"The ones involving the blurry waking up next to someone after a party; the ‘misunderstandings’ on the sofa; the awkwardness on a date, where you might feel the need to ask for Angela, or is that making too much of a big deal of it?"

We need to end the inversion of reality

"The arts are a masterclass in empathy, in how we see ourselves in others. Films, books, songs, paintings, plays — it’s how we access the inner lives of ourselves and others. How we relate."

"I fell in love with Pammy because she was a massive animal rights advocate. An animal lover beyond dogs and cats. My kinda lady."

"The spitegeist is schadenfreude on steroids. You’ve slipped on a spectacularly stupid banana skin and we are crowding over you, gurning and hooting like gibbons."

"We’re supposed to care about Oasis, or Ozzy, or those Coldplay kiss-cam people, or how bad the English women’s team are at penalties, while, a few short hours away, ordinary people are being murdered by starvation."

I want a hair holiday... I want to break up with my hair

"Having spent several insomniac 4ams doing mental Tetris packing inside my head — as dull as it sounds — I reluctantly realise I’ll have to do something I’ve never done before. I’ll have to pay for check-in luggage."

"This is not an Irish wedding, accessorised by castles and lakes and ice sculptures and matching bridesmaids and those dining chairs also dressed to look like bridesmaids. No."

An Irish cyclist, Simon Jones, recently cycled through Iran, posting a love letter to its people on Instagram: “To the country I was warned about most, but wish I didn’t have to leave so soon.”