Telegram to Rose of Tralee

........please stop......stop.

One of my best mates was the Dublin Rose last year.

I asked Mary Ann to enter 'The Rose' but she politely declined, so I plied her with dulse and yellowman, to no avail, 'Turn it o'er te a dander wi' Drennan' she said, 'I like te see places catholics aren't allowed te go!'

Thank Christ. I thought I was the only one watching it.

cactus flower wrote:

Thank Christ. I thought I was the only one watching it.

You know that half wit spent half of his half wit life in Canada? Don't know how familiar you are with Northern dialects, safe to say, none of them come close to that cartoon talk.

There's a really bad made for television version of 'Bury my heart at Wounded Knee' on More 4+1 if you'll want cheering up

was it fixed? i heard over lunch yesterday (before the result) that tip was going to win and bookies stopped taking bets.

zakalwe wrote:

was it fixed? i heard over lunch yesterday (before the result) that tip was going to win and bookies stopped taking bets.

She seemed to have the victory speech learned off all right, but fair does to her, ambition in a woman can be an excellent thing.

Well it isn't a very transparent judging process.

In fairness it is an absolutely ridiculous spectacle. Its entirely harmless of course but I really don't see the attraction in recreating that episode from Father Ted year after year. Decent prize for winning though! A trip worth something like 25K!

I didn't see any of it, but was talking to a friend yesterday who was watching it and we agreed that if they'd just come out, take a twirl in the dresses, leaving adequate time for critique among the audience and feck off again without saying anything, we'd be happy enough.

Kate P wrote:

I didn't see any of it, but was talking to a friend yesterday who was watching it and we agreed that if they'd just come out, take a twirl in the dresses, leaving adequate time for critique among the audience and feck off again without saying anything, we'd be happy enough.

Having come to the Rose of Tralee late (no telly until recently) I would like to put in a word for it. If I was of a philosophical turn I would say it deconstructs the classic beauty contest.
For a start, to be blunt a lot of the contestants are pleasant, but dead plain. Rather than being the gleaming lumps of anonymous, siliconed flesh in conventional contests, the Lovely Girls are lovely on the inside. They have Mums and Dads and daft friends, in other words, they are human beings. The party pieces are only fantastic: rubic cube in just over a minute (friends and supporters dressed as Rubic cubes, the Breakfast Roll song, Elocution.... The interminable real-time vague lostness of the interviews. And now a Lovely Boys segment as well.

Feck it, I love the whole thing.

I like the spectacle of the frocks, but find the rest very Killinaskully. I don't think it's my inner snob but the sense that all of these girls are so much better than a five minute interview, a few nervous giggly smiles and a flash of the rubic cube ( heard about that one!)

Listening to last year's Rose on the radio yesterday - an American whose name escapes me, I was really disappointed to hear her say that she had spent time with Concern in Africa (which is a big place - where? doing what?) and her lesson learned was that she was lucky and other's aren't. Hmmm. She's an attorney - I would have expected something a little more meaningful - or at least that she'd be savvy enough after a year's rosing to be able to use the media opportunity to say something worthwhile on the subject. Yes I'm being curmudgeonly because my mammy never thought I was beautiful enough to enter me in the competition. Not. It's You're A Star with Fancy Frocks.

I once knew the lovely boy, though and he is, actually, a lovely boy.

I was at the Rose of Tralee last year (one of my friends was a Rose) and it was actually a great fun event down there. It is one of those awkward things though. It needs television for publicity and that yet it is completely unsuited to being televised. As a local event though it is great fun.

Didn't see it, won't watch it, won't watch it. I will start when an ugly fat girl with a regional accent who works in a hairdresser wins.

cookiemonster wrote:

Didn't see it, won't watch it, won't watch it. I will start when an ugly fat girl with a regional accent who works in a hairdresser wins.

Ah AMI may just be your cup of tea.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Snen6_1UJcU

cookiemonster wrote:

Didn't see it, won't watch it, won't watch it. I will start when an ugly fat girl with a regional accent who works in a hairdresser wins.

Cookie! Beauty is Truth you know, and that's all ye need to know.

cactus flower wrote:

Having come to the Rose of Tralee late (no telly until recently) I would like to put in a word for it. If I was of a philosophical turn I would say it deconstructs the classic beauty contest.
For a start, to be blunt a lot of the contestants are pleasant, but dead plain. Rather than being the gleaming lumps of anonymous, siliconed flesh in conventional contests, the Lovely Girls are lovely on the inside. They have Mums and Dads and daft friends, in other words, they are human beings.

I'm with you, CF.
I wouldn't watch the whole 2 nights of the Rose, but when I started watching it I got sucked in.

I'm damning it with faint praise here, but the Rose of Tralee is... nice!
You have to suspend cynicism when watching, and just treat it as a Lovely Girls competition. And they are lovely girls.
If I was to wax lyrical, I'd call it a celebration of Irish femininity! A beauty pageant in which personality trumps physical attractiveness, (though the girls were attractive, I hasten to add)!

Sure its not trendy, but we can't be cool all time.