goldfish. Kids are mad in the head.

She was my goldfish though, and nothing seemed to kill her. My friends’ fish seemed to come and go all the time. One week they’d be swimming around their tanks, the next they were getting flushed down the toilet. Not Wanda though. Nothing could kill her. Or so I thought.

I was two when we got Wanda and she was still going when I turned nine. I remember wondering how long goldfish could live. If Google was around I definitely would have looked it up. (Mid 90s, no Google. People still had conversations.)

Wanda, the elixir of life. Defier of odds. The immortal goldfish. Nope, absolute horse shit. Only recently I learned the truth.

My sisters brought me to get Wanda when we first got her. They were all excited about me having a pet. They’re ten years older than me. They also named Wanda. I think they were also the ones who decided Wanda was female. How can you know the sex of a goldfish? There’s hardly a scaly little cock and balls floating between their fins.

So here’s the truth about Wanda’s immortality. My sisters only told me this recently when we were drunk. Wanda didn’t live forever. In fact, she died almost every fucking weekend.

My sisters always had house parties as young teenagers. I remember them. My parents would go for dinner and leave my sisters to babysit me. Once my parents were out the door, I’d be sent upstairs with my LEGO. A gang of awkward teenagers with mouths full of braces and oily hairstyles would arrive at the door. They’d pile into our living room carrying naggins of vodka or cans of cider. The Lynx Africa and Tommy Girl brigade.

Apparently it was a common joke amongst my sisters friends – the boys obviously – to kill my goldfish. One time, Wanda’s bowl was spiked with whiskey. Another time she ended up in the microwave. We lived right next to the sea, so one time someone threw her from our balcony, aiming for the marina. I always thought Wanda lived a peaceful, long life. Far from it. In reality, she was being absolutely fucking tortured, and dying constantly.

I keep referring to Wanda as a singular fish. Clearly she wasn’t. Every time someone killed Wanda, my sisters would have to go to the local pet shop and replace her. I never noticed. For nearly ten years. Here I was thinking my goldfish, my pal Wanda, was impervious to death. It was all a lie.

One day when I was nearly ten I came home from school and Wanda was floating at the top of her bowl. The day had come. I flushed her down the toilet, saluting my friend Wanda, the goldfish that had lived a long and happy life.

Nope.