The Master of Verse?

The intensity was there for everyone to see. Thinking was the new drinking as quiz master Jay Marone spat and spluttered out questions through his Beamish steeped false teeth. Some say Jay could have been the new Chris Tarrant but for a leg injury he sustained in a recent freak accident. Others say he could have actually been in Tarrants, (an early bar further along Marones route) but for that same injury! Jay Marone was similar in build to a shovel and you knew that if a strong enough wind blew, it was only the copious quantities of stout he consumed, combined with heavy metal crutches that would stop him from becoming an unsaddled quiditch broom! Formerly a brilliant butcher who had a way with women, a terrible way, he now sat, at the corner of J D’s bar minding his own business, but telling everyone else’s, physically preparing for, what was now, the legendary weekly mastermind challenge! (The term, physically preparing, in this sense, means, drinking an adequate amount of alcohol to keep his hands from shaking so much that the print did not fall off the newspaper).

The venue for mastermind, or plastered mind, was the old watering hole, J D s. A bar that brought the town of Cobh together in times of trouble, torment, treasure and thirst. Where the glorious pong of pigs trotters and tripe punched you in the nose upon arrival on a cold winters day. There was a family atmosphere with daily arguments, name calling and queues for the bathrooms a plenty. Local radio provided the soundtrack, local papers provided the stimulation and local psychiatrists provided the counselling if you spent too long in J D s. The intellectual, cerebral conversations that were heard between the walls of this bar, such as ‘that is my chair’ ‘no it is not, it is mine’ and ‘its your round’, ‘hey, I just got here’ ‘Tough!’, made it difficult to choose worthy candidates for Saturdays eagerly anticipated quiz. These questions came straight from Saturdays broadsheet to baffle and boggle the minds of the men brave enough to take part. As the days sun soared and cast its rays over the previous nights vomit and Chinese curry cartons, strewn across the street, two men, on opposite sides of town, left home, like ancient warriors, prepared for battle.

One man, Marty Keen, recklessly meandered his way through cross town traffic in a constant battle with his dashboard, desperately trying to gain an inch or two to see oncoming blurs. On Saturdays, dogs, cats and wheelie bins were on high alert along the streets of Cobh while the residents were warned to only go outside if absolutely necessary as hurricane Marty was blowing from 0-18mph in ten minutes. He was a cheeky chappy who had a grin from ear to ear that irritated the sombre anti socials sipping their drinks in J D s like lonely sociopaths, but he did not care. He drank for happiness and underneath his jam jar glasses which somehow made his eyes look smaller, and a baseball hat which defined his sporty casual look, was a man with less worries than Bobby McFerrin. When he finally did arrive at J D s, car sweating and breathing a sigh of relief, Marty always told a great story or was inadvertently the topic of a great yarn after he left. One beautiful summers morning Marty had been sitting and drinking for about twenty minutes, chatting randomly to some of the locals as usual. Suddenly the urge to find out the time got the better of him and he nonchalantly pulled out his Mother’s mantle piece clock which was the size of a big, hefty pigeon, from his inside coat pocket to check the time before returning it, with an informed look on his face, back where it seemed impossible for it to fit. There was a silence, almost taunting a piece of tumble weed to breeze in and add to the scene before one punter said ‘I think Big Ben wants his clock back’. Amid the laughter and confusion, someone composed themselves enough to ask, why he was carrying around this tick tocking time box?, and without even understanding why he was asked, Marty simply replied,’ sure my watch is broken!. Contestant number one!!!!

Living on top of the hill, a cats throw from J D s, reigned a man, so full of sayings and wisdom that, had you not met him, you would have considered him a figment of imagination, a fable, a legend, like the tooth fairy or Willie Nelson. Patrick Livermore, with a laugh that would open doors and a an argumentative streak that would slam them closed, was a morning quart drinker, he had 4 pints and no more or his frying pan at lunch time would have been considered a weapon of mass destruction. Many a morning the saloon style doors of J D s would swing open to reveal another customer and in his loudest, proudest voice, Patrick, would boast ‘ah sure, would you look who it is?’, before turning to his neighbour, only to ask in a whisper ‘who is that?’. With a yearly buster(a game to see how many goals your particular weeks football team can score, and if your collective teams, over the year, get the most goals, you win) running in the bar, Patrick would always wait until the very last moment to pay his entry fee, because, as he explained ‘well if I died half way through the season, it would be an awful waste of money’. He was like a first class passenger aboard the Titanic with his faithful flat cap, puffing on his pipe, wearing his unsullied, starched suit and also, he was as wet as a can of Atlantic Ocean. He and Jay Marone were like an old married couple who could only put up a front in public for so long before rude remarks and senseless snipes sparked from their tongues like faulty wires exposed in the rain. They argued about absolutely everything from the names of people stood in front of them to dates that their friends retired. Silly squabbles ensued and the only reason Patrick was always right, was because Marone was always wrong. Contestant number two!!!!

The excitement in J D s was as contagious as the crowd that converged to witness that Saturdays series of questions. There was Matthew ‘I’ll have a pint of rob there bud’ Canavan, Pepe ‘I own a brush, therefore I am a painter’ Burke, along with Teddy ‘the bottle broke on its last bounce’ Mulligan all awaiting in anticipation, this contest of kings. Jay Marone was in place, newspaper in hand, face in a grimace, a pint and a half Beamish reflecting in his eyes as mastermind was about to commence. Marty, was working the crowd, waving at foreigners and cleaning his lips of lingering lumps of dry stout. Patrick, with his lungs full and satisfied, and an empty bladder begging for a refill called another pint and gave Marone the nod to signify the start of this weeks challenge.
So to question one: How many of each species of animal did Moses take on his Ark?
It was Marty’s question. It went so far over his head, NASA knew about it and the whole ark story had to be explained to him, including a descriptive doodle on a beer mat of the biblical boat. Like a blind mugger, Marty took a stab in the dark and said 18! It was passed over to Patrick who answered ’2′, to steel the point. Jay Marone with his typical tone and aided with the answers made fun of the two confused contestants with the fact it was actually Noah who had the ark and not Moses!! 4 questions in and still no points between them, the pressure was growing and as the bar got full up, well, the bar got full up!

Question 5 and 6 were the reason Marone was assigned the master of ceremonies as it proved his reading power was as strong as his calcium deficient bones. He was a caring man once a month when he went to the local GAA to donate alcohol to blood donors group, but a selfish man on Saturdays, Marone prided himself on a perfect performance to outshine the contestants.
He went on, ‘number 5, which country is famous for the the dish, ven-delow?’ Bewilderment was now etched permanently on Marty’s face and Patrick looked so lacking in inspiration that they, along with the rest of J D s, asked Marone to offer up the answer as ven-delow befuddled the whole bar. As he answered, ‘India’, a perplexed onlooker leaned over his shoulder to view the question, as he was a keen cook and ven-delow was not something that ever probed his palate ! ‘VINDALOO, ya clown’, he blasted, grabbing the paper from Marone as the bar was now up in arms. ‘Who let this idiot in charge of the quiz?’. ‘How was I supposed to know?’ Marone squealed apologising abrasively before snatching the broadsheet back. Shouting over the uproar, Jay now went with the final question and the decider. It was a tie, at a whopping zero each, and now this was it, whoever answered this, won. ‘According to Roman Mythology, who pulled the thorn from the lions paw?’. Neither Marty or Patrick were experts on Roman legends nor had they ever come across such a story from their intensive research for Saturdays. In Roman times, remember, this was sure to be a name that they had known as youngsters, yet may escape their tongues in this day and age but not Marone. Glowing and gloating, as no one knew it and with his peacock feathers about to show, he announced that it was in fact ‘Andy O’ Neil’ who was the fearless Roman soldier that tore that treacherous thorn from the Lions paw?????? That common Roman name of Andrew, shortened to Andy, probably by his father, Seamus to distinguish him from his other Roman friends in the school yard like, Alan, Siobhan and Padraig! Andy O’ F****** Neil was repeated up and down the bar as beer mats and betting slips were hurled in Marones direction. Needless to say, this was the last official quiz in J D s as master Marone was now clearly a flustered fraud with no idea of his own idiocy. It ended on a draw and a fair result to finish on, as neither Patrick nor Marty deserved to lose, or win for that matter. After a long and arduous appeal from a certain, Andy O’ Neil, amazingly, Androcles has since been credited with the removal of the thorn from the king of the jungles paw, and despite Jay Marone’s best efforts, Roman Mythology still remains void of random Irish men.