bahern7

Folks, This picture (see link below) was taken by my good self at the Royal Canal, Dublin in December 2016. Best, BA https://goo.gl/photos/vLqm4UcN56nSqMwf8

Folks, So I went and published a book the other day via Kindle Direct Publishing. It's called The World's a Stage and I wrote it last year. Proud to have it available now on Amazon. Check out the link below for further details: http://amzn.eu/4CsxRzn Best, Brian Ahern

Folks, I grabbed this shot (see link below) whilst out and about this morning in Dublin 15. Much thanks to the Ireland site on Google+ for sharing it further. Best, BA https://plus.google.com/+BrianAhern/posts/2NYVJmo5n1R

About twenty-five years ago I was going through a phase. It was called chronic self-consciousness. There was a play on in Andrew’s Lane theatre that I wanted to see. I’ve racked my brains to remember the title but can’t. However, I do remember certain particulars of the night I went. I had no girlfriend at the time and was extremely bashful about the idea of going to see a play on my own. Oddly enough I had no problem attending the cinema unaccompanied but for some reason (perhaps it’s of a higher cultural and aesthetic grade) a play was a completely different story. So off I popped to the box office a few days beforehand and, incredible as it seems to me now, I bought two tickets! The sad aspect is that I knew I had nobody to attend the play with me but I didn't want the person I was buying the tickets from to see that I was only purchasing one ticket. I had no desire to elicit looks of pitying sympathy from the box office staff. Duly, the night o...

Peeps, Here's another of my Instagram Stories that I've posted to YouTube:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lTty32j-5D4 Best, BA

A lil bit o YouTube fo y'all... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dwcn8aOf6Hc

Folks, Here's a panoramic shot I took last week near Cappagh Beach in Brandon, West Kerry. You have my full permission to enjoy the picture. Best, Brian Ahern #gaeltacht #kerry #brandon #googlephotos #photosofireland #sceneryphotography #panorama 

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           Friends, I'm enormously proud and pleased to present to you a link to my 2nd Instagram story; it's positioned hereunder. Feel free to click on't:-) Best, BA https://www.instagram.com/p/BJAVqPMASNB/?taken-by=bahern7 PS The Phoenix Park pics scattered throughout this blog post are in keeping with the location of the story; said park.

Friends, There's been some chatter of late regarding a fresh concept called Instagram Stories. You may or may not have heard.  Ever the adventurer, I gave it a whirl. See link here:  https://www.instagram.com/p/BI-k29dAcgg/ Best, BA PS The collage pic above (my own work, incidentally) I merely added to give a bit of colour to this blog post.

Friends, Dubliners and people from the countryside, This shot (which I'm quite pleased with) was taken in Rossbeigh, County Kerry in 2014. It's up on Google+ too (where it's had almost 7000 views. But, hey, who's counting?:-). See link below. Best, BA https://plus.google.com/u/0/photos/+BrianAhern/albums/6312429553287614065/6312429553599542834?pid=6312429553599542834&oid=100095589267771210840

  Here's our local writers' group, the Phoenix Writers, and their new publication Phoenix Ink Five up on Amazon y'all! This humble scribe has a story in the collection entitled The Last Walk. Click the link below and go grab a copy:-) BA #amwriting     #dublin     #amazon     #writing    #writersgroup     #creativity     #makeabuck    https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1910179957/ref=pdp_new_dp_review

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With Jack Chambers TD tonight at the launch of Phoenix Ink (5) - some gr8 stories and poems in there inc. my own The Last Walk which Jack promised to read later:-) thanks to Tony Devlin for a terrific speech and John O Donnell & numerous others for all their hard work! BA https://instagram.com/p/BHNuUJqAM2q/

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So there I was, standing in the queue at the supermarket till with my weekly shop. The customers in front were a couple with a young child. The woman was wearing a burqa. I noticed the only part of her face visible was her eyes. As an avid reader of newspapers and of every shade of commentator from far right to far left, my head was swimming with views on this scene. I'm not proud to admit that one of my first thoughts was "the creeping Islamification of society." I thought of a story I heard - apocryphal? - of a woman stopped by security in some western airport. Asked to remove her niqab, she duly obliged - to reveal a clamped mouth. Is there any stronger symbol of female oppression on earth, I asked myself? The family had almost finished putting their groceries through the checkout, and were packing them into bags. The last item was scanned. It was time to pay. The man began rummaging in his pockets. The cashier looked on, waiting for payment. I earwigged, trying...

Folks, Some birdsong by the canal for your exclusive delectation. See YouTube link below. Humbly, Brian https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=INlrqzD6jL4

Some years ago, armed with little more than a teaching English as a foreign language (Tefl) certificate, I flew to Madrid. Upon arrival I hooked up with a Canadian teacher pal who showed me the pedagogical ropes. Pretty soon I got a job in a school, having turned up for the interview clean and sober, dangling my certificate and giving it lots of blarney. Within days I was teaching classes. Within days, too, I was immersed in the famed Madrileño nightlife - albeit on a shoestring budget. I'd loaf around Plaza Mayor in the evenings drinking cheap beer, staying out until all hours. Myself and a crew of fellow teachers from a diversity of nations, true internationalists, would stumble through the streets like minstrels of old, chugging on booze, replenished at intervals from Chinese corner shops. Strangely, I always seemed to be the one who stayed out the latest, drank the most, and could remember the least from the nights before. Needless to say when I fetched up at school on t...

  Folks, If I may say so, this is one of my better photos of the Liffey (linked below on Google+)... As the great man himself says: "Anna was, Livia is, Plurabelle's to be. Northmen's thing made southfolk's place but howmulty plurators made eachone in per-son? Latin me that, my trinity scholard, out of eure sanscreed into oure eryan!" James Joyce https://plus.google.com/u/0/+BrianAhern/posts/HuzVYcgkbem?pid=6277118420494627058&oid=100095589267771210840 With deep humility, Brian

Folks, I was up in the People's Gardens in the Phoenix Park. Here's a picture (link below) I posted to Google+ of a flower riot that I found up there:-) Best, BA The link in question:  https://plus.google.com/u/0/+BrianAhern/posts/9PygEGBAznh?pid=6275223228283429266&oid=100095589267771210840

Readers of my blog (well, one must dream!), Here's some footage I shot while visiting the Villa Ephrussi de Rothschild in Saint-Jean-Cap-Ferrat, France in August 2014. Myself and Aisling had a really special and memorable day there. Hope you like this sunny snippet:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=01iJoebUQhc Best, BA

Friends, To see the above scenic shot on my Google+ profile, simply click this link:  https://plus.google.com/u/0/+BrianAhern/posts/Ta9u19CCgY6?pid=6248245849798009954&oid=100095589267771210840 Best, BA #Kerry #Ireland

Friends, To see the above panoramic picture on my Google+ profile, simply click this link:  https://plus.google.com/u/0/+BrianAhern/posts/K9kQ4rYMNvj?pid=6242714953647274226&oid=100095589267771210840 Best, BA PS It's was taken by me in County Kerry, Ireland.

The liberal intelligentsia of the city was out in force and anyone who spoke against the spectacle would be trolled to death. A man in an oubliette was reading Winter's Heart from memory. At a window in a motorway motel, a pair of curtains closed. The red door of the City Arms pub opened onto the January morning. Plain trails and a crescent moon adorned the sky. He spotted nests in the bare trees. Lord Viscount Avonmore, Lord Chief Baron of the Exchequer, passed by in his limousine. She headed down to Foshbury Palace to see Walking to the Graveyard. It was back by popular demand. After the show, she bedded down in the cave of the seven sleepers. "Depart thou to Hades," she told the clamper the next morning when she went to get her car. She was sick to the back teeth of redundant bureaucratic practices and duplicative functions. One morning on the bus he conceived of a comedian whose catchphrase would be: "Ooh, me nerves!" He overheard someone say that B...