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Fire Escape Partners
3465 25th Street, Suite 17
San Francisco, CA 94110 | (noun)
[BLAWR-nee] 
1. artfully flattering talk: "John's blarney was charming and even made her blush, but it didn't make her like him any more."
2. humbug; nonsense; rubbish
verb form: blarney
Origin:
Approximately 1766; from Lady Blarny, a smooth-talking character in Goldsmith's the 'Vicar of Wakefield,' her name being a literary contrivance in allusion to the 'Blarney Stone,' which is supposed to bestow skill in flattery to those who kiss it (located in Blarney Castle, Blarney, near Cork, Ireland). In action:
"Art and the art of talking run deep in her blood, no matter what the occasion. Growing up in a small Jewish community in the British colonial backwater that was Newfoundland until 1949, Morgan remembers a place of 19th century charm and effusive conversation.
'It was a fascinating experience. All the people I grew up with were from the west coast of Ireland. We had the accents, the soda bread, the blarney and folktales,' she recalls.
And after a day of school with Irish nuns, there was Hebrew school with a rabbi who loved to talk about opera and art. But a trademark tenacity colors Morgan's talk, however smiling and warm.
Friends and colleagues will joke -- or sigh or complain -- about the difficulty of ending a conversation with her, on the phone or in person. 'As you know, she's relentless,' says FIU provost and executive vice president Mark Rosenberg, in a resigned tone of patient admiration."
Elisa Turner. "New kid on the art block: With the groundbreaking of a museum in November, FIU aims to be a major player," The Miami Herald (September 07, 2003).
"Although this swan song for O'Neill revisits some of the suffering found in Long Day's Journey, the script includes wonderful moments of humor and blarney, like the scene when Hogan's rich, uptight neighbor drops by to complain about Hogan's wandering pigs -- and leaves with his head spinning.
Phil Hogan is a great trickster, all right. Or is he? O'Neill uses much of the ribbing, teasing and joking to keep the audience off-balance.
'He's always pulling the rug out from under you,' said Sullivan. 'Then after an hour of laughing, all the masks are ripped away, and you say, Wow.'"
Channing Gray. "Trinity stages O'Neill's Moon -- in the round," The Providence Journal (September 28, 2003).
"Shy Sunita only had eyes for her boss, womaniser Dev, but he didn't want to know and by the time he'd realised his true feelings she had fallen for Ciaran's brand of Irish blarney.
With Dev there was almost an element of Sunita wanting what she can't have.
But just when he's decided she would be perfect wife material, through the door comes this cheeky Irish chappie and smoothie Dev is left out in the cold."
"7 Street Love Triangles," The Sunday Mail.
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