Every Monday night in Irish class we are all supposed to tell a scéal–a story about something that had happened in our lives. The idea is provide to practise composing and speaking Irish. The truth value of the scéal is not particularly important–It can be completely made up. This is personally difficult, since mistakes are inevitable and I do not deal well with making mistakes in public. But it is obviously important, so I go ahead.

In the scéal I try to talk about something that really happened, simply because I want to relate Irish to the rest of my life. Last night I said a little bit about Convergence. This may have been too ambitious, since I had to look up some specialized vocabulary. However, the work was fun.

Chuaig mé agus mo bean cheile deireadh seachtaine Bloomington. Bhí muid ar comhdháil ficsean eolaíochta. Chonaic muid ar comhdháil eipeasóid clar teilifise clasaiceach, “An Crios comsholais”.

Tagann spásairi eachtrannach ó pláinead eile. Is spáslung sásar eitleach mór. Tá leabhar ag spásairi as teanga eachtrannach. Aistreann daoine an tideal: “Duine Serbheáil”. Tugann spásairi síocháin agus rath gach áit. Tá dealramh gach rud breá. Aistreann bean an iomlán leabhair faoi dheiradh. Is sé leabhar cocaireacht.

My wife and I went to Bloomington this weekend. We were at a science fiction convention. At the convention we saw an episode of the classic television program, “The Twilight Zone”.

Alien spacemen come from another planet. The spaceship is a big flying saucer. The spacemen have a book in an alien language. People are able to translate the title: “To Serve Man”. The spacemen bring peace and prosperity everywhere. Everything seems fine. Eventually a woman translates the whole book. It is a cookbook.

I don’t know if I used the right Irish word for “serve”, or if the play on “serve man” works in Irish. I think the latter question relates to distinguishing between direct and indirect objects.