I’ll talk about my first ever job on today’s Working Wednesdays, a job which was unpaid but I got free football fanzines out of it, and I was helping support my country’s international football team. Aged 15, I wrote articles for and helped sell the Northern Ireland football fanzine, Arconada…Armstrong! Named after the ITV commentary…
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I use the Lonely Planet Guide Booksquite a lot when I travel and I like them. Usually they are correct, mostly they are useful but sometimes they are horrendously wrong and ill-informed. As soon as they go to press they are out of date, as prices go up, bus timetables change, visa regulations change etc.…
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I’ve loved writing for as long as I can remember. I’ve also loved football for as long as I can remember. Put the two of them together and it was obvious that I was going to do some football writing at some point. Or in my case, at many points and a LOT of football…
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** STOP PRESS!! This article was written a while back and scheduled long before this week’s fire on the Belfast to Dublin train, so please bear that in mind…** (this is the first time since starting DSL in 2007 I have had to do this…) // I’m sure a lot of you reading will be…
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Travelling in your home country is something people often overlook and despite the fact that I don’t live in Northern Ireland anymore, I still LOVE the tourist sights that we have to offer. On every trip back I make sure I visit at least one tourist attraction. Crossing the Carrick-a-Rede rope bridge on Northern Ireland’s…
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I often get asked about Europe and why I haven’t written much about my own continent for a while. The real answer is that all my travels in Europe were 2003 – 2009. In the last 4 years I’ve had less than 2 weeks travelling in Europe! This makes it my LEAST travelled continent in…
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The Crown Bar in Belfast in my home country of Northern Ireland is a brilliant place. I LOVE it and I take my friends there any time I’m showing them round my country. I’m pretty surprised this is the first time I’ve written about it, but buzzing at the thought of helping promote Belfast and…
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I was driving through Yeovil in England in early 2008 when a call came through from a renowned Northern Irish journalist “Jonny, I’ve been asked to do a few interviews on Northern Ireland football fans for a new book, are you interested?” Straight away it was a “yes” and that was it – I was…
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My Working Wednesdays series covers stories from my constantly changing career. For today’s post we head back to January 1998, exactly 15 years ago this week I was working for the local newspaper, the County Down Spectator in Bangor, Northern Ireland. Now obviously writing is something I love doing, so this seemed an obvious job…
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I was once described as a “football nut” and I’m not sure what that entails, but basically I LOVE football. Ever since I saw Norman Whiteside score for Northern Ireland against Algeria in the 1986 World Cup on a black and white TV, I have been a football fan. Firstly I played it – at…
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