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The one question the priest did not ask me, thank goodness, was why I wanted to get married. That might have held up the enterprise indefinitely, and we are already so far behind with this attempted wedding of ours that I dare not risk another hold-up. Since serving the notice at Cork Registry Office, it’s

The funeral director down the lane is also the local taxi service, which partly explains why I see him drive past our back gate so often. According to my neighbours, he has been known to joke ‘I’ll take you dead or alive’, and although he has not gone so far as to have this written

Our house was suddenly shrouded in a thick, grey mass of cloud and it felt like a sea fog had descended. The Irish could not give a damn for rules and regs and no one is going to tell them what they can set fire to To some extent it had, but the fog grew

‘We don’t have an appointment for you!’ yelled the woman sitting behind the reception hatch. My 87-year-old father stared back at her. He had made this appointment at his local GP surgery in the Midlands and I had flown from Ireland to be with him and my mother when they attended it. We had the

‘Life is changed, not ended,’ said the slogan on the lectern as the priest told his flock what to think about a difficult subject, with a reassuring smile. ‘It’s quite a big change,’ I whispered to the builder boyfriend who was staring down at his feet in an attempt to stop the allergic response that

A warm Sahara wind was blowing and by late afternoon the western sky where it met the sea was the colour of golden sand. Surfers bobbed like seals on the milky ocean, waiting for a wave. It stretched like a sheet of silk all the way to the golden horizon. Lying by the hotel pool

The empty train seat looked inviting, and all three of us stared at it, then looked away, not daring to either take it, or offer it to the other. This train from Clapham Junction to Surrey was absolutely packed. But when someone got up and there was a seat right next to me, I realised

‘This is a New York strut,’ said the builder boyfriend as he wedged in place a steel bar, bracing shut our bedroom door to prevent us being murdered in our beds. We had been settling in for the night. The BB had been about to close the farmyard gates when a car swept inside them

‘Printers are evil,’ said the office supplies salesman after I texted him to complain that my new printer was not working. A day earlier he had installed it perfectly, and it worked perfectly – all the while he was standing there. Then he left, and the devilish thing looked at me and thought: ‘I’ll have

The anger management counsellor stormed through the door and shouted at me to turn the heating up. Hello to you too, I thought, but I was polite because I realise we are going to get difficult customers doing B&B in West Cork, where tourists come from all over the world. At first, however, I didn’t

‘Where are my empty plastic bottles?’ I ran around the house screaming, after discovering my stash had disappeared. The government in Ireland has done something with the recycling laws that has made people into wild-eyed scavengers. It has introduced a scheme whereby you can feed all your empty bottles and cans into a machine in

‘I’m making a hedgehog rescue ladder,’ said the builder boyfriend, who was on his knees in the farmyard, drilling a series of mini rungs into place on two mini rails. The builder boyfriend keeps going to check but the hedgehog seems very happy, snoozing away in its comfy box I should have known. Why did

‘My name is Love,’ typed the help assistant, ‘and I’m a member of the Airbnb community support team.’ I was using one of those chat boxes, where someone from the company you’re grappling with, embodied in a flashing cursor, interacts with you in print on a live chat screen. I am kind and polite, I

My friend replied to my text with seven sets of animal paw prints, interspersed with pink hearts and rounded off with a cat face. This was in reply to me telling her it had been nice to see her when she stayed with us in West Cork. I squinted at these emojis, trying to make

My passport and driving licence sat on the counter but the girl stared back at me, repeating her demand. ‘I need your DVLA check code,’ she said. I told her I didn’t have the slightest idea what she was on about. ‘I need your DVLA check code,’ she said again, doing her best ‘computer says

The TV talent show star was due to arrive at 5 p.m., and would be checking into our house long before we were ready to open it as a B&B. I said yes to the lady in the village who organises events, and she told me to expect this singer who is very popular in

The sound of the little cart on the lane came first and then the sight of the pony clip-clopping towards our gate. An old woman, as old as the hills, was sitting atop the cart jiggling the reins as she jogged the pony expertly down the road. An old woman, as old as the hills,

Every time I have a protracted ding-dong with a big organisation, I put in a request under data protection law to see what they’ve been saying about me behind my back. Anyone can do this. If you get into a row with a charity after complaining they’ve put your direct debit up without telling you,

My neighbour had a surgical procedure and keeps telling me about it. Every time she starts, I shout ‘No! Please stop!’, because I’m squeamish. At the risk of distressing anyone else who is squeamish, I do need to say that she had her eyeball injected, because of what followed. Three people in four days –

The little toy shop stood at the highest point of a steep winding lane of shops all painted different colours, near the harbour. So quaint, so beguiling and magical was this place, it was like walking into your childhood memory box. On the shelves of games on the back wall I found KerPlunk, Connect 4,