And to you Starry (sure that's a cue for a song)
Fascinating information yourself
Clare (unior in Particular (the man on the bed) was a goldmine for such information
It was he who told us that it was considered unlucky to play a bodhran indoors as it was a ritual instrument, though his twinkling sense of humour made mus suspect that that wasn't a fiddler fed up with Ireland's traditional death-watch beetle talking :-)

One on the most fasinating trditions he described was 'the bohocks' - the STRAW BOYS who used to come to the wedding celebrations dressed in straw and dance with the bride
Several people described this to us, but Junior took me aside in the jacks (pub toilet) one night and told me that was only half he story
He said that, in the old days they would take the bride out of the room and ritually pretend to 'break her in' for the groom
"Nobody else'll ever tell a stranger that in case it gets back to the priest" he added
He was one lovely man
At the wake, they laid him out on the bed with his fiddle resing on one arm and a packet of fags in the other hand
On his 90th birthday Tom Munnelly told him "If you don't pack up the fags and booze you'll be dead before you reach 100"
Tom died decades younger than Junior did
Jim