FROM the vantage point of having been married for 27 years, I see marriage, or at least mine, as a big hold-all.

HOME, 6.30pm, and I’m in the downstairs study where the Strictly Come Dancing theme tune is rapping out its staccato beat.

IT’S 9pm. I’m in Sligo, at my sister’s house, where my siblings and their families have gathered for the weekend to celebrate my mother’s birthday.

IT is Friday, 4.30pm. I am at home, up a tree. I’ve been doing more site-maintenance (old farmhouse, three acres: it never ends), what with the vintage shop closing.

I HAD two glasses of Merlot last night — all that my feeble liver can take.

HAVING to travel to the coldest, furthest reach of the house to watch Freeview TV has been one of our oldest family traditions.

SUNDAY. 1.30am.

MONDAY, 6.40pm, day two of my daughter’s hospital admission.

A DIAGNOSIS of a long-term medical condition in a child will bring on a major upheaval in the lives of the whole family involved.

WE ARE driving to Páirc Uí Rinn to see a lad we know play in a Cork under-21’s football final.