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I remember now, Chris! I'd just forgotten the name of the group! Yes, I liked a some of them ,too - particularly one....I think I mentioned it at the time - now which one would it have been, can you remember ?

I have spent several happy holidays in Counties Clare (the Burren, fabulous for plants), Donegal and Mayo. I think they have some of the loveliest beaches in the world, especially Mayo.
Also places where long flat slabs of rock jut into the sea with the best rock pools I've ever found. Amazing sea urchins. Then I saw that Monica woman on a cookery program cutting into live ones. I wrote but of course I never got an answer.

Hello, Rosalind,
My family come from the area around Carrickfinn Airport in Donegal.
Great beaches there. The older folk still call them "strands".

Same old town or Clare Island, I expect, elle.

Hi there,

You are right Chris, I did like the Saw Doctors and have just listened to them again - I still like them and have a slight preference for Same Old Town, which I think was my preference the first time I heard them thanks to you.

Fairly bright and mild here -

Hello, Elle!
The Green and Red of Mayo is Mayo's anthem!
The Gaelic teams' colours are green and red, too.
I love Bing and Galway Bay, and also "The Galway Shawl" though I wouldn't know if Bing tackled that one?
So your redemption is ordained.
Queen Victoria got rid of all her wallpaper from one of her residences, because visiting dignitaries were becoming ill, and they traced it to arsenic in the wallpaper.
I think the green colours contained arsenic.
It had a specific name which I have forgotten.
But you seem to be OK in your house.

I think only the wealthy could afford wallpaper when those villas were built, Rusty.
My gt gt grandfather was a policeman for 60 years and when he retired, he bought one of those somewhere near where Elle lives, I believe. I doubt he had wallpaper, though the police did get pensions even then (1890s). My other gt gt grandfather PC received £85 a year!

Hi, Rusty!
It is glorious here now - bight blue skies and lovely sunshine. If it weren't so cold, it would be spring-like!
I now have two earworms...."Galway Bay" and "Same old town"!
I rather think Bing is in the ascendant!
We have lived in our present home for thirty odd years - so I have long lost count of how many times we will have redecorated throughout - definitely nary a vestige of old wallpaper left! We are quite safe from arsenic poisoning!!
I would have liked still to have most of the old features though, but there wasn't an option - the house interior was utterly divested of everything remotely Victorian.
All too far gone even to think of restoring the property.
And anyway, we were too broke in those far ago days...... we had to live upstairs for a few years, as downstairs wasn't even fit for habitation!
We had to work our way through the house, "fixing" a bit at a time!
How long have you lived in your present home?

Hi, Chris!
Been listening to the songs again...you are quite right.......my favourite was / still is "Same old town..." !

Hello, Elle!
The arsenic was Scheele's Green.
Needless to say it is a great relief you have none in your house.
On reflection, I agree with Rosalind, it would only be the better off folk who had wallpaper away back in time.
How are you off for ghosts?
I have been living here many years.
Just spoke to my painter.
He is coming back possibly on the 29th, if not, the following week, to do more rooms.
Bing was the biz, all right.
Pa-rum-pum-pum-pum.