>(1) Under no circumstances may two men share an umbrella.

>(2) It is ok for a man to cry under the following circumstances:
a) When a heroic dog dies to save its master.
b) The moment Angelina Jolie starts unbuttoning her blouse.
c) After wrecking your boss' car.
d) One hour, 12 minutes, 37 seconds into "The Crying Game".
e) When she is using her teeth

>(3) Any Man who brings a camera to a stag night may be legally killed and eaten by his mates.

>(4) Unless he murdered someone in your family, you must bail a friend out of jail within 12 hours.

>(5) If you've known a bloke for more than 24 hours, his sister is off limits forever, unless you actually marry her.

>(6) Moaning about the brand of free beer in a mate's fridge is forbidden. Complain at will if the temperature is unsuitable.

>(7) No man shall ever be required to buy a birthday present for another man. In fact, even remembering your mate's birthday is strictly optional.

>( On a road trip, the strongest bladder determines pit stops, not the weakest.

>(9) When stumbling upon other blokes watching a sporting event, you may ask the score of the game in progress, but you may never ask who's playing.

>(10) You may flatulate in front of a woman only after you have brought her to climax. If you trap her head under the covers for the purpose of flatulent entertainment, she's officially your girlfriend.

>(11) It is permissible to quaff a fruity alcopop drink only when you're sunning on a tropical beach... and it's delivered by a topless supermodel...and it's free.

>(12) Only in situations of Moral and/or physical peril are you allowed to kick another bloke in the nuts. Unless you're in prison, never fight naked.

>(13) Friends don't let friends wear Speedos. Ever. Issue closed.

>(14) If a man's fly is down, that's his problem, you didn't see anything.

>(15) Women who claim they "love to watch sport" must be treated as
spies until they demonstrate knowledge of the game and the ability to drink as much as the other sport watchers.

>(16) A man in the company of a hot, suggestively dressed woman must remain sober enough to fight.

>(17) Never hesitate to reach for the last beer or the last slice of pizza, but not both.... that's just mean.

>(1 If you compliment a bloke on his six-pack, you'd better be talking about his choice of beer.

>(19) Never join your girlfriend or wife in discussing a mate of yours... except if she's withholding sex pending your response.

>(20) Phrases that may not be uttered to another man while lifting weights:
a)Yeah, Baby, Push it!
b) C'mon, give me one more! Harder!
c) Another set and we can hit the showers!

>(21) Never talk to a man in a bathroom unless you are on equal footing: Both urinating, both queuing, etc. For all other situations, an almost imperceptible nod is all the conversation you need.

>(22) Never allow a telephone conversation with a woman to go on longer than you are able to have sex with her. Keep a stopwatch by the phone. Hang up if necessary.

>(23) The morning after you and a girl who was formerly "just a friend" have carnal drunken sex, the fact that you're feeling weird and guilty is no reason not to do it again before the discussion about what a big mistake it was.

>(24) It is acceptable for you to drive her car. It is not acceptable for her to drive yours.

>(25) Thou shalt not buy a car in the colours of brown, pink, lime green, orange or sky blue.

>(26) The girl who replies to the question "What do you want for Christmas?"with "If you loved me, you'd know what I want!" gets a Playstation, end of story.

A young footballer has encountered many difficulties by the time he reaches the ranks of the minor grade. He has endured unknown verbal abuse from auld lads in their fifties living out their lives through the gossans. They have survived the horrors of puberty (some of them anyway) and now are talking the talk of the big man, even if all they’re still shaving on a Saturday night is bum fluff and they’ve got nowhere to go.
In the smaller clubs, you could be approached at age 15 to enter the murky world of minor footballer. As a 15 year old, you are in awe of these big hulking 17-18 year olds each with the very small beginnings of a beer belly. They talk about women in a way you wouldn’t hear on a German satellite channel and you move closer to pick up tips, even though you’ll have no guinea pigs to practise with for another couple of years and it’s debatable whether even they have practised such things either.
They are probably listening to such musical geniuses as Chimera, Slipknot, Slayer, Spineshank and Sepultura, while you are buried in your auld fellas’ 70s vinyl collection of Rory Gallagher, Led Zeppelin, The Who, Pink Floyd etc, and declaring that rock died when Kurt Cobain exited planet rock with a bang.
You see them walking moodily around the school, yelling abuse at teachers you’re still afraid of. You watch in frustration as the girls in your year, especially the one you fancy, almost throws herself at the six foot one midfielder. A rage builds inside of you that you can't let out till you're at home in your bedroom and your mammy wonders have you been drinking too much Ovaltine at night.
Does this sound like the screenplay of an American teen movie? It does to me. But has this story happened to you? Well, some people are blessed with all the right moves from the day you first see daylight, though it’ll comfort the rest of the pack that almost everybody got their arses clattered when just a few seconds outside the auld lassie by some monstrous midwife whose beard would be the envy of Ronnie Drew.
The star minor footballer is one that is respected by old and young alike. He is the great white hope of the parish, the fella who'll bring back the county title when he gets to senior grade, barring he gets lured by some ‘foreign’ soccer team from Dublin who then bounce him on to….(whisper it on a GAA lovers website…E n g l a n d).
Cue screams and howls of protests from the auld bucks at the counter who mutter to themselves that the pup was never any good and neither was his father. ‘Sure didn’t I go on the blanket for Ireland lad. That’s right, I camped out for JP2’s visit to Knock in 1979. What's wrong with the youth these days? If I said I was going to play pansy football in England to my father, God, Jesus, Mary, Joseph and the Holy Ghost have mercy on him, he’d have taken me two legs off with a scythe and boiled them for the Christmas dinner. He always said to me never play 'Tan' football.’
So you have a lot to live up to. As you begin to go to the minor training sessions, a strange thing occurs. Those same lads that are eighteen or so, begin to recognise you at school and grunt a greeting towards you as you walk nervously past them down the corridor, waiting for the obligatory psycho that’s ready to pounce on you and drag you into an empty room for a ‘chat’. You remember that this same psycho lad used to come around to your house on a Saturday, while at national school, and you spent hundreds of hours defending your home made fort from imaginary Klingons or some such foreigners.
However, with the big lads noticing you, the ‘one’ begins to as well. She comes up and actually talks to you. Her eyelids start fluttering, the shy grin, and the fidgeting of the hair nearly makes you run for a bucket of water to cool down with. You stutter like a diesel car on a frosty morning as you talk about how the science teacher is such a bastard for having giving out to the ‘on

Wish I was too dead to cry
My self-affliction fades
Stones to throw at my creator
Masochists to which I cater
You don't need to bother;
I don't need to be
I'll keep slipping farther
But once I hold on,
I won't let go 'til it bleeds

Wish I was too dead to care
If indeed I cared at all
Never had a voice to protest
So you fed me shit to digest
I wish I had a reason;
my flaws are open season
For this, I gave up trying
One good turn deserves my dying

You don't need to bother;
I don't need to be
I'll keep slipping farther
But once I hold on,
I won't let go 'til it bleeds

Wish I'd died instead of lived
A zombie hides my face
Shell forgotten
with its memories
Diaries left
with cryptic entries

And you don't need to bother;
I don't need to be
I'll keep slipping farther
But once I hold on,
I won't let go 'til it bleeds