Daonáireamh na hÉireann

Posted on Friday, April 7, 2006

This census thing promises to be a bit of fun. I’m just looking at it here now, as we speak, and I have to tell you, there’s a few things in it I’m going to need help with. I’m actually stuck at the introduction and, in particular, the definition of a household. This is what it says:

A household is

one person living alone or
a group of related / unrelated people living at the same address with common housekeeping arrangements, that is, sharing at least one meal a day or sharing a living room or sitting room.

Hokay! Leaving aside their execrable grasp of punctuation and grammar, what precisely are they talking about? This could demand a house-call from Gonad the Ballbearian.

A household is one person living alone. Where? In a ditch? In a cardboard box under a bridge? At the top of a gigantic stone pillar? Hello there. I’m the Census Enumerator. Would you be Simeon Stylites the Elder? Good, good. I was wondering if Simeon Stylites the Younger would be at home? No, no I’m not blind. I’ll fuck off so. Thanks. Let’s say I’ve lived my entire life on the back of an enormous fish, but I live alone. According to the census instructions, that makes me a household.

OR, a household is a group of related / unrelated people living at the same blah blah . . .

What’s this about a group of related / unrelated people? Doesn’t that just mean the very same thing as a group of people? Listen, I’ve lived in houses where there were hundreds of people, and they shared fuck-all. Sharing one meal a day? What does that mean - we gnaw at the same bone? You order a pizza for four, I order a blindingly-hot curry, he has chips, and we swallow them while we’re running for the bus to town to get rat-arsed. Is that sharing a meal? Furthermore, what is this thing you call Living Room? Perhaps they mean Lebensraum? Oh Jesus, sorry with the darkness.

OK, now we’re on to the first page, and that has to be progress, right?

Here’s a sample of questions, with suggested answers. Perhaps Bock’s People will rise up as one and fill out the Census as they feel their beloved Bock might.

The first question that piques my interest is Question 13: What is your religion?

Here, I’m hoping, people will eschew the usual bland, fuck off and mind your own business, and instead enter First Church of Bugs Bunny.

After that comes Question 14: What is your ethnic or cultural background?

Now, as you know, I’ve been concerned for some time about the increasing marginalisation of the Travelling Community. Therefore, in an effort to bring them into the mainstream, I’ve decided to tick the Irish Traveller box. The more people who do this, the less marginalised Travellers will be, which can only be a good thing. Also, as there’s no legal definition of a Traveller anywhere in Irish law, nobody can tell me I’m not a Pavee.

Question 15 Do you have any of the following long-lasting conditions?

The interesting one is (d) A psychological or emotional condition. Yes / No

What??? If you’re fucking alive, you’re in some kind of psychological or emotional condition. This is more of it. They’re afraid to say the word illness. What the fuck is an emotional condition? What does it mean? Nothing.

Yes. I have nothing.

Question 16 If Yes to any of the above . . .

All right, let’s cut the shit. Yes, I have dismembered close relations. Yes, I have immured their bodies in the new storey-and-a-half house I built just outside the pressure zone. Yes, I am planning to attack innocent people in a shopping mall with a chainsaw, just as soon as Lidl sell me a cheap petrol one. I’ll only need it the once.

Question 25 In the last four weeks, have you done any of the following activities without pay?

What the fuck? Are you mad?

Question 26 How would you describe your present principal status?

What sort of nonsense is this? It isn’t even English. I can half understand it because I have a reasonable grasp of English, and I’m equipped to decipher it to some extent, but what about foreigners? We need to know about the new people in the country and yet this is the standard of the census questions. How can you survey people properly if you’re going to ask people this kind of horse-shit? And look, let’s be honest. At least the Poles and Lithuanians speak good English. As for the knackers, forget it. Marginalised as usual.

Question 29 What is (was) your occupation in your main job?

Hired Assassin

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