Beauty and the beast: Some thoughts about Jacinda Ardern

You should never trust a person wearing a mask ... unless you’re in the middle of a pandemic and that person is Jacinda Ardern. I interviewed Jacinda Ardern in Crave cafe last Thursday in what was a surreal and somewhat discomfiting experience. Surreal because after two years of trying to get this interview, and after …

Emojis in the age of the rona lockdown

😀 Grinning FaceThe look you’re able to pull on the first day of lockdown when the daughters who previously said they would never live at home again decide to move back for the four weeks.😃 Grinning Face with Big EyesThe look you pull when those same daughters say, “Are you sure it’s okay? You don’t …

COVID-19: Should we be fearful of the coming dystopia?

My daughter (the second of four) asked me today whether I was afraid—of the coronavirus and the devastating implications of the current pandemic. My answer was no. I don't feel afraid—but it was only later that I was able to think about why not. Here are some of my reasons. I remember the GFC in …

Apples and Oranges

One of the downsides, and there are many, of spending three months indoors writing books all day and drinking beer all evening, is that when you finally emerge into the public domain (unlike your book, which will probably spend months in some dusty office being manhandled by a bespectacled chap who likes to use the …

Crave: Where everybody knows your name

I was conducting an interview recently with a couple of guys I think the world of. But it wasn't going so well. In fact, it was going horribly. Ten minutes into the conversation, they started to argue. Not with me but with each other. I realised later, listening back to the tape, that I had …

Face paint: Hiding in full sight

The best thing I saw on the train this morning was a woman applying makeup. Full makeup. With a mirror, a brush. Everything. She was sitting over the other side of carriage, facing in my direction. Transforming her morning self. The face part, anyway. The part that gives away how we feel. Whether we think …

I Am Easy To Find: A soundtrack to my latest long night

It's been difficult to know all week whether I've been depressed or just perpetually hungover. Which seems like the perfect emotional backdrop for a new album release from The National. The National are my ultimate "do I accidentally take too many pills/just listen to some music" kind of band. My darkest times of the past …

When God took Job’s teeth: Tommy Tiernan tells a Bible story

No one — NO ONE — tells Bible stories like Irish comedian Tommy Tiernan. That he tells Bible stories at all says something. Something about his Catholic upbringing, perhaps, and definitely something about where his faith is now. As he said in a recent interview on Irish television, ‘It feels to me that we're born with an …

New fiction: The Block Splitter

'Tell us the one about the kangaroo again,' said Brodie, warming his damp socks by the fire. His feet were still inside them. The end of his big toe poked out the top of one of them. He didn’t care. 'Not 'til you take your fuck'n feet away from them flames,' said Grundy. 'You'll burn …