A County Offaly man who swore blind he would never drink again was spotted by observers downing a few pints in a pub just forty-eight hours after he made what he described as his “solemn promise”.
Jimmy O’Shea (28), of Tullamore, who immortalised the phrase “Ah Jaysus me fecking head, never again”, shocked casual observers when he was discovered having a few social pints with the lads after making the promise to God not to ever even consider drinking again if God would only cure his hangover of the previous Friday night.
God will understand
“I’m sure God will understand,” Jimmy said to friends after he downed his fifth pint in quick succession. “After all, didn’t he invent the stuff and turn water into wine and all that stuff? And from what I hear he’s a fairly understanding lad.”
Seemingly Jimmy’s promise was made the morning after being ‘out for the one.’ The promise never to drink again was made not only to God in an attempt to receive a Divine Miracle cure for a raging hangover.
The very same promise was made to Jimmy’s mother, girlfriend, a young-wan in the chipper and the local taxi driver who waived the clean-up charge after Jimmy threw-up in the taxi on the way home.
Only wanted ‘the one’
Jimmy explained the sequence of events. “Well,” he said. “It started out fairly simple enough,” he told his mainly understanding and sympathetic group of friends.
“I only dropped in to the pub for one quiet pint on the way home from work when Mickey Flynn decided to buy everyone a pint on the strength of his dog having pups. Jaysus it would have been rude to refuse.
“I had fully intended to only have the one,” Jimmy told the lads, who at this stage were in total agreement with him. “Honestly Patricia, the girlfriend and I had a date to go see a film and the Mother had the dinner cooked. The plan was to be home by seven, have a quick shower, eat the dinner and meet Herself.”
Best laid plans go to waste
Jimmy expounded that at times a well-laid plan fails to materialise. “You see,” he explained, “after Mickey bought me a pint I had to return the compliment and that, of course, meant he had to buy me one back.
“Before we knew where we were we’d got into a discussion about whelping pups and never felt the hours passing. Shur, we were joined by a few lads from Saint Finbars who had just won the hurling and were out celebrating and before we knew it we were into a few rounds.
“One thing you can say about Saint Finbar lads — they’re a generous lot. Jaysus I had a rake of pints in me by the time I left. Fair play to the lot of them.”
Divine Providence
Meanwhile in Ireland understands that Jimmy claims Divine Providence in providing ‘the cure’ the following morning and, of course, since he had ‘the one’ he might as well have another convincing himself that God had ordained in scripture that a bird never flew on one wing.