THE Rose of Tralee: in the modern world of televisualising, it’s a rarity. There are not many programmes that an entire household will actually sit down and watch together, on a TV, live, interrupted only by trips to the kettle and a bit of snarky tweeting.

HOW do you know you’re getting old? When you break into a sprint, without giving three weeks’ notice to your body? Is it the sight of the first few grey hairs in the mirror that look so ludicrous, you think “Aw COME ON, special effects in this movie are cat!”.

“JANET! Why shouldn’t we have a Secret Society, too?’ said Peter.”

WE don’t have a good record with exercise equipment. The road to heaven — or in our case, the attic — is paved with various objects made of moulded plastic and rubber, bought with good intentions.

I DON’T think anyone was to blame.

THE nights have been like those of a claustrophobic Deep South melodrama.

YOU are at a public meeting.

AS Ireland tries to scrape the metaphorical dog-dirt of the Anglo tapes from the metaphorical shoe of her self-esteem, using the metaphorical limp useless twig that is an Irish political inquiry, a few questions arise:

I’M trudging.

THE taxi-driver’s fury is obvious but he restrains himself admirably. He just clicks his tongue and furiously taps at the taxi-driver-touch-screen-thing on his dashboard. It happens again half a mile later and the latest infringement ellicits nothing more than a barely audible tail-end “...ck’s sake”.