"off with his fridge as an unconventional travelling companion. The film recreates Tony's actual 1997 journey hitchhiking around Ireland as he re-evaluated his life and career, found romance, met a wide range of bizarre characters, made many new friends and discovered that people are perfectly prepared to treat a small white domestic appliance as though it was a fully fledged person with a personality in its own right. During the course of the film the fridge is taken surfing, christened, blessed by nuns, accompanied by a bagpiper, taken to a bachelor festival and becomes the hero of a national radio"
"the sea and touch the shores of Ireland. Many contenders arrive, including a man named O'Neill, who begins to fall behind the others. O'Neill cuts off his left hand and throws it onto the beach before the other challengers can reach the shore, becoming the first to touch land and win all of Ireland as his prize. These legends seem to originate (or to have been written down) in the 17th century, centuries after the red hand device was first used by O'Neill families. Several Scottish families may descend from an O'Neill dynast named Anradhán. According to ""Leabhar Chlainne Suibhne"","
"reports. To this day, it continues to be listed as one of the greatest betting coups of all time. Curley invested his earnings in a stable of horses which he continued to have trained for specific gambles, and in the purchase of Middleton Park House, a mansion in Mullingar, County Westmeath – for which he later ran a raffle of dubious legality (though his jail sentence for illegally running a lottery was overturned on appeal), earning him over £1m. Irish bookmakers amended their rulebook following the coup to require that bets of over £100 be placed at least half an"
"in the Irish National Lottery's Lotto game. Lambert, who at the time was living in a converted bus that he had driven from his native Wales to Galway and parked just off the N17 road, had purchased his winning ticket in a local Claregalway shop. After his win, he left the band and settled in County Galway, where he restored an old house and built his own recording studio. Coincidentally, the Saw Doctors' song ""To Win Just Once"" was written and recorded shortly before Lambert hit the Lotto jackpot. It is the only song on the ""Same Oul' Town"" album"
"a sitcom called ""Upwardly Mobile"" about a working-class family who won the Lotto and moved to an upper-middle-class area. It ran for three seasons between 1995 and 1997. ""Waking Ned"" (known as ""Waking Ned Devine"" in North America) is a comedy film set in a tiny rural village, based on a fictitious winner of the Lotto. National Lottery (Ireland) The National Lottery () is the state lottery of Republic of Ireland. It was created when the Republic of Ireland government passed the National Lottery Act, 1986 to help raise funds for good causes. The eligible causes are sport and recreation,"
"and faith"", and told the gathered crowd that he was innocent, although he did know who had killed McGee. His last words were ""God save Ireland and God save my soul"". Whelan's widow Bridget moved back to Montreal and lived as a recluse until her own death. Shortly after the debacle, the revolver Whelan was alleged to have used to murder McGee was lost. It surfaced as a family heirloom in the family of Scott Renwick in 1973, and 32 years later was offered at auction for $55,000. The gun was eventually bought at the auction for $105,000 by the"
"Evans ran the ""Jolly Drover"" pub at Hill Brow, Hampshire, then on the main A3 road, sporting the muttonchop whiskers he had admired in his grandfather. He published two memoirs: ""Behind the stumps"" (1951) and ""The gloves are off"" (1960). The pub was adorned with cricketing photographs and Evans was always ready to reminisce about his cricketing days. He became a cricket expert for bookmakers Ladbrokes, famously offering odds of 500 to 1 on an England victory against Australia at Headingley in 1981, the match in which Ian Botham and Bob Willis fought back from following-on at 227 runs behind"
"– I'm not totally sure about this – he's haunted and he's dancing around with all this Turkish music in his brain ... Then his best mate comes back, and all the crew, to drag him back down to hell or wherever they are."" The song ends with a rendition of the traditional Irish jig ""The Lark in the Morning"". ""Bottle of Smoke"" is the story of an imaginary horse of that name that goes on to win the Cheltenham Gold Cup, winning the song's narrator a large sum of money after he bets on the horse at long odds:"
"says betting is ""not an obsession"". In 2012, he won $17.4m gambling in the United States, of which $5.2m was retained as income tax by the US Internal Revenue Service (IRS). In 2016, ""The Irish Times"" reported that he was seeking a refund of the tax on the basis of the US double taxation treaty with Ireland; the IRS stated that McManus was a self-confessed tax exile out of Ireland and therefore - despite McManus's sworn affidavits to the contrary - not a legal resident of Ireland in 2012. McManus was diagnosed with cancer in late 2008 and after receiving"
"got them a yellow Rolls Royce for when they arrived at the airport. Another year he arrived with a white horse which Amarillo Slim, who was a real horseman, rode out of the airport. “Those years he had Tom McEvoy, Jack Keller, Stu Ungar, Doyle Brunson, Chip Reese, and Perry Green from Alaska. It was funny to see them try to pay for goods in Killiney village with chips from Terry's poker tournament, something they were used to doing in Vegas."" The Irish Poker Open 2007 Main Event had a guaranteed prize pool of €2 million – twice the €1"
"he became a popular and colourful character. He developed an addiction to gambling and squandered away a large part of his inheritance, running up substantial gaming debts and by 1750 was threatened with arrest. Following the death of his wife in childbirth, he was appointed to the lucrative post of tax collector for Coleraine but gambled away £800 of the King's money. His estate was sequestered and by 1760 he was penniless. He gained support trying to help overcome his addiction from a childhood friend, Andrew Knox. Knox was a wealthy land-owner and MP for Donegal who lived on an"
"book is an autobiography and armchair treasure hunt with instructions on performing magic tricks. The treasure hunt was created by game designer Cliff Johnson and solved by Sherri Skanes on March 20, 2004. On September 5, 2003, Blaine began an endurance stunt in which he was sealed inside a transparent Plexiglas case. The case was suspended in the air next to Potters Fields Park on the south bank of the River Thames in London, and measured by by . A webcam was installed inside the case so that viewers could observe his progress. The stunt lasted 44 days, during which"
"an illegitimate son to Palmer, increasing the financial burdens on the beleaguered physician. With Dr. Palmer's life and debts spiralling out of control, the physician then planned the murder of his erstwhile friend John Cook. John Parsons Cook, a sickly young man with an inherited fortune of £12,000, was a friend of Palmer. In November 1855, the pair attended the Shrewsbury Handicap Stakes and bet on various horses between 13 and 15 November. Cook won £3,000 by betting on ""Polestar""; Palmer lost heavily by betting instead on ""the Chicken"". Cook and Palmer had a celebration party at the Raven, a"
"""I've a fiver in me hand and a fiver in me pocket, and I'm going to the airport, and I'm going like a rocket"". The series aired for two seasons on Monday Nights on Network 2 (now RTÉ 2). The format was sold to 11 countries. The series had an average of 200,000 viewers. The Irish series aired on Living TV in the UK. The series ended in 2002 after RTÉ choose not to renew the show for their 2003 line. Brendan Courtney was moving to other RTÉ shows, such as ""Treasure Island"", and he also moved to the UK"
"try something he has never done before - bowling - and heads to Arena 7, where he encounters a helpful assistant. He then visits a pharmacy to buy condoms or ""coiscíní"" and goes out to a nightclub in a bid to ""get lucky"". After many unsuccessful attempts at asking girls to dance with him, he finally finds an Irish-speaking lady who is happy to oblige. Later that night, he calls a phone sex line but the operator hangs up, not understanding him. Later in Galway, he tries his hand at busking and, singing the filthiest, most debauched lyrics he can"
"raised in the United Kingdom and United States, often among the emigrant Irish. Potentially winning tickets were drawn from rotating drums, usually by nurses in uniform. Each such ticket was assigned to a horse expected to run in one of several horse races, including the Cambridgeshire Handicap, Derby and Grand National. Tickets that drew the favourite horses thus stood a higher likelihood of winning and a series of winning horses had to be chosen on the accumulator system, allowing for enormous prizes. The original sweepstake draws were held at The Mansion House, Dublin on 19 May 1939 under the supervision"
"takes a jab at the English (a popular ploy in some Irish songs). As this sort of wraps up the story, it is usually sung as the last verse, be it the sixth or seventh. Probably the most common version of the seventh verse involves the man seeing a ""thing"" in her ""thing"", or in ""the bed"", where his ""thing"" should be. Again his wife is ready with an answer. It is a rolling pin. The narrator then remarks, ""A rolling pin made out of skin, I never saw before."" Another version reuses the tin whistle excuse, upon which the"
"of the show remains the same. Mooney would meet each contestant, and then start the first game, ""Treasure Ireland"", which had become a 3D tour of Ireland. Each contestant was given a ""bonus wheel"", for use later, and then they saw on their screen a list of 5 randomly chosen landmarks in Ireland, and chose one. Streak would then fly to that location. Once he reached there, the computer chose a point in that place, and Streak would disappear into the distance and return with a cash prize. The contestant then got a choice of 3 more locations. Streak would"
"his fortune. He begins his journey by bidding farewell to his family and friends. He leaves his hometown of Tuam, County Galway on foot, resting in Mullingar where he charms the local women with his ""curious style"" his Galway brogue (accent) and swagger . He next arrives in the Irish capital city Dublin, and decides to tour the city, but is robbed of his meagre possessions. He attempts to locate the thief, but is mocked for his Connacht accent (""Connacht brogue wasn't much in vogue"", The term brogue generally refers to an Irish accent). He hops a ship in the"
"habits carried out with mathematical precision. Very little can be said about his social life other than that he is a member of the Reform Club. Having dismissed his former valet, James Forster, for bringing him shaving water at instead of , Fogg hires Frenchman Jean Passepartout as a replacement. At the Reform Club, Fogg gets involved in an argument over an article in ""The Daily Telegraph"" stating that with the opening of a new railway section in India, it is now possible to travel around the world in 80 days. He accepts a wager for £20,000 (£2,075,400 in 2017),"
"weeks of its run, although they added a rule where the two players had to choose different numbers. The program was involved in NBC's first cross-game promotion, held on St. Patrick's Day in 1975 and called ""Shamrock Sweepstakes"". Players from NBC's six daytime game shows at the time (""Sweepstakes"", ""High Rollers"", ""Wheel of Fortune"", ""Hollywood Squares"", ""Jackpot!"", and ""Blank Check"") answered a set of questions dealing with Ireland and Irish/Irish-American people; the one who got the most correct won $100,000. A later promotion involved home contestants; over a week, celebrities played the game (mainly actors from NBC soap operas, although"
"Gordon-Cumming discussed the tapestry with Wilson, commenting that the different colours of the cloth made it difficult to see the counters; Gordon-Cumming put a piece of white paper in front of him on which to place his now highly-visible stake. Although many of the inexperienced party were playing for small stakes, Gordon-Cumming was betting between £5 and £25 for a coup; he played the system of betting, in which if he won a hand with a £5 stake, he would add his winnings to the stake, together with another £5, as the stake for the next hand. Soon after play"
"painted on the bottom. Whoever had the most went through to the final. In the final, whoever had the most houses won a holiday home in Spain. In the second half of the series, a new game was squeezed in at the start, before Treasure Ireland, ""The Sliding Door Game"". After the contestant had been interviewed, they picked one of five 'sliding doors' on the board, each of which contained a different amount of money. Treasure Ireland itself was given an update in this series. There were new graphics in between locations, so instead of the screen showing an aerial"
"the Irish Sweepstakes or respond to a newspaper ad which asks ""Are you a coward?"". He settles on the latter, discovering it has been placed by Star, a stunningly gorgeous woman he had previously met on Île du Levant. Star informs him that he is the one to embark on a perilous quest to retrieve the Egg of the Phoenix. When she asks what to call him, he wants to suggest ""Scarface"", referring to the scar on his face, but she stops him as he is saying ""Oh, Scar..."" and repeats this as ""Oscar"", and thus gives him his new"
"the jackpot reached £1.7 million for the May 1992 bank holiday drawing. A 28-member Dublin-based syndicate, organized and headed by Polish-Irish businessman Stefan Klincewicz, had spent six months preparing by marking combinations on almost a quarter of a million paper playslips. In the days before the drawing they tried to buy up all possible combinations and thus win all possible prizes, including the jackpot. The National Lottery tried to foil Klincewicz's plan by limiting the number of tickets any single machine could sell, and by turning off the terminals his ticket purchasers were known to be using heavily. Despite its"
"to see the race first-hand, so he crept into the centre of the course and watched the race concealed in a thicket of gorse. The gamble succeeded, with Yellow Sam winning the 13-hurdle race by two and a half lengths. Since nothing about the coup had been illegal, the bookmakers were forced to pay out the full IR£300,000 (>€1.7m adjusted for inflation). They did, however, pay out the winnings in single notes, filling 108 bags. The coup made Barney Curley widely known throughout Ireland and the United Kingdom, and made headlines in many Irish and British national newspapers and television"
"All-Ireland team. Higgins came to be known as the ""People's Champion"" because of his popularity, and is often credited with having brought the game of snooker to a wider audience, contributing to its peak in popularity in the 1980s. He had a reputation as an unpredictable and difficult character. He was a heavy smoker, struggled with drinking and gambling, and admitted to using cocaine and marijuana. First diagnosed with throat cancer in 1998, Higgins died of multiple causes in his Belfast home on 24 July 2010. Higgins still holds the highest break to win a World Championship, being 135 in"
"to have given Rosner the idea for the series. (That both actor Ben Murphy and his character, Patrick Flaherty, were of Irish extraction, and that Murphy was sometimes shown wearing a Bowler brand derby hat, seemed to support this.) Rather than having a drawing consisting of individually numbered ping-pong balls selected by randomly ordered machines, participants in this lottery purchased numbered tickets. (The cost per ticket was not stated in the series. However, since the lottery itself was described as having a bank sponsoring it, depositors apparently received a specific number of such tickets upon opening new accounts or obtaining"
"his generous spirit. At that time, Ireland was still one of the poorer countries in Europe; he believed in investment in Ireland. His home, Cabinteely House, was donated to the state in 1986. The house and the surrounding park are now in the ownership of Dún Laoghaire–Rathdown County Council who have invested in restoring and maintaining the house and grounds as a public park. In 1986, the Irish government created a new public lottery, and the company failed to secure the new contract to manage it. The final sweepstake was held in January 1986 and the company was unsuccessful for"
"with previous endorsers such as Westlife. In the 2007 Irish General Election, Tayto ran an advertising campaign with Mr. Tayto as a fake election candidate. Tayto claimed that the number of spoiled votes in the Carlow–Kilkenny constituency indicate that some actually voted for their mascot, but this is purely speculative. Tayto was fined during the campaign for littering, due to its fake election posters being posted in public places. In 2009, Tayto Ltd. published ""The Man Inside the Jacket"", a fictional autobiography of Mr Tayto written by Maia Dunphy, Ciaran Morrison and Mick O'Hara. Tayto indicated that a percentage of"
"service to London and Uckfield. Neil Trotter and partner Nicky Ottoway, who won £108 Million in the euromillions purchased a £5 Million property with 8 Bedrooms overlooking vast woodland and fields with its own lake in Cowden, following their win. The traditional mansion is also home to Neil’s fleet of Supercars. An attempted break in was reported to the property by a balaclava gang in the months following the purchase of the house, surprising many as Cowden was known as an area with a low crime rate. The English author and illustrator of children's books, Roger Hargreaves, best known as"
"'John' to help fund a 'Bring Back Charlie' campaign, and provoked Pope John Paul II to pray for 'John's' children because his kids put condoms on the family chess-set bishops. The ""Irish Times"" included ""Ireland on the Internet"" among its top ten computer books of 1995. ""That's Ireland – A Miscellany"", co-written with Damien Corless, was a hardback best-seller that included such trivia as that three in every ten TDs since 1922 have been called some variation of Paddy, Mick, Sean or Seamus, and that when the Pope held his youth Mass in Galway in 1979, each diocese was asked"
"deemed the kit authentic to the period and estimated the value at somewhere between $7,000-$10,000. The owner of the kit decided not to sell the item after learning this. However, the kit included 1880 era features, including royal flush artwork (not a feature of poker until the 1870s) and an 1880 revolver. The ""Pawn Stars"" episode refers to him as a professional gambler, but there is no evidence that he ever pursued gambling as a livelihood. The episode also misidentifies Borthwick's book as being about gambling. John David Borthwick John David Borthwick (1824-1892), born in Edinburgh, Scotland, to a prominent"