I like lists. I made one last week using a sheet of headed paper the government sent me, a carpenter’s pencil I found behind my ear and a Robert Roberts coffee stain. You can try this at home yourself. Use a tea stain if you want. Or a biro. The choice is yours.

First on my list - the garden centre. Howya getting on, Breda? I need a television plant. [Blank silent stare]

Maybe I should explain. Maybe you should. Right. I have this big TV wall bracket thing and I want something to put on it. It looks very bare. I was considering a plant. Did you consider a TV, Primal? I did for years but now I ‘d prefer looking at a plant. I might be killing the sale here, but did you consider taking down the bracket? The wall would have to come with it. I like having the wall there for hanging things on. Like TV brackets? Yeah. If I ever get a second plant, I’d need a second bracket wouldn’t I.

Next on the list - the post office in the local shop. Can I have a €50 whatchamacallit, a Musketeer voucher please? A what? The vouchers that you can use in any shop. Oh, an All-for-One voucher. There you go. That’ll be €52 please. What? €50 worth of stuff costs €52? That’s scary. I’m afraid so, Primal. Is there anything else I can frighten you with?

Actually there is. This. That’s your shopping list, Primal. Look again. A shopping list with a coffee mug stain. Robert Roberts? Yes. Java. Very nice too. But look what it is written on. Ah, a TV Licence renewal reminder. I’ll do you up one now. No! Stop! I don’t want one. You’d better. That’s a 4th reminder. They’ll be at your door and you’ll be fined for not having one. No I won’t. I don’t have a telly. [Second blank silent stare of the day]

So what do you watch in the evenings? A pot plant. You watch a pot plant. Well not watch really. More look at. The wall-bracket where the telly used be is soon to have a pot plant on it. It’s in the car. How does that work out when you’re having a pint? “Hey lads, anyone watch that aphid last night? Something else huh?” And you won’t get Comfort conditioner in a 2l size here.

Look. Can you just tell them I don’t have a telly? They wouldn’t believe me. Why don’t you just write that on the back of the reminder and send it back to them? Tried that the last three times and it didn’t work. Try it again. Can’t - my shopping list is on the back. Sorry. Can’t help ya, Primal.

Okay. Thanks anyway. Hey, what you mean about the Comfort? I read it on your list. The 750ml is the only size they do here. It’s only a small shop remember. You’ll have to go to the supermarket. So you’re saying this shop is too small for Comfort? Something like that. Anyway, good luck now - there’s a queue behind ya.

It wasn’t on the list so I added it - a pint. The pub was deserted. Suited me fine. I’d read the paper in peace. The barman’s eyes lit up with the prospect of someone to talk to. It wouldn’t be my favourite Mediterranean country but as far as Mediterranean countries go it’s okay. I suppose you’re right, Rob - and I went back to my paper. I see you’re reading the paper there, Primal. Keeping up with current affairs and world news and all that. Well, I’m trying to but someone keeps disturbing me. I suppose it’s all on about the Lisbon thing and all that. Look, Rob. Why don’t you turn on the telly for yourself. Nah, I’m fed up with it. Nothing but racing and soccer and all that. Pity I dropped the car home - I have a grand pot plant in the boot you could be watching. [Third blank stare of the day]

He shuffled off. Finally some Comfort in this town. I checked the telly listings. Sure enough, a gardening programme at 8. I have the best thing in reality TV.*

*I needed ammunition for blank stare number four in case he came back.

We didn’t have TV until I was about 12 or 13. I hope no kids are reading this as that’d scare the living daylights out of them.

An aunt got one of those new fangled coloured TVs and gave us her old black and white. Such excitement. It was like Christmas. Probably because it was Christmas.

The snag was we didn’t have a spare socket. To the rescue rode my uncle. (No messing - he had a bike). A table was pulled to the middle of the floor and the set was plugged into the light fitting. It worked fine and we all huddled around to watch a war movie. It may have been called Mother Goose. I’m not sure. Maybe that was just the call-sign used by the pilot of the lead plane. It’s all I remember.

It wasn’t until the new year my uncle returned and wired up an extra socket. All over Christmas, the auld fella would sit with just the flickering light of the TV and the fire, grumbling as he tried to read his paper.

Up until then, I had been dabbling in the drug that is TV. And like all addicts, I was creative in getting my fix. An old man down the road had one and it put it on on Sunday afternoons to watch the big game from Croke Park. I didn’t mind the hurling but loathed the football, yet I’d sit through it feigning excitement and making appropriate comments and noises. Once the game was over, he’d put the kettle on and produce the biscuits and buns. Ah shur, leave it on, I’d suggest. There might be something else good coming up. It was always Tarzan after the game and I knew it. He did too I suppose and just played along. He wanted the company, I wanted the telly.

That was years ago. Months ago I turned off my own TV and haven’t turned it on since. I don’t know how for long. It wasn’t intentional. I didn’t even notice I’d kicked the habit until I was asked if I’d seen such-and-such.

If I get rid of it altogether by year end I won’t have to renew my license come January. That’s appealing. The license itself is appalling. All that money for RTÉ and they just show rubbish. They don’t even have Tarzan any more for crisake! Even the ads they run reminding us we need a license are rubbish. One had three Irish twenty some things pretending they couldn’t speak English. The inspector responds in Polish and Chinese, and reminds the guy who says he’s from Barbados, that English is spoken there. The funny thing is, no Polish person can understand what the actor’s saying - it’s definitely not Polish.

If I hold onto it, it will be to watch DVDs. I can do that on my computer but the quality is not the same. I’ll see how things go during the feathers - there are always DVDs then, and time to watch them. And some worth viewing a second time weeks later.

Yeah, I may hold onto it just for that. What’s bugging me though, is I’d have kicked the habit, yet I’d still be paying for the drugs.

Euronews are running a piece on the Irish elections this morning. A clip showing Enda Kenny casting his vote in the company of (that gorgeous creature - his words, not mine) his wife has the following voice-over:

Fine Gael leader, Enda Kenny, has said she will do everything in her power to prevent Sinn Féin playing king-maker in the new government.

I had EuroNews on the TV this morning. Every 5 minutes or so they made the following announcement.

Boris Yeltsin will be buried live here on EuroNews today.

If they go ahead with it, it will be the best reality TV ever.

It reminds me of years ago when a work colleague sent out an all-employees email:

There will be a presentation for Pat O’Brien who is getting married in the conference room at 3 o’clock today.

The GM responded immediately:

The conference room shall not be used for religious services of any kind without prior permission from the management.

Ted Walsh is many things. As he proved on RTÉ’s The Restaurant, he is a great cook. He is a great husband, father and neighbour, well liked and respected by one and all. He is an accomplished horse trainer, best know for his successes with Rince Rí, Papillion and Commanche Court, and as a jockey, was champion amateur 11 times. He is a natural wit and pundit.

But one thing Ted Walsh is not, is a politically correct waffler. He is a straight talker who says what he thinks. Whether he is chatting to someone on the street, a stable lad, a rich owner, a talk show host or as a TV commentator himself, Ted is Ted. Just like his cooking there are no airs and graces. Like it or lump it.

This is the man who threatened, live on Channel4, to knock John McCririck* through the window of a commentary box. Who’d blame him? Watching the RTÉ coverage of Fairyhouse yesterday I thought his co-presenter, Robert ‘Mouth full of Marbles’ Hall, was going to suffer the same fate on two occasions. Neighbour, colleague and friend or not, Ted wasn’t taking Hall’s pandering to the powers that be.

Hall made a remark about the number of horses which had been balloted** out. A red rag to a bull. Ted pointed out the flaws of the HRI’s^ balloting system and the lack of joined-up thinking in that authority. There are hundreds of horses that will never see a racetrack. Granted they may get their allocation of 5 bumper^^ runs and any number of point-to-points^^ but that’s not real racing and is a big disappointment for the owners who have invested financially and emotionally.

Meanwhile, another arm of the HRI is investing heavily in promoting racehorse ownership. And doing a great job of it. They have made it easy for everyone to participate through clubs and syndicates. There were 1,500 of these in 2006. In Ted’s opinion they are doing far too good a job. What is the point of the HRI encouraging new owners into the game when they can’t guarantee them being allowed play?

Hall unsuccessfully tried to defend the balloting system on the grounds that it was the only solution. Ted just said it doesn’t work and they need to think of another way.

A trainer was fined €250 for withdrawing his horse at too late a stage. His real crime? He said the ground had become too firm from the third last in. Other trainers had used excuses like stone bruises and, the old chestnut, off feed. Here, Ted pointed out, was a man being fined for his honesty. Hall backed up the stewards saying they declared the going good, the trainers had walked the course that morning and concurred, therefore they had no right to be calling it good-to-firm or firm now.

But what Hall was missing was the simple fact that, while the ground had been watered overnight and was good that morning, the warm day and the breeze had dried it out since. Ted could see this. Even TV viewers like myself could see it. There was dust rising.

For readers with no interest in racing who have managed to get this far, let me draw some parallels with our state institutions.

Like the HRI who encourage more owners and horses into the scene but fail to provide them with a chance to race, our county councils allow housing developments but fail to provide for the backup facilities like schools, water supply and sewage treatment.
Like the stewards who made up their minds that the going was good not firm and would not be told otherwise or re-evaluate their decision, our government have decided the election will be on a Tuesday and will not be moved. This, despite the fact that so many voters who work or study away from home will be denied their constitutional right.

There are too many stewards and HRI-like officials running this country and not enough Teds. Perhaps too many of us are taking it lying down like Hall.

* From Kav’s image bucket.

** Balloting is the process by which horses are selected for a race where the number entered exceeds the number permitted to run. Considered unfair by most owners and trainers. I haven’t aksed the horses. More here if you’re really interested. You will have to be really, really interested to read it though.

^ Horse Racing Ireland. A body charged with the administration and promotion of horseracing in Ireland.

^^ I’m fed up explaining things. Google them. Sorry - just lazy today.

Saturday mornings used be great. Let the dog out of his kennel. Throw him a few fresh kittens. A big bowl of Wheatibangs for myself. Brew up a pot of coffee. Then sit back from 6:30 to 9:00 and watch back-to-back documentaries on RTÉ1. Two and a half hours of pure heaven.

That’s all changed. RTÉ no longer show documentaries from 6:30 to 9:00. Now it’s 9:00 to 11:00, by which time it’s too late. I have other things to do. Trolley rage. Hoover the fridge. Do some charity work. Take a drive somewhere. Normal Saturday stuff.

Instead I’m subjected to Simple Painting. Simply fekin Painting with Frank fekin Clarke. The plastic Paddy who insists on sticking a big dirty H into Slán at the end of his show. As we say in Ireland, sHlán leat. No we don’t Frank. Fek off! Oh, and leat - well maybe you’re right - maybe you do have only one viewer. This morning it was me. Now, fek off, again!

Follow this with reruns of Bergerac and Magnum PI. The TV guides tag them with an (R). Yep, repeats alright. First screened in the ’80’s so RTÉ figures enough time has elapsed to slip them into the schedule again. Fek it lads, they were crap back then. L-shaped sheets don’t cut it in the noughties. Twenty years sitting a shelf won’t have made them any better. They aren’t whiskeys. Only my mother and my half-wit friend TJ liked them the first time. TJ joined the Guards, by the way.

I only have terrestrial TV so my options are limited. RTÉ2 - kids stuff. Fair play to them. TV3 - Emmer-fekin-dale and Best of Ireland AM. I didn’t know there was a best. I’m not even sure if there could be a Mediocre of Ireland AM. TG4 - A stream from Euronews. “The international community have called on Iran to halt their nuclear programme”. Imagine that. “Ah com’on, will yiz give up all that auld nuclear shite like good lads now”. The same stories repeated every 10 minutes. Gets boring after a while. Maybe there should be an (R) in the TV guide for this too.

Radio. Ah, the wireless. I do love the wireless. But not on Saturday morning. RTE2FM - Dave Redmond. Who? RTE Radio 1, Newstalk, RnG - all repeats of the week gone. I was there lads. I have the t-shirts. No use telling me about it. Lyric FM - No, too sleepy. I want mental stimulation. Today FM - normally my favourite but they have Martin King on. A part-time weatherman, part-time DJ, full-time plonker who goes on the national airwaves once a week and plays requests for John from Santry, Jason from Tallaght, Britney from Clondalkin, Jayo from Ballyier. If you’re Tom from Athenry and want something played for your granny’s 100th birthday you can fek off. This is a Dublin show.

I’m getting a dish.