Columns - Irish Examiner

Aida Austin

"The ‘ends well’ bit, I shout. "I want the ‘ends well’ bit. I want the ‘ends well’ bit now."

HOME ALONE, and waiting for a call from my husband. 

Sat, 13 Dec, 2014

"Our wedding anniversaries are cursed, I vote we forget presents"

Wednesday night, upstairs, and my husband is resurrecting his Spiderman Scuttle - something to do with muscle flexion, I seem to remember - which involves scampering sideways, like a crab, back and forth across our bouncy floor-boards so that the bed shakes.

Sat, 06 Dec, 2014

’It’s as if obesity is a disease you can catch, like chicken pox’

MY mother’s gone radio silent; it’s Tuesday afternon and her Monday morning phone call that has punctuated my life as inevitably and reliably as the weekly shop, never arrived. 

Sat, 29 Nov, 2014

"Come on," he shouts, just like he did when I was in childbirth, "last push now"

SUNDAY, 5pm, and after a five-year break from painting, I’m resurrecting my old studio. It’s a long way from Picasso’s atelier on the Riviera but it will do, like it always did, the job.

Sat, 22 Nov, 2014

Aida Austin: We’re looking for someone who’s clean, relaxed and funny

I am in Sligo, where life has transposed itself, like it always does, into a scene from ‘The Edwardian Farm’.

Sat, 15 Nov, 2014

Mum says there was no cholesterol in her day, so she doesn’t know if it’s hereditary and at least it’s not Ebola

IT’S THURSDAY, 5pm, and my husband finds me in the back hedge, hacking at rugosa with lopping shears. He’s carrying two cups of tea in one hand and eating a sandwich from the other.

Sat, 08 Nov, 2014

"It has sound effects and everything! You’re first"

UPSTAIRS in bed at 11pm. My husband says he wants to watch episode 3 of The Bridge on my laptop but this would contravene our no-technology-in-bed-rule. 

Sat, 01 Nov, 2014

Look at us swishing along in our boots, all cotton-eye Joe!

1am in Sligo - and at the kitchen table, my sister’s head is bowed in earnest industry over some sprigged cotton which she’s cutting into covers for her jam-pot lids. 

Sat, 25 Oct, 2014

Aida Austin: Family life feels forever fixed in time

My sister’s house, Sligo, where children hold your hands, drink their milk and family life feels forever fixed in time.

Sat, 18 Oct, 2014

Aida Austin: "You’re attractive and funny, not a doggy waiting for re-homing"

I’M IN London, walking down Upper Street towards my son, who is waiting in Five Guys — a burger joint he’s recommended because it’s “munch”.

Sat, 11 Oct, 2014