I’d watched Big Brother since series 1 in the year 2000 (wasn’t it strange that we were all fully grown?). I even applied to be on it, sending in a video of me cutting meat in Steenson’s butchery (I’m going to have to find that video sometime and fire it up!). I also appeared in Read more about The Lock In Part One: Auditions, Voting and The Big Night![…]
I had been to Southampton a few times, sometimes to fly from the airport back to George Best Belfast City. Other times, as band manager of the waves, I had been to rehearsals and gigs there. It is a big city, and much less busy than London. It was only a matter of time before Read more about Hong Kong Army Alfred! Southampton FA Cup Final Day (May 2006)[…]
Back in 1998 in those glory days when simply watching Northern Ireland playing football or getting pished down the Wins (Bangor) or the Monico (Belfast) I happenned to help with an election campaign. It wasn’t by chance and it wasn’t because I wanted to. It was just because I had just turned 18 and life Read more about “Everybody Has To Lose Sometime” – The Jack Beattie Campaign June 1998[…]
Selling our self-produced ‘Here We Go…Again‘ fanzine (for the Northern Ireland national team) next to Marty Lowry for years had meant we chatted about all sorts of random things, including Marty telling me about Shaun with an H. This man was Shaun Schofield, who had been attending every single Northern Ireland home and away match Read more about Book Review: There’s Always One by Shaun Schofield[…]
“Hey you, up in the sky, learning to fly. Tell me how high will you go before you start falling” – Noel Gallagher. It was never an ambition to do a Sky Dive. It was too scary for me. Imagine jumping out of a plane from thousands of feet up in the air and relying Read more about “That’s me, Up In The Sky”: Sky Diving🪂Over Lake Taupo, New Zealand🇳🇿[…]
Following the first two meetings of the South of England Northern Ireland Supporters Club in Weymouth and Torquay, the third meeting fell to Bristol, where it was thought we would attract more members to the club. We chose the date of the Bristol City v. Nottingham Forest match, so we could meet Sammy Clingan, of Read more about SOE NISC Bristol Meeting – Walkabout, Nerys’ Welsh Tits and Sammy Clingan[…]
Back in 2005, for my 25th birthday I got pissed up in a 4 star hotel in Warsaw, Poland drinking with Northern Ireland stars Keith Gillespie, Warren Feeney and Maik Taylor. That hotel was a posh one – The Intercontinental Hotel. It fitted the occasion, but the hotel itself looked out over a building much Read more about “This; a present from Stalin’s Reign” – The Palace of Culture and Science, Warsaw, Poland[…]
It was pretty inevitable really. At some point or other in my life I was going to go to the top of it. And it finally does deserve a blog entry of its own on top of the mention in my New York condensed blog post. What it is is the Empire State Building! It Read more about Empire State Building: A moon is in my head[…]
I had the pleasure of working in a busy Bournemouth Hotel for six months in 2004. It was a strange destiny that ended me up in there but anyway, I’ll give this blog entry my thoughts on it. Just another one of those jobs in a long line of ones I’ve tried and enjoyed for Read more about Six months in a hotel[…]
Back in 1991, while in P7, final year at Kilmaine Primary School we often had football matches at lunch and break time. To this day, only one match from that period sticks in memory and what a cracker it was. The primary school used to let us eat lunch in the classroom and in warmer Read more about Kilmaine Lunchtime Premier League 1991 – P7R 3-3 P7T[…]