Sir, - This year, instead of drawing up a list of resolutions for the New Year, I thought I would draw up a list of things that others might; or might not, do. Here goes:
1. That people on radio, TV and even in newspapers would stop saying "between you and I". Why? Because, between you and me, it's wrong!
2. That politicians who claim to have been completely vindicated would be asked to spell the words. Failure to do so correctly would result in a fine of £500. Those who claim only to have been partially vindicated would face a lesser fine of 500 Eircom, or two Ansbacher, shares.
3. Her-ass? I have no idea who she is but, unless she is anatomically different from all others of her sex, her ass is what she sits on. (In the case of Marilyn Monroe in the film Some Like it Hot, it was also what caused Jack Lemmon to observe that watching it oscillate back and forth as she walked down the station platform was like watching Jello on springs!) Nevertheless, the word is pronounced Harris, as in Rolf, Richard or, though only as a last resort, Eoghan. (How dare you, I am not being pedantic! Oh all right then, but could we settle for pernickety, a much nicer word?).
4. That prominent Irish people would give up their attempt to create a new fashion by wearing tea cosies on their heads. That Sean O'Casey fella started it. Now Darina Allen is at it. Is this a fashion statement? If so, what are they trying to say? That there is something brewing underneath?
5. That editors would ban all photographs in which a columnist poses with thumb beneath jaw-bone, middle finger across the chin and index finger up along cheek bone. This sort of thing was an essential accompaniment to the CVs of stage actors back in the 1950s, with one difference. In those innocent days before political correctness both index and middle finger, cigarette in between, rested lightly on the cheek bone as a thin wisp of smoke wafted lazily upwards. Sorry, guys, but it doesn't make you look one bit more contemplative or even, perish the thought, intellectual. It's old hat, if not old tea cosy.
I could go on. Sorry, that's Beckett, not O'Casey. Time to stop. Happy new millennium. - Yours, etc.,
Brendan Casserly, Abbeybridge, Waterfall, Co Cork.