Flowery's girl

I rarely write anything terribly serious in my blogs as to be honest they are usually just something I use for a little bit of light heated escapism but this time I need to make an exception. Megan Malone is just three years old. She is beautiful, bright and fun-loving. Very recently Megan was diagnosed with a very rare type of cancer after just one week of being ill. She has multiple brain tumours and the cancer has spread to her spine. The survival rate in Ireland for this sort of cancer in Ireland is just 20%. Megan will need to travel to America in the next few weeks if she is to have any hope of recovery. Megan's Dad John was one of my neighbours growing up in Ennis and I am very lucky to consider his sister Aine one of my best friends. The entire Malone family are just nicest people you could ever hope to meet and for life to deal them such a harsh blow is just unthinkable and so unfair. I have two small children myself and the thought of either of my children suffering like...

I am a huge lover of the performing arts which is no doubt due to the fact my parents who like to consider themselves ‘culture vultures’, introduced me to the theatre at a very young age. I was hooked from the very first opening curtain and when I spied an advertisement last week for Lambert Puppet Theatre’s Cinderella playing in the Strand Theatre in Carrick-On -Suir, I seized upon an opportunity to familiarize my four year old son and three year old daughter with the wonderful world of live entertainment and booked four tickets for the family immediately. I had been advised when I booked that the doors were opening at half one and the show would be starting at two o’clock sharp so we arrived at the comfortable time of quarter to two which I felt meant that we were in plenty of time for the performance but weren’t so early that the children would get bored and start asking to go home or worse – begin to dismantle the theatre seat by seat, row by row out of sheer boredom (it could...

So many people thought that it was the end of MacDonald's fast food restaurants after Morgan Spurlock's documentary "Super Size me" where he spent 28 days living solely on MacDonald's food. The effect on his psychological and physical well being was so dramatic on such a negative scale that it led to the common public agreement that MacDonald's was knowingly promoting poor nutrition that was both physiologically addictive and physically harmful for its own profit. MacDonalds's responded to this documentary by discontinuing the Super Size meal and by promoting salad options in the store. Also the quality of meat and produce in their meals dramatically improved as well. I don't think that they need have bothered. Firstly, all people love what's bad for them. Cigarettes, chocolate, alcohol, a self-centred egotistical boyfriend (take comfort in the fact that you will probably grow out of this one. I did and eventually married an absolute honey but ther...