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Tomás Murray

@tomasjmurray.bsky.social

2K followers 60 following 8K posts

Lean left • Tom is fine • Far from the west of Ireland now • Fond of cats, jazz, old films, paintings, poetry, stout, & Sylvia • Sylvia most of all 🎷🧵 https://tinyurl.com/3bvnbyfb 🎬🧵 https://tinyurl.com/47stke59 • https://tinyurl.com/2jan4tzd

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Tomás Murray @tomasjmurray.bsky.social · Jul 8

My wife, Sylvia, died this morning. 💔

“When the door
scraped shut, it was the end
of all the sounds there are.

You left me
beside the quietest fire in the world.”

Sylvia & Lily (Cork, Ireland, July 2007)

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Tomás Murray @tomasjmurray.bsky.social · 12h

(My lame attempt at humour, D.)

Tomás Murray @tomasjmurray.bsky.social · 13h

#NowPlaying #TMCC™

‘You Go to My Head’: youtu.be/QAwSrAhlcMM?...

Tomás Murray @tomasjmurray.bsky.social · 14h

Yesterday was my sister Máire’s birthday. It would have been—was—her 55th.

(The three of us left agree—not that it much matters now—that Máire was definitely the brains of the four. My late father once commented that she could see around corners.)

A repost. My sister Catherine (Kate), my late wife Sylvia, & the girl who could see around corners.

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Tomás Murray @tomasjmurray.bsky.social · 15h

(And to the individual who, when I mentioned my first jazz purchase in That Other Place™, replied “Dave Brubeck is jazz for people who don’t really like jazz“:

I do still remember your reply, sir, but I don’t recall your name.)

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Tomás Murray @tomasjmurray.bsky.social · 15h

Since I can’t recall a regret, Ms P., I am going to flip your q around. When I got my first job in Dublin way back in ’88 I, on a whim*, bought a copy of ‘At Carnegie Hall’ (The Dave Brubeck Quartet) that began a lifelong love affair w/ jazz.

(*Nobody in my family knew the first thing about jazz.)

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Tomás Murray @tomasjmurray.bsky.social · 17h

Today is Mr Sim’s 125th birthday (excuse my lazy repost but there are some good photos).

Tomás Murray @tomasjmurray.bsky.social · Oct 9

Alastair Sim, Actor, #BornOnThisDay in 1900, in Edinburgh, Scotland

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Reposted by Tomás Murray

Andrew Male @andrewmale.bsky.social · 20h

In autumn light. #Hildy

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Tomás Murray @tomasjmurray.bsky.social · 20h

. . . Aloysius O’Kelly’s ‘Mass in a Connemara Cabin’ (1883), National Gallery of Ireland:

Tomás Murray @tomasjmurray.bsky.social · 20h

Yesterday's @frankie49.bsky.social diary entry on a quite extraordinary life.

Our Man in Havana – Frank McNally on a forgotten Irishman honoured in Cuba

James Joseph O’Kelly was also, for a brief period, a man of two wives

www.irishtimes.com

Reposted by Tomás Murray

Andrew Male @andrewmale.bsky.social · 1d

“It was about these two tramps waitin’ for this mate of theirs. I opened me programme and ‘is name’s not there. Y’ could wait a hundred years an’ he’d still never walk out on to the bloody stage. I slipped out to this café next door an’ read the paper.” Willy Russell, Breezeblock Park.

Breezeblock Park, Liverpool Everyman Theatre, 1975
The full text runs

Ted Don’t talk to me about theatres. I went to one once. ’Ey, John, what was the name of that play, that play I took you an’ y’ mother to see when it was rainin’ in town? Remember?
John (still absorbed in the television) Waitin’ for somethin’ wasn’t it?
Ted Waitin’ For Godot. That was it. I’ll tell y’ about theatres. We went in to see this thing, it was about these two tramps waitin’ for this mate of theirs. Well, I’m not kiddin’ you? All this audience were sittin’ there waitin’ for him as well. I could see straightaway what was gonna happen though. I’d been in there about five minutes an’ I knew. I opened me programme didn’t I, John? An’ I looked down the list, y’ know where it gives the names of the characters like? An’ straightaway I knew, didn’t I? His name’s not there in the programme y’ see, this Godot’s. Well, it’s common sense, if his name’s not in the programme he’s never gonna show up. Y’ could wait a hundred years an’ he’d still never walk on to the bloody stage. But all the rest of these stupid buggers in the place – they didn’t have the sense to look in the programme an’ work it out for themselves. I slipped out to this café next door an’ read the paper. I laughed meself silly at the rest of them next door. When our John come out with his mum, I said to him, didn’t I, John? I said to him – don’t tell me – the Godot feller didn’t turn up!

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Tomás Murray @tomasjmurray.bsky.social · 21h

(I have no experience w/ editing someone else’s work—or w/ publishing my own, other than an academic thesis—but I imagine it might be very rewarding work, esp. if the writer is receptive.)

Tomás Murray @tomasjmurray.bsky.social · 21h

(I’m glad to see your guys survived to fight at least one more day. And that Stacey got to see the drama. It was a fun game.)

Reposted by Tomás Murray

Miller on the Threshold @iammilliam.bsky.social · 2d

Just the latest way in which technology is enabling people who don’t actually like reading to diminish the cultural relevance of those who do.

The New Yorker @newyorker.com · 2d

Abridging has always been in vogue. Now, apps like Blinkist take entire books and crunch them down to a series of what are called Blinks—which amount to around 2,000 words. “Is that what books are coming to, a handy social lubricant?” Anthony Lane asks.

Can You Read a Book in a Quarter of an Hour?

Phone apps now offer to boil down entire books into micro-synopses. What they leave out is revealing.

www.newyorker.com

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Tomás Murray @tomasjmurray.bsky.social · 2d

(You are a first-rate romantic, Ms N. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.)

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Tomás Murray @tomasjmurray.bsky.social · 3d

(Probably my second favourite volume of the 12.)

Reposted by Tomás Murray

Frank McNally @frankie49.bsky.social · 3d

Sunrise on the Beckett Bridge, Dublin.

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Tomás Murray @tomasjmurray.bsky.social · 4d

(Absolutely.)

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Tomás Murray @tomasjmurray.bsky.social · 4d

You do yourself a disservice, Ms P.

(It took me only 58 years to arrive at a way of dealing w/ the world that I can live with.)

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Tomás Murray @tomasjmurray.bsky.social · 4d

Be grateful. Express that gratitude in tangible ways. Forget about those who promised to help but never really did. They may have meant well. Hug the ones who showed up. Remember their names.

essencesimmone.blacksky.app @essencesimmone.blacksky.app · 6d

Those who are 35+, what advice do you have for people just entering their 30s?

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Tomás Murray @tomasjmurray.bsky.social · 4d

Be grateful. Express that gratitude in tangible ways. Forget about those who promised to help but never really did. They may have meant well. Hug the ones who showed up. Remember their names.

essencesimmone.blacksky.app @essencesimmone.blacksky.app · 6d

Those who are 35+, what advice do you have for people just entering their 30s?

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Tomás Murray @tomasjmurray.bsky.social · 4d

(Their treatments of Winnie-the-Pooh are an abomination. Don’t @ me.)

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Tomás Murray @tomasjmurray.bsky.social · 4d

(Beautiful.)

Tomás Murray @tomasjmurray.bsky.social · 4d

(Sylvia *loved* his voice. Loved SD period.)

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Tomás Murray @tomasjmurray.bsky.social · 4d

Tomás Murray @tomasjmurray.bsky.social · 4d

Today is Glynis Johns’s birthday.

With Deborah Kerr on the set of ‘Perfect Strangers’ (1945)

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