Murder mystery night

Everyone should round off a school term with a good murder mystery evening. I had the dubious honour of being Paddy O' Lay. An Irish gambler. A male Irish gambler who bets on horses. This necessitated a visit to the shop to buy the Racing Post, a paper I have so far never felt it essential to buy. So, wearing a tweed jacket, tweed hat, with my hair tucked into it, brown trousers, binoculars (for spotting the horses) and the Racing Post tucked fetchingly under my arm, I arrived for the murder mystery, singing "Ireland Oh Ireland, together standing tall" loudly at the front door. (For those not in the know, this is the very stirring song played before Ireland plays any rugby international. I love it. It is also the ONLY Irish song I could muster at that moment.) Sadly, I do not have a photo of Paddy. You will have to use your imagination.


"Top o' the morning to ya" was the only Oirish accent I could come up with so I repeated that ad nauseum. But how we laughed. You arrive in character, and the entire evening you stay in character. Well, until the murderer is discovered. I am happy to report that I was innocent. Simon, Jackie and Jean had done a splendid job of decorating with signs and notices, and the dinner was quite splendid too. Please note the details. We even had a drinks trolley.

We were stuck in a snow drift on a train in 1925, after all, in the First Class carriage. Of course there was a drinks trolley.

These evenings are a lot of fun, and as there were 6 teachers there, it was all the more reason to relax. Holidays are here!

I waited to see if the schools were closing again yesterday before heading off to work, and many did, but not ours. However, less than half the kids turned up for school, and they were the ones who are generally "good" and who want to work, so it was a lovely day working with co-operative pupils. Oh if only it was always like that!