What Do You Call This And Where do you Think I found One?

I had a grand idea for my wee house this past week. Mirrors. Not that they would make the place any bigger but I figured they could do wonders to make it feel a bit bigger. So I scoured the Galway area (well as far as I could walk) looking. And I came up with two cool mirrors one guy was selling and he told me he'd deliver them for free if I took them both. Now that was a deal because I couldn't have carried either one of them home even on a bus.

Then arose the problem of hanging them up. I did find a few nails here in the wee house but nothing strong enough to hold those mirrors up so I set back out a few days later looking for molly bolts. At least that's what I thought they were called. But you have to understand that there are no Home Depots or even Ace Hardware stores here. Nothing even close. There is a Do It Yourself place called Woodie's but it looked like it would take three buses and an hour's trek so I just walked along the harbor. More because I like it there than because I thought I'd find a hardware store really, but as I strolled down a side street I'd never been on before I saw what I was looking for. A store front window filled with drills and screwdrivers and saws and levels.

I went in and walked the three aisles there asking for molly bolts. They thought I was nuts. I tried to explain what I wanted them for and how they worked and eventually came across a plastic drawer of what I call molly bolts.

"Oh, those!" the Shopkeep said. "We call those plaster plugs. Yep, yep that would do the trick alright. Plaster plugs."

"I'll take six," I said. "And that little hammer and this small level."

He put them in a small paper bag and on the way out, feeling very accomplished, I looked back at the store so I could remember it was there. And the name made me laugh.

J. O'Toole and Sons.