Pictured above is one of Irish sport's most enduring images: Packie Bonner in the act of palming away poor old Daniel Timofte's penalty (Genoa, June 25th, 1990). Not pictured anywhere on this page is the moment (4 years later) when Packie haplessly flapped Wim Jonk's speculative long ranger into his own net (Orlando, June 4th, 1994).
Never mind. Even despite that rare lapse (in the dying moments of his international career) Bonner remains an Irish sporting colossus. The fact that his lively agility between the sticks wasn't matched by his remarkably stiff and rigid TV presentation style is a fact that need not detain us. We'll always have Genoa.
"Dave F" appears (I think) to share our affection for the big fella, if this graffito (spotted on Harvey's Quay) is anything to go by:
The indefinite article does, however, confuse the issue somewhat. It may not be the aforementioned "Bonner" that Dave actually "has" (all the time). It could well be North Carolina general assembly member Bonner Lee Stiller, or 'Russian' human rights activist Yelena Georgevna Bonner, or even the late American bluesman Juke Boy Bonner. The graffito remains elusively non-committal…
Even if we remove the additional 'n' in "Bonner", and get closer to what was (I suspect) the creator's intended message, it's hard to tell if the claim is intended to be pejorative or complimentary. Is priapism something to be hidden or flaunted?
What important observations! :D If we go with the last one of the suggested scenarios, what purpose does the graffiti serve? Is it to warn possible future girlfriends, just to point out a curiosity or is it meant as a freak-of-nature-exposing tabloid headline?
April 25th, 2007 at 12:08 pmThanks L. This is vital work and I presume future generations will thank me for it. They’ll be still talking about Dave F’s “bonner” well into the 22nd century if I’ve anything to do with it.
This is classic boys’ school stuff. Having a “bonner” all the time means that you’re…er…excited even when exclusively in the company of men. By schoolboy logic that makes you a “gaylord”, and to anxious young fellas there’s no more damaging ‘insult’ than that.
This, of course, fails to take into account the fact that young males can get “bonners” in practically any situation: looking at pieces of cheese, thinking about their homework etc, etc.
April 25th, 2007 at 1:35 pmIn the 1972 Sam Peckinpah film ‘Junior Bonner’, Steve Mcqueen plays a young lad trying to hide his erectile exitement whilst working in a cheese factory during summer break. Naturally it all ends badly in haze of ’stilton’ and ‘camembert’
April 25th, 2007 at 4:29 pmi heard once that the night shift at a munster certain cheese factory would go to great LENGTHS and PULL all kinds of STROKES to enhance their cheese flavour. The child labour laws are their for a reason - to keep 14 year olds out of cheese factories. I knew a guy who would rather stand all the way home on the after school bus than risk the inevitable ‘discomfort’ of sitting in a seat pre warmed by a female passenger, of any age size or mustache colour.
April 26th, 2007 at 11:49 amI believe the correct interpretation of the graffito is: Dave F has a boner [that is, hard-on] all the time.
July 11th, 2007 at 10:18 pmEr…thanks John - though I think we’d arrived at that conclusion already…
July 12th, 2007 at 9:22 am