# "KILROY was Here....."



## Guest106 (15 Nov 2008)

Whatever happened to Kilroy ?
Has any body seen him lately or has he emigrated ?
His slogan as above was scrawled in a million public and private places over several decades past and all one could deduce from it is that he (he never performed in female loos) travelled a lot and fancied himself as a poet.

Last time I encountered his handiwork was in the refurbished Heuston Station in the mid 1990's where as I ogled the decorator's art in the men's toilet, I saw a freshly appended scrawl announcing to the world " the painter's work has been in vain for Kilroy has struck again....KILROY was here".

Perhaps that was his offspring at the bus-stop this morning painstakingly scraping off the bus timetable firmly glued to that revolving drum placed there for our convenience ?  The boot atop my right leg got mighty itchy for action at this time but I resisted the temptation.


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## mathepac (15 Nov 2008)

1John said:


> ...  The boot atop my right leg got mighty itchy ...



Hhhmm I love those thigh-high boots. 

AFAIK, Kilroy has moved on to TV-land, "de mass-meejya" and now does an agony aunt thing a la Dr Phil on one of the day-time channels where he use his mammy's maiden-name to double-barrel himself, Howard Kilroy-Silke.


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## Simeon (15 Nov 2008)

I do have a sneaky admiration for him though. As far as I know, his step father was born in the shadow of Ben Bulben. Forthright to a fault, he is as far as you'd get from the fawning politicos of the moment. Although I remember his son getting his collar felt about 20 years ago, it has not stopped KS of going for the jugular of n'er-do-wells, fundies and corporations.
Har Har, Here Here/I jump for joy // 'Cause I/was here/before/Kilroy


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## DrMoriarty (15 Nov 2008)

Surely Kilroy-Silk is not the _real_ Kilroy?


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## Guest106 (15 Nov 2008)

Of course, ye are dead right, that was the way of him.
But what fire burned within him that caused him to inflict his sloganeering on all of mankind ?
I mean.....was he an unfrocked priest, a rejected politician, a drummed out guard, a failed teacher or maybe even a civil servant who'd been "let go" ?.....the CS never seemed to sack them not even back then.  Oh God how I'd love to know.
For he was a quare one, was our Kilroy.
But some say he never existed.  Who knew him ?  And what did ye know of him ?  Where'd he come from ?  Who were his people ?  What was his background ? 

Well I knew him.  He was no daw and that was for sure.  I've tracked him for decades 'cross land and ocean and never seen him bested yet except by trickery.  I saw him in '62 in Glasgow's Rangers Louden pub stronghold when he silenced the loudmouth's criticism of his religion with the riposte that  he would "prefer to belong to a religion that was started by the Almighty himself than to belong to one that was founded in the sweaty underpants of a Saxon monarch".  I encountered him even at the Berlin Wall where his message was repeated again and again and on either side of the Brandenburg Gate.
Generous to a fault.....he'd buy you a pint or a meal or a bed and seek nothing in return.
And then somehow he slipped away.  Never liked cats so the Celtic Tiger was too much for him.  
So where are you now, Kilroy ?


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## mathepac (15 Nov 2008)

Definitely a complex, multifacted persona, or plasma, some say. Ethereal, ephemeral  and hard-headed by times, appearing in publications as diverse as Ian Fleming's James Bond novels,  Irish State papers, the Codex Vaticanus and the RTE Guide.

The last documented encounter placed him in London's Nottinghill tube-station, famous as the busking-ground of another luminary, Leo Sayer, where in his uncanny, chameleonesque style he committed the immortal, if ungrammatic words to the mirrors in the ladies toilet, "Kilroy wuz 'ere".

Some say he appears on BBC on Sunday evenings, wearing a white race-suit and helmet and that he thrives on Clarkson's dandruff, all we know is he's called Kilroy.


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## Simeon (15 Nov 2008)

In England I've always seen it written as Kilroy woz 'ere


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## Guest106 (17 Nov 2008)

Wonder what old Kilroy's thoughts would have been if he were around to relate them to us these days in regard to Ireland's cultural diversity ?
He was always a man of forthright views, almost Jesuitical you might say tho' he would rail at the comparison.

He told me once tho' that there'd never be a Hussein on the Kerry team.
I had countered that perhaps Kerryfolk were not ready for such a surrender of national stock.  But Kilroy would have none of it.
"My people" he opined as he brushed the Guinness from the wire-like stubble of his upper lip and thumped the glass on the counter, "would never stand for it.....never ".  It was easy to believe him back then as we put the world to rights right there in Mount Brandon's lovely lounge bar.

Deep thinker that he was, he must have some misgivings betimes nowadays on that score.  I wonder if he would remember that we bought the Nigerian Rose and her companion a drink and of the look he gave her when she told him her first name was Cait.  Somehow I knew instinctively what he meant when he spluttered that he'd known a few Caits in his time but didn't know they had them in Nigeria as well.  As her dusky form vanished in the direction of the Rose contestants compound, he muttered under his breath " Christ, I'll never get my head around this...."

I'd just love to trade ironies with him one more time.
Come back Kilroy.....all is forgiven.


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## mathepac (17 Nov 2008)

Simeon said:


> In England I've always seen it written as Kilroy woz 'ere


Like Kilroy himself, the users of the ladies jacks in Nottin'ill were brought up with their colloquial version of the famous nursery rhyme - 

"Fuzzy Wuzzy wuz a bear
Fuzzy Wuzzy 'ad no 'air
'E weren't very Fuzzy
Wuz 'e, eh, innit?"

ringing in their ears, hence the spelling error, in their eyes, in your version of the salutation.


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## Simeon (17 Nov 2008)

Ladbroke Grove/Westbourne Park style of iambic pentameter/heroic couplet x 2


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## mathepac (17 Nov 2008)

Simeon said:


> Ladbroke Grove/Westbourne Park style of iambic pentameter/heroic couplet x 2


 - heed the advice "...you gotta have eyes in your feet", which Kilroy has.


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## Simeon (17 Nov 2008)

Providing you haven't lost your life under a taxi cab. Hey Mat! Are you really a one man band?


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## Brianne (18 Nov 2008)

Perhaps that was his offspring at the bus-stop this morning painstakingly scraping off the bus timetable firmly glued to that revolving drum placed there for our convenience ?  The boot atop my right leg got mighty itchy for action at this time but I resisted the temptation.[/quote]


As my grandmother used to say > Let me introduce my tailor to your shoemaker!!!


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## mathepac (18 Nov 2008)

Simeon said:


> ... Are you really a one man band?


Yes but back then I was just a boy, givin' it all away in The Swan on Bayswater Road drinking from the long tall glasses.


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## Simeon (18 Nov 2008)

A one _boy_ _band_?


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## shootingstar (18 Nov 2008)

1John said:


> Whatever happened to Kilroy ?
> Has any body seen him lately or has he emigrated ?




He`s out in the celebrity jungle


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## mathepac (18 Nov 2008)

Simeon said:


> A one _boy_ _band_?



Yep, pre Louis and Simon, very strict budgets and no TV.

Kilroy was my manager and if the going got tough, Leo's support was only a heart-beat away, making us a boy-and-a-half band.


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## Simeon (18 Nov 2008)

making us a boy-and-a-half band.
Shouldn't that be "a boy and an aaf band"?  You're moving away from the Estuary, innit!


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## Guest106 (19 Nov 2008)

Naaahhh......Kilroy was no couch potato......TV to him meant 'Totally Void' while PC meant 'Permanent Construction' which was after all his comfort zone, his milieu, if you will.  He was a man for the great outdoors as a general rule.  He embraced the world at large and woman's place was in the home.  Pity Brigid and he were not more compatible.

He had little understanding of or time for such futuristic banalities as 'bottom lines'. 'going forward' or 'reality checks'.   He was the real deal.
Back when I knew him that's what he stood for anyway.  Once when replying to his lawyer's query as to his links to his homeland, he replied "'twadn't on my mind till now but I'll go for Puck and might take in Lishtowell as well".
Made no sense to the lawyer but nobody on the Kilburn High Road needed explanation.

He was a man's man, was our Kilroy and he's out there now somewhere.
Hope someone blows his cover soon.  I know, I know, there's a million reasons why he'd not be comfortable in today's world.


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## FredBloggs (19 Nov 2008)

1John said:


> Whatever happened to Kilroy ?
> ......... (he never performed in female loos) ........


 
How do you know?




1John said:


> Last time I encountered his handiwork was in the refurbished Heuston Station in the mid 1990's where as I ogled the decorator's art in the men's toilet, I saw a freshly appended scrawl announcing to the world " the painter's work has been in vain for Kilroy has struck again....KILROY was here".


 
You seem to spend a lot of time in toilets


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## Guest106 (20 Nov 2008)

Some find what they are looking for.


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## Simeon (20 Nov 2008)

1John said:


> Naaahhh......Kilroy was no couch potato......TV to him meant 'Totally Void' while PC meant 'Permanent Construction' which was after all his comfort zone, his milieu, if you will.  He was a man for the great outdoors as a general rule.  He embraced the world at large and woman's place was in the home.  Pity Brigid and he were not more compatible.
> 
> He had little understanding of or time for such futuristic banalities as 'bottom lines'. 'going forward' or 'reality checks'.   He was the real deal.
> Back when I knew him that's what he stood for anyway.  Once when replying to his lawyer's query as to his links to his homeland, he replied "'twadn't on my mind till now but I'll go for Puck and might take in Lishtowell as well".
> ...


This post is rapidly going down he pan. Are you insinuating that Kilroy was from the Kingdom? Did you study Proctology in Kilburn? Did you ever meet Kilburn and The High Roads? If so, I think we should be told. continued page 96


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## Guest106 (20 Nov 2008)

And what of it if he was from the Kingdom ?
Wasn't every fight he ever started caused by his defence of some aspect of Kingdom affairs ?


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## Guest106 (15 Dec 2008)

ATTENTION all Breeze Shooters.
There has been a sighting of Kilroy.  At 8pm last Thursday, I was passing thro' Heathrow Airport and there near the baggage check in Terminal 1 inscribed on the wall with a green marker was the time honoured inscription "Kilroy was here".  Seemed fresh but the ink was dry as a bone.  Hurriedly, I scanned the largely inter-racial queue of travellers wending their way before me but could not fix on a likely suspect.
At least now I know, Kilroy lives on and my quest continues.


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