The Den

It was October 1995 and our school formal had arrived.  Well as you can imagine all the girls in our year wanted the perfect date, the perfect dress, the perfect hair and make-up, all I really wanted was the a certain guy to ask me to be his date.   So we go back to a few weeks earlier when the date and venue for the formal were announced at the morning assembly.   As I watched the other faces around me light up with joy , there really was only one face I was interested in seeing. Mr tall, dark and very handsome with those brown eyes that could melt a woman's heart at 50 paces.  I had such a massive crush on him for quiet sometime but I never knew how he really felt about me, we always had been good friends very good friends actually, I suspected he always knew that I liked him a lot.  But being the sweet guy he was he never said anything so as not to make me feel like a twat!!! So by the end of that week he approached me and asked if I would be his date. Well to say I was the prov

  When we were kids Christmas was actually well thought out gifts from your loved ones that was months in planning, nowadays the kids of this generation are placing their parents in severe debt wanting IPADS, IPHONES Apple Watches, Or XBOX's.  When I was growing it was bicycles, roller-boots, skateboard, walkman's ghetto blasters etc.... My first TV was a portable Black and white Ferguson it didn't come with a remote you had to get out of bed and turn the two dials to change the channels. And then it was only a few channels not like today where you have Netflix , Prime and an assortment of online streaming platforms to watch your favourite movies and tv shows. As children when Christmas Eve, arrived it was the one night of the year you actually agreed to go to bed at 9'o clock that night and didn't argue, as you knew 'Santa' was on his way.  You came in that night from playing with your friends and it was your dinner, bath, allowed to open one present, have

Well after the events of the previous week it was the was that beautiful Saturday morning in May and I was today making my first holy communion.  So the day had started with breakfast for me the thought of it was making me sick, I was so nervous, the it was down to the hairdressers to have the ol' bonnet styled for the big day.  Everything was going so far so good, until the time came to get into my dress.  Well it was the ugliest thing ever created.  I was going to look like a toilet roll cover.  It had frills down the front and this massive white rose at the neckline, Jesus Christ were they all short-sighted when they chose that dress for me out of Cuddy's in Magherafelt.  I cried I didn't want to put this thing on at all. The tears turned into anger and I fellout with Big Phil and F.J that morning quite a few times actually before leaving the house.  I swore blind I was not going to the chapel absolutely no way.  But the sly old fox that was Big Phil came up with a plan.

As a youngster born in the 70s and growing up in the 80s well I had a world of great TV shows and music to entertain me.  I had loads of favourite tv shows from Miami Vice to the A-Team , The dukes of hazzard to the Fall Guy and how could i forget Dempsey and Makepeace. I had major crushes on all the male leads.  The covered every part of my bedroom in poster form that I had collect from all the magazines I had bought with my pocket money every week.  I also had a collection of vinyl records everything from Def Leppard to Queen.  A collection that would of made Simon Cowell weep, and I still have some but now I mostly stream music on Spotify.   And due to these tv shows my love affair of cars and building go-karts to look the General Lee began.  One summer Big Phil and I set about making the 'General' from the old wheels of what used to be my pram and any timber he has lying around our yard at home.  My steering wheel was blue rope that used to exist as our washing line.  My se

When I was growing up and still to this day GAA Football and Hurling are  major sporting events in our house.  Back in the day my future granda Philip and his brothers were part of the Creggan Winners of 1954  they beat Cargin to win the All-lreland SFC.  On the Cargin team of that year would be my other future Granda Francis Joseph McErlane unbeknown to them the ties that would later bind them together forever.   Growing up it was a given that I would support either team or neither team.  But at a very young age I made my choice I would choose the green and yellow of Creggan over the green and white of Cargin, now I know one Granda would jump for joy and one would probably curse my soul, but it was my choice and I would live by it to this day.   After that win Creggan wouldn't beat Cargin for another 67 years and go on to win the SFC by beating Aghagallon in the final, but not before taking on their arch rivals Cargin to get to the final.    I remember this day so well.  There was

17th March 2001: st patrick's day What we thought was going to be a quiet St Patrick's Day would turn out to be not so quiet!! We were all preparing for our cousin's wedding the following day, getting our outfits sorted, running for last minute things like makeup, getting our nails done you know the drill.  The day had been relatively busy and everyone was slightly knackered and the last thing any of us wanted was to go out considering we all had to be bright-eyed for the following morning.  So after tea-time the phone was in constant use, the plan was set we would all go for a few drinks as it was the bride's last night of freedom.  So we had left everything sitting ready and prestine for the morning.  Off we went like the VonTrapps down the road to the local pubs.  We started in Marrions and we crawled round the lot until some idiot had the idea we would go further a field, so off we hoofed it to the Tumbledown in Moneyglass , the Largy bar , the Crosskeys you name we