I was down in Kilkenny on Monday, for a session in Stone House Books in the MacDonagh Junction shopping centre. It’s a lovely bookshop, independently owned, and I had a really good time chatting to the kids there. The shop is running a book club over the summer – with discounts on the books they discuss – and their first featured book was ‘Wired Teeth’.
Since I was visiting the home of the Cats, on a whim, I decided to check out where the connection between cats and Kilkenny came from (for those who don’t know, it’s the nickname for Kilkenny’s indomitable hurling team). The possible background stories are actually pretty gruesome . . . but interesting. I particularly like the limerick:
- There once were two cats of Kilkenny
- Each thought there was one cat too many
- So they fought and they fit
- And they scratched and they bit
- ‘Til (excepting their nails
- And the tips of their tails)
- Instead of two cats there weren’t any!
During the session, a new news site called 32.ie dropped in to check things out. You can check out their report and (a somewhat abbreviated) interview on their website.