Irish Troublemakers

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Note – this story is running rampant around the web. I have done my best to do the homework on these 9. Yes, a couple of them did go on to do great things, but most of them had lives of hardship. The worst mark of disrespect I can show is to leave the false story online and ignore their struggles.

In the Young Irish disorders in Ireland in 1848, the following nine men were captured, tried and convicted of treason against Her Majesty the Queen, and were sentenced to death: Charles Gavan Duffy, William Smith O’Brien, John Mitchel, Patrick O’Donohue, Terence Bellew McManus, Richard O’Gorman, John Blake Dillon, Thomas Francis Meagher, and Thomas D’Arcy Magee.

Before passing sentence, the judge asked if there was anything that anyone wished to say. Meagher, speaking for all, said:

“My lord, this is our first offense, but not our last. If you will be easy with us this once, we promise, on our word as gentlemen, to try to do better next time. And next time — sure we won’t be fools to get caught.”

Thereupon the indignant judge sentenced them four of them to be hanged by the neck until dead and drawn and quartered. Passionate protests from all the world forced Queen Victoria to commute the sentence to transportation for life to far away wild Australia. Of the 9 Irishmen, 5 were exiled to Tasmania (Van Diemen’s Land), three escaped to North America, and Charles Gavan Duffy went into self-imposed exile in Australia. In 1874, word reached the astounded Queen Victoria that Sir Charles Duffy, who had been elected Prime Minister of Victoria, Australia, was the same Charles Duffy who had been transported 25 years before. If this one man had done so well, what happened to the others?

  • Thomas Francis Meagher
    Originally sentenced to death but had sentence commuted to life in Tasmania.
    Escaped and made his way to New York City.
    Joined the US Army at the start of the Civil War and rose to Brigadier General.
    Appointed acting governor of the Montana Territory.

  • Terrence McManus
    Originally sentenced to death, his sentence was commuted to life in Tasmania.
    He escaped and made his way to San Francisco, California.

  • Patrick O’Donoghue
    Was sentenced to death but had his sentence commuted to life in Tasmania
    Published the first Irish Nationalist paper in Australia.
    Suffered great hardship in Tasmania and escaped to San Francisco. He died 2 years later in poor circumstances in New York.

  • Richard O’Gorman
    Escaped prosecution in Ireland by escaping to New York.
    Set up a law practice and was eventually appointed to the Supreme Court of New York.

  • William Smith O’Brien
    Sentenced to death, but had his sentence commuted to life in Tasmania.
    Though he had been a politician and member of British Parliment, after his pardon, he never again was active in politics.

  • Thomas D’Arcy McGee
    Escaped trial by pretending to be a priest.
    Moved to Montreal where he was elected the mayor and then to Canadian Parliment.
    Became the Minister for Agriculture in Canada.

  • John Mitchel
    Sentenced to life in Tasmania for his part in the 1848 Irish Rebellion.
    Escaped and made his way to San Francisco.
    Set up several newspapers.
    Returned to Ireland in 1875 where he ran for Parliment. He won – twice – but was not eligible to take the seat he fought so hard for because he was a convicted felon.

  • John Blake Dillon
    Avoided trial in Ireland by escaping to New York disguised a priest.
    Became a lawyer and set up a practice in New York with Richard O’Gorman.
    Returned to politics and was elected Westminster Parliment.

Interesting Facts

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  • Nearly a third of all bottled drinking water purchased in the US is contaminated with bacteria.
  • You are more likely to be struck by lightning that to be eaten by a shark. You are more likely to be infected by flesh-eating bacteria than you are to be struck by lightning.
  • If you urinate when swimming in a South American river, you may encounter the candiru. Drawn to warmth, this tiny fish is known to follow a stream of urine to its source, swim inside the body, and flare its barbed fins. It will remain firmly embedded in the flesh until surgically removed.
  • When a pilot light in a gas barbecue fails to ignite the gas jets properly, it is easy for you to inhale gas accidentally while trying to light it by hand. If this has happened, when the match does light, sometimes a trail of flame will blaze from the jet onto your mouth, filling your lungs with fire. Oddly enough, you would suffocate before burning to death as the flame would consume the oxygen in every breath you would take.
  • The soft plastic headphones used on airplanes create a warm, moist environment in the ear canal that is ideal for breeding bacteria. Wearing headphones for just an hour will increase the bacteria in your ear by 700 times.
  • On a plane, if the passenger in your seat on the incoming flight had serious gas, then you are sitting on a cushion full of disease-causing microbes.
  • Homely criminals get 50% longer jail sentences, on average, than good-looking criminals.
  • Four sunken nuclear submarines sit at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean. One, a Russian sub resting in deep water off of Bermuda, holds 16 live nuclear warheads. Scientists and oceanographers are unsure what the impact of the escaping plutonium will have, but warn that corrosion could create the proper chemical environment for a massive nuclear chain reaction.
  • In 1994, electromagnetic interference (EMI) from a nearby cellular telephone captivated a power wheelchair at a scenic vista in Colorado, sending the passenger over a cliff.
  • More people working in advertising died on the job in 1996 than died while working in petroleum refining.
  • It is impossible to lick your elbow.
  • A shrimp’s heart is in their head.
  • People say “Bless you” when you sneeze because when you sneeze, your heart stops for a millisecond.
  • If you sneeze too hard, you can fracture a rib. If you try to suppress a sneeze, you can rupture a blood vessel in your head or neck and die. if you keep your eyes open by force, they can pop out.
  • In a study of 200,000 ostriches over a period of 80 years, no one reported a single case where an ostrich buried its head in the sand.
  • It is physically impossible for pigs to look up into the sky.
  • A pregnant goldfish is called a twit.
  • Between 1937 and 1945 Heinz produced a version of Alphabetic Spaghetti especially for the German market that consisted solely of little pasta swastikas.
  • More than 50% of the people in the world have never made or received a telephone call.
  • Rats and horses can’t vomit.
  • Rats multiply so quickly that in 18 months, two rats could have over million descendants.
  • The “sixth sick sheik’s sixth sheep’s sick” is said to be the toughest tongue twister in the English language.
  • If the government has no knowledge of aliens, then why does Title 14, Section 1211 of the Code of Federal Regulations, implemented on July 16, 1969, make it illegal for U.S. citizens to have any contact with extraterrestrials or their vehicles?
  • In every episode of Seinfeld there is a Superman somewhere.
  • The cigarette lighter was invented before the match.
  • Thirty-five percent of the people who use personal ads for dating are already married.
  • A duck’s quack doesn’t echo, and no one knows why.
  • 23% of all photocopier faults worldwide are caused by people sitting on them and photocopying their buttocks.
  • In the course of an average lifetime you will, while sleeping, eat 70 assorted insects and 10 spiders.
  • Most lipstick contains fish scales.
  • Like fingerprints, everyone’s tongue print is different.
  • Over 75% of people who read this will try to lick their elbow.

Interesting Factoids

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  • The first couple to be shown in bed together on prime time television were Fred and Wilma Flintstone.
  • Hawaiian alphabet has 12 letters.
  • Men can read smaller print than women; women can hear better.
  • City with the most Rolls Royce’s per capita: Hong Kong
  • State with the highest percentage of people who walk to work: Alaska
  • Percentage of Africa that is wilderness: 28%
  • Percentage of North America that is wilderness: 38%
  • Cost of raising a medium-size dog to the age of eleven: $6,400
  • Average number of people airborne over the US any given hour: 61,000.
  • The world’s youngest parents were 8 and 9 and lived in China 1910.
  • The youngest pope was 11 years old.
  • The only two days of the year in which there are no professional sports games (MLB, NBA, NHL, or NFL) are the day before and the day after the Major League All-Stars Game.
  • A crocodile can’t stick it’s tongue out.
  • The oldest known goldfish lived to 41 years of age. Its name was Fred.
  • In 1987, a 1,400-year-old lump of still-edible cheese was unearthed in Ireland.
  • If an orangutan belches at you, watch out. He’s warning you to stay out of his territory.
  • 1,200 college students streaked at the same time in Boulder, CO in 1974.
  • Penguins can jump as high as 6 feet in the air.
  • The most money ever paid for a cow in an auction was $1.3 million.
  • There is a town in Newfoundland, Canada called Dildo.
  • On average, a human being will have sex more than 3,000 times and spend two weeks kissing in their lifetime.
  • The average human has seven sex fantasies in a day.

Intellectually Challenged People on the Loose

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  • IDIOTS IN SERVICE:
    This week, all our office phones went dead and I had to contact the telephone repair people. They promised to be out between 8:00 a.m. and 7:00p.m. When I asked if they could give me a smaller time window. The pleasant gentleman asked, “Would you like us to call you before we come?” I replied that I didn’t see how he would be able to do that since our phones weren’t working. He also requested that we report future outages by email (Does YOUR email work without a telephone line?).

  • IDIOTS AT WORK:
    I was signing the receipt for my credit card purchase when the clerk noticed I had never signed my name on the back of the credit card. She informed me that she could not complete the transaction unless the card was signed. When I asked why, she explained that it was necessary to compare the signature I had just signed on the receipt. So I signed the credit card in front of her. She carefully compared the signature to the one I had just signed on the receipt. As luck would have it, they matched.

  • IDIOTS IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD:
    I live in a semi-rural area. We recently had a new Neighbor call the local township administrative office to request the removal of the Deer Crossing sign on our road. The reason: too many deer were being hit by cars and she didn’t want them to cross there anymore.

  • IDIOTS IN FOOD SERVICE:
    My daughter went to a local Taco Bell and ordered a taco. She asked the person behind the counter for “minimal lettuce.” He said he was sorry, but they only had iceberg. At another Taco Bell, I was asked if I wanted the food to go. I said no. She asked, do you want to eat it here? I said, can I eat it on the roof?

  • IDIOT SIGHTING #1:
    I was at the airport, checking in at the gate when an airport employee asked, “Has anyone put anything in your baggage without your knowledge?” To which I replied, “If it was without my knowledge, how would I know?” She smiled knowingly and nodded, “That’s why we ask.”

  • IDIOT SIGHTING #2:
    The stoplight on the corner buzzes when it’s safe To cross the street. I was crossing with a coworker of mine when she asked if I knew what the buzzer was for. I explained that it signals blind people when the light is red. Appalled, she responded, “What on earth are blind people doing driving?”

  • IDIOT SIGHTING #3:
    At a good-bye luncheon for an old and dear coworker who is leaving the company due to “downsizing,” our manager commented cheerfully, “This is fun. We should do this more often.” Not a word was spoken. We all just looked at each other with that deer-in-the-headlights stare.

  • IDIOT SIGHTING #4:
    I work with an individual who plugged her power strip back into itself and for the life of her couldn’t understand why her system would not turn on.

  • IDIOT SIGHTING #5:
    When my husband and I arrived at an automobile dealership to pick up our car, we were told the keys had been locked in it. We went to the service department and found a mechanic working feverishly to unlock the driver’s side door. As I watched from the passenger side, I instinctively tried the door handle and discovered that it was unlocked. “Hey,” I announced to the technician, “it’s open!” To which he replied, “I know – I already got that side.”

In My Day

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Note: The Washington Post recently had a contest wherein participants were asked to tell the younger generation how much harder they had had it “in the old days.” Winners, runners-up, and honorable mentions are listed below.

  • Second Runner-Up:
    In my day, we couldn’t afford shoes, so we went barefoot. In winter, we had to wrap our feet with barbed wire for traction.

  • First Runner-Up:
    In my day, we didn’t have MTV or in-line skates, or any of that stuff. No, it was 45s and regular old metal-wheeled roller skates, and the 45s always skipped, so to get them to play right you’d weigh the needle down with something like quarters, which we never had because our allowances were way too small, so we’d use our skate keys instead and end up forgetting they were taped to the record player arm so that we couldn’t adjust our skates, which didn’t really matter because those crummy metal wheels would kill you if you hit a pebble anyway, and in those days roads had real pebbles on them, not like today.

  • And the winner:
    In my day, we didn’t have rocks. We had to go down to the creek and wash our clothes by beating them with our heads.

    • Honorable Mentions:
  • In my day, we didn’t have fancy health-food restaurants. Every day we ate lots of easily recognizable animal parts, along with potatoes.
  • In my day, we didn’t have hand-held calculators. We had to do addition on our fingers. To subtract, we had to have some fingers amputated.
  • In my day, we didn’t get that disembodied, slightly ticked-off voice saying ‘Doors closing.’ We got on the train, the doors closed, and if your hand was sticking out, it scraped along the tunnel all the way to the next station and it was a bloody stump at the end. But the base fare was only a dollar.
  • In my day, we didn’t have water. We had to smash together our own hydrogen and oxygen atoms.
  • Kids today think the world revolves around them. In my day, the sun revolved around the world, and the world was perched on the back of a giant tortoise.
  • Back in my day, ’60 Minutes’ wasn’t just a bunch of gray-haired, liberal 80-year-old guys. It was a bunch of gray-haired, liberal 60-year-old guys.
  • In my day, we didn’t have virtual reality. If a one-eyed razorback barbarian warrior was chasing you with an ax, you just had to hope you could outrun him.
  • Back in my day, they hadn’t invented electricity. We had to watch television by candlelight.
  • In my day, we didn’t have Strom Thurmond. Oh, wait. Yes we did.

Idle Thoughts

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  • Indecision is the key to flexibility.
  • There is always one more son-of-a-bitch than you counted on.
  • If you find something you like, buy a lifetime supply, because they will stop making it.
  • All things equal, fat people use more soap.
  • You can’t tell which way the train went by looking at the track.
  • Be kind, everyone you meet is fighting a tough battle.
  • This is as bad as it can get, but don’t bet on it.
  • There is no substitute for genuine lack of preparation.
  • By the time you can make ends meet, they move the ends.
  • Happiness is merely the remission of pain.
  • Nostalgia isn’t what it used to be.
  • Sometimes too much drink is not enough.
  • The facts, although interesting, are irrelevant.
  • The world gets a little better every day and worse in the evening.
  • The careful application of terror is also a form of communication.
  • No one shred of evidence exists in favor of the idea that life is serious.
  • Someone who thinks logically is a nice contrast to the real world.
  • Things are more like they are today than they ever have been before.
  • The other line always moves faster until you get in it.
  • Anything worth fighting for is worth fighting dirty for.
  • Everything should be made as simple as possible but no simpler.
  • Friends may come and go but enemies accumulate.
  • It’s hard to be nostalgic when you can’t remember anything.
  • I have seen the truth and it makes no sense.
  • To live forever, acquire a chronic disease and take care of it.
  • Suicide is the most sincere form of self-criticism.
  • If you think that there is good in everybody, you haven’t met everybody.
  • If you can smile when things go wrong, you have someone in mind to blame.
  • One seventh of your life is spent on Monday.
  • The more you run over a dead cat, the flatter it gets.

How to Write Good

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by Sally Bulford
  • Avoid alliteration. Always.
  • Prepositions are not words to end sentences with.
  • Avoid cliches like the plague. (They’re old hat.)
  • Employ the vernacular.
  • Eschew ampersands & abbreviations, etc.
  • Parenthetical remarks (however relevant) are unnecessary.
  • It is wrong to ever split an infinitive.
  • Contractions aren’t necessary.
  • Foreign words and phrases are not apropos.
  • One should never generalize.
  • Eliminate quotations. As Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “I hate quotations. Tell me what you know.”
  • Comparisons are as bad as cliches.
  • Don’t be redundant; don’t use more words than necessary; it’s highly superfluous.
  • Be more or less specific.
  • Understatement is always best.
  • One-word sentences? Eliminate.
  • Analogies in writing are like feathers on a snake.
  • The passive voice is to be avoided.
  • Go around the barn at high noon to avoid colloquialisms.
  • Even if a mixed metaphor sings, it should be derailed.
  • Who needs rhetorical questions?
  • Exaggeration is a billion times worse than understatement.

The Heavy Thinker

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It started out innocently enough. I began to think at parties now and then to loosen up. Inevitably though, one thought led to another, and soon I was more than just a social thinker.

I began to think alone – “to relax,” I told myself – but I knew it wasn’t true. Thinking became more and more important to me, and finally I was thinking all the time. I began to think on the job. I knew that thinking and employment don’t mix, but I couldn’t stop myself. I began to avoid friends at lunch time so I could read Thoreau and Kafka. I would return to the office dizzied and confused, asking, “What is it exactly we are doing here?”.

Things weren’t going so great at home either. One evening I had turned off the TV and asked my wife about the meaning of life. She spent that night at her mother’s.

I soon had a reputation as a heavy thinker. One day the boss called me in. He said, “Skippy, I like you, and it hurts me to say this, but your thinking has become a real problem. If you don’t stop thinking on the job, you’ll have to find another job.” This gave me a lot to think about.

I came home early after my conversation with the boss. “Honey,” I confessed, “I’ve been thinking…”

“I know you’ve been thinking,” she said, “and I want a divorce!”

“But Honey, surely it’s not that serious.”

“It is serious,” she said, lower lip aquiver. “You think as much as college professors, and college professors don’t make any money, so if you keep on thinking we won’t have any money!”

“That’s a faulty syllogism,” I said impatiently, and she began to cry. I’d had enough. “I’m going to the library,” I snarled as I stomped out the door.

I headed for the library, in the mood for some Nietzsche, with a PBS station on the radio. I roared into the parking lot and ran up to the big glass doors… they didn’t open. The library was closed. To this day, I believe that a Higher Power was looking out for me that
night.

As I sank to the ground clawing at the unfeeling glass, whimpering for Zarathustra, a poster caught my eye. “Friend, is heavy thinking ruining your life?” it asked. You probably recognize that line. It comes from the standard Thinker’s Anonymous poster.

Which is why I am what I am today: a recovering thinker. I never miss a TA meeting. At each meeting we watch a non-educational video; last week it was “Porky’s.” Then we share experiences about how we avoided thinking since the last meeting.

I still have my job, and things are a lot better at home. Life just seemed… easier, somehow, as soon as I stopped thinking.

Actual Newspaper Headlines

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  • Grandmother of eight makes hole in one
  • Deaf mute gets new hearing in killing
  • Police begin campaign to run down jaywalkers
  • House passes gas tax onto senate
  • Stiff opposition expected to casketless funeral plan
  • Two convicts evade noose, jury hung
  • William Kelly was fed secretary
  • Milk drinkers are turning to powder
  • Safety experts say school bus passengers should be belted
  • Quarter of a million Chinese live on water
  • Farmer bill dies in house
  • Iraqi head seeks arms

    • Some become unintentionally suggestive:

  • Queen Mary having bottom scraped
  • Is there a ring of debris around Uranus?
  • Prostitutes appeal to Pope
  • Panda mating fails – veterinarian takes over
  • NJ judge to rule on nude beach
  • Child’s stool great for use in garden
  • Dr. Ruth to talk about sex with newspaper editors
  • Soviet virgin lands short of goal again
  • Organ festival ends in smashing climax

    • Grammar often botches other headlines:

  • Eye drops off shelf
  • Squad helps dog bite victim
  • Dealers will hear car talk at noon
  • Enraged cow injures farmer with ax
  • Lawmen from Mexico barbecue guests
  • Miners refuse to work after death
  • Two Soviet ships collide – one dies
  • Two sisters reunite after eighteen years at checkout counter

    • Once in a while, a botched headline takes on a meaning opposite from the one intended:

  • Never withhold herpes from loved one
  • Nicaragua sets goal to wipe out literacy
  • Drunk drivers paid $1,000 in 1984
  • Autos killing 110 a day, let’s resolve to do better

    • Sometimes newspaper editors state the obvious:

  • If strike isn’t settled quickly it may last a while
  • War dims hope for peace
  • Smokers are productive, but death cuts efficiency
  • Cold wave linked to temperatures
  • Child’s death ruins couple’s holiday
  • Blind woman gets new kidney from dad she hasn’t seen in years
  • Man is fatally slain
  • Something went wrong in jet crash, experts say
  • Death causes loneliness, feeling of isolation

Happiness is a Psychiatric Disorder

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David Wells with the state of Iowa gives us this tongue in cheek description of happiness attributed to an article by Richard P. Bentall in the June 1992 issue of Journal of Medical Ethics.

“Happiness is a Psychiatric Disorder”

Happiness meets all reasonable criteria for a psychiatric disorder. It is statistically abnormal, consists of a discrete cluster of symptoms, there is at least some evidence that is reflects the abnormal functioning of the central nervous system, and it is associated with various cognitive abnormalities; in particular a lack of contact with reality. Acceptance of these arguments leads to the obvious conclusion that happiness should be included in future taxonomies of mental illness, probably as a form of affective (mood) disorder. This would place it on Axis I of the American Psychiatric Association’s “Diagnostic and Statistical Manual”. With this prospect in mind, I humbly suggest the following:

  • Major affective disorder, pleasant type
    Once the debilitating consequences of happiness become widely recognized, it is likely that psychiatrists, social workers, ando ther mental heath professionals will begin to devise treatments for the condition. We can expect the emergence of happiness clinics, and anti-happiness medications in the not too distant future.