Thing 284 Stop at Setright's for a Pint.

Families own their own traditions. Closer the family, the more traditions they own. Some are traditions shared with other families, like Christmas Eve in Browne's Pub in Parteen, or the old Greenpark Bonfire on May Eve. Others are family specific traditions. In our case, dad used to take me, Ci Ci Doo, Bean Bag and Thorny Wire to Galway for the June Bank Holiday and our first swim of the year. We didn't swim in April or May, not because we didn't want to, but because swimming then would mean our June swim wasn't the first of the year... I love those kind of traditions. I hope my family, when I'm grown up enough to have one, are as keen on the small little traditions as I've always been.

So, and you've probably already seen this coming: Setright's is something of a family tradition. I work in Shannon. My Da, coincidentally, also Dan Mooney worked in Shannon, still does sometimes. His Da worked in, guess where? Shannon. Boom. Also, his name was Dan Mooney. See we're big for our traditions in this family. Back in the day, stopping off for a few pints after work was the done thing. You couldn't do it now, what with drink driving being a criminal offence, and rightly so. Back in the 80's though? Different kettle of fish.

Right, so now you can scroll back up to the top there and have another look at that photo. Right in the middle there you should be able to see a name: DP Mooney. And at the bottom; Setrights' Tavern. That was presented to my Grandad in 1983, a year before I was born, on his retirement (Not just him, mind, there were others there too).

I drive past Setright's everyday on my way to and from work. It's now three years since I started working in Shannon. That's three years of promising myself that I'd stop in to Setright's one day on my way home from work, and have one pint, so I could be the third generation of Dan Mooneys to do just that. Like I say... nuts about traditions.

Pint was tasty. Saturday afternoon in January, with Munster on the telly (albeit in a dead-rubber of a match), warm fire blazing. Myself and Dr Frasier stopped off in the bar where my Dad and his Dad stopped on their way back from work, and the two of us had ourselves a pint.

Course then we couldn't go anywhere for an hour and a half while we let our bodies break it down. And there's nothing else there except for an overpass for pedestrians... and I've already spat off one of those.
Now here comes the really cheesy bit. I feel better about myself for having done it. I'm glad I stopped off. I think my Granda' would have got a kick out of knowing that I went there for a pint, solely because he did and Dad did. I also think he'd get a kick out of knowing that plaque with his name on it is still hanging on the wall.

New thing with a bit of family history.