This blog is a personal take on Listowel, Co. Kerry. I am writing for anyone anywhere with a Listowel connection but especially for sons and daughters of Listowel who find themselves far from home. Contact me at listowelconnection@gmail.com

Tag: Garvey’s Super Valu Page 1 of 2

Antiques, Stained Glass and US Presidents

St. Mary of the Angels….photo: Chris Grayson

Listowel Traders at the Antiques Fair

The National Antiques, Art and Vintage Fair will be held in Limerick Racecourse on November 16 and 17. Dan and Maureen Hartnett of Listowel will be there.

Article from The Irish independent.

Book Promoting

I’m busy with engagements these days.

These doors lead to Listowel Garden Centre and Café. The lovely people there have invited me to be a (small) part of their customer appreciation evening on November 21. I’ll remind you all again next week.

Here I am in Super Valu, replacing the stock of my book which was sold out.

Tomorrow, Wednesday November 13 2024 I’m on Radio Kerry with Deidre Walsh on Talkabout and on Friday, November 15 2024 I will be a guest of Listowel Tidy Towns at their prize giving.

Moments of Reflection is available in Woulfe’s, Eason, Listowel Garden Centre, Garvey’s Super Valu, Prifma, Kerry Writers’ Museum, Watsons in Duagh, An Siopa Milseán in Abbeyfeale and O’Mahony’s in Tralee.

Presidential Messages

It is customary in the US for the outgoing president to leave a message for his successor. Below is the message George HW Bush left for Bill Clinton.

Biden never revealed the contents of the note Trump left for him in 2020 but he described it as “shockingly gracious”. I hope Biden will be just as gracious in defeat. I hope Trump will share the note with us all. It’s time for healing.

Windows of Wonder

In the Church of the Resurrection, Mallow there are some striking windows.

Doesn’t this look like a priest with outstretched arms blessing the congregations. The window looks like his vestments

This window is in the baptistry.

This blue resurrection window has a look of the Harry Clarke studio about it but I couldn’t find the information online.

Listowel Food Fair 2024

The big name celebrity guest this year was Mark Moriarty. His book sold out and his demonstration was enjoyed by a full house in the ballroom of The Listowel Arms.

Mark with Ruth O’Quigley, one of the longest serving members of Listowel Food Fair committee.

Jimmy Deenihan presented Mark with his commemorative plaque.

Breeda and Margaret, both keen cooks and fans of Moriarty, came from Co. Cork to see him in action.

A Fact

The rose family of plants gives us flowers, apples, pears, plums, cherries, almonds, peaches and apricots.

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In the Military

Mick O’Callaghan’s photo of a corner of his garden

The Curragh Military Museum

I visited here on my Kildare holiday. All my photographs are taken outdoors. Photography is not allowed in the museum.

Frightening looking field guns and tanks are on display.

My son in law, who is a member of the army reserve and is familiar with much of this artillery was my guide. Aoife was there too.

This museum is well worth a visit for anyone interested in military history.

From The Archive

The gymnasium was in the sportsfield.

Lessons in Sport

I like to support my family’s sporting endeavours when I can.

That’s Cora, No. 19 waiting with her friends for their turn to go on at their Under 13 developmental match in Bishopstown on Friday August 16 2024.

30 girls turned up for each side and everyone got a chance to play half a game.

Ballincollig, Cora’s team, were playing Bishopstown. This is what happened before the game.

A lovely young lady who was a member of Bishopstown GAA club, Kate Wibbe, had lost her life in a road accident earlier in the week. Kate had just celebrated her 23rd. birthday and was on her way to work at her first job when the tragedy occurred.

On Friday evening, before the game, on a pitch on which Kate had trained and played, 60 young girls and their mentors bowed their heads and observed a minute’s silence. It was very sad, very sobering and very respectful, a valuable life lesson on the solidarity of sport. GAA is family.

Big Day in Super Valu tomorrow

The official reveal of Garvey’s Listowel store revamp is on tomorrow Thursday August 22 2024.

Special guests, tastings, giveaways and fun in store. The shop is looking fab. when I visited yesterday the pimping was in full swing.

A Fact

There are at least thirty ways of saying “drunk” in Ireland. Here are twenty to be going on with;

Three sheets in the wind, out of his skull, stocious, in the staggers, scuttered, scundered, polluted, legless, ossified, twisted, rat-arsed, bollixed, jarred, fluthered, paralytic, pissed, half cut, shit-faced, locked, langers etc., etc, etc.

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Writers’ Week and other things

Listowel Town Square in June 2022

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Listowel Writers’ Week 2022

What a great few days, (Writers’ Week is not really a week) we had. I enjoyed every moment from start to finish. I haven’t had such a hectic time since before Covid.

I’m going to tell you all about it, not necessarily in the order in which it happened.

This event happened in St. John’s on Friday June 3rd. 2022. The ladies onstage are best selling authors, Catherine Ryan Howard, Carmel Harrington and Hazel Gaynor. They write in three very different styles. What they have in common is that they are all really successful, they write full time and their work has been categorised as commercial fiction as if that was somehow inferior to literary.

As Catherine said, they write the books people read.

With them on stage is Catherine Moylan who is chair of Writers’ Week. Catherine is passionate about including these writers in the festival of writing. It was a great event.

Catherine Ryan Howard wrote a brilliant thriller set in lockdown Dublin. It is called 56Days and I’d highly recommend it. Her Nothing Man is great too.

Carmel Harrington writes what is called up lit. Up Lit is a new trend. It stands for uplifting literature, stories with kindness at their core. Carmel is hugely popular. She is on her 11th book. Her tenth, A Mother’s Heart is in the shops now.

I particularly love Hazel Gaynor’s books. She writes historical fiction and she is a meticulous researcher of sometimes little known topics. Many of her books are available in audio book form or for Kindle.

I’m delighted these three ladies came to Listowel. They have proven that they deserve their place in a festival that celebrates writing.

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Meanwhile

While I was enjoying plays and books, another exciting thing was taking place.

A lovely lovely Listowel girl was being picked as Kerry Rose for 2022.

Édaein O’Connell has everything you could want in a Rose. She is “lovely and fair as the rose of the summer”. She is also media savvy, well able to account for herself, a witty and entertaining journalist who appeals to readers at home and abroad.

I hope she sings The Night Visiting Song as her party piece. It will bowl the judges over. My money is on Édaein to be the first ever Kerry Rose to win the contest outright. Even if she doesn’t, she will be a brilliant Kerry Rose for the year.

Édaein was sponsored by Garvey’s Super Valu and one of her first tasks as Rose was a visit there.

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A Half Century Ago

This class of Leaving Certs. from 50 years ago had a reunion lately but I got no pictures unfortunately.

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A Request

Dear Mary 

I am writing because I found your blog, and I was wondering if you could help me with some research I am conducting.

In particular I am looking for fifth and sixth year class photos of the Presentation Secondary School, for girls in Listowel for the following years: 1957, 58, 59, 60, 61, 62 and 63. 

I would really appreciate if you could help point me in the right direction, or if indeed you might know anyone who might have a yearbook with class photos, that they could send me by taking a picture of the yearbook themselves.

Kind regards,

Mel Cannon

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Knocknagoshe, a Halloween Window and a Look Forward to Listowel Food Fair

The shadows lengthen as the sun declines


at St. John’s Tralee in October 2019


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Promoting A Minute of Your Time

 With the lovely Sharon in Garvey’s Super Valu, Listowel

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A Stroll Around Knocknagoshel



The Village Park

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A Little Ditty


Three wise men of Gothan

Went to sea in a bowl

If the bowl had been stronger

My song had been longer.

Anon

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Craft Fair




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Listowel Florist Halloween Window




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Listowel Food Fair 2019




Check out the great things in store for us next week.



Listowel Food Fair 2019

Listowel Public Toilet (Part 2), Helping to Research North Kerry Ancestors and Tidy Towns Awareness Day



Ballybunion Sunset, March 2019




Photo: Bridget O’Connor



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The Hullabaloo about the Loo



We’re at 1972. The saga continues next week.

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Harriet Owen in Listowel


Harriet Owen is pictured here with Tom Fitzgerald and Jimmy Deenihan. Harriet is a frequent visitor to Listowel. Her ancestors come from North Kerry and she is doing some genealogical research, helped by Tom and Jimmy.  She is very much at home here now. We will be seeing her again soon.

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Tidy Towns’ Awareness Day



When I was in Super Valu on Friday March 29 2019 I ran into my friends from the Tidy Town Committee raising awareness of their work for the environment.



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