JohnMadden's Blog

As promised, this is a continuation of last week's post . The first anyone knew that AJ had left the school was when he showed up on his grandmother's doorstep. This was a good three-quarters of an hour before she was due to go and collect him as normal, so you can imagine her surprise. The facts, as far as I know them are these: At some point during school on a Wednesday, AJ and one of...

Spoiler alert: I'm ending on a cliffhanger this month... I think this story and the one I want to tell next time are natural companions, but I want to give both the time and space they deserve. On with the show. AJ surprised me last week. It was coming up on dinner time and I was staring into the fridge trying to see if I could figure out some form of telekenesis that would have dinner make...

Today, as part of the usual, barely controlled (who am I kidding? Completely uncontrolled) chaos of weekend shopping, we had an extra errand to run. We needed a bigger car seat. Our Little Miss has until recently, been fitting just fine in the padded bucket looking thing that comes with every over-priced travel system. Now that she's hit the right weight and height markers that she can move...

In among all the Christmas shopping of the past few weeks (or if I'm being honest, months – I do mine very gradually), I managed to slip in a few minutes in Eason's. It's become an annual tradition for me – I buy myself a couple of books, a couple of bottles of fancy beer and I tell myself that this Christmas will be the one that I finish them before I go back to work. We're...

I like food. I like it enough that one of the shelves in my kitchen has a pronounced bow to it from the weight of cookbooks. I like it enough that Mrs. M gets a panicked look in her eyes whenever I perk up during 'Great British Menu' or 'Masterchef' or God forbid a Heston Blumenthal show (which usually prompts her to preemptively forbid me from buying liquid nitrogen over the...

The great thing about fatherhood, wrote Michael Chabon (and as a Pulitzer Prize winner, I expect he knows what he's talking about), is that the bar is set so hilariously low and in my experience, it's (mostly) true. Dads get extra credit and the 'what a good father!' comments simply for being seen with kids who are somewhat healthy and happy, even if you're dragging them around...

Summer, it appears, is over for another year. I don't mind saying that in late September. Even if we didn't get much of one this year, I can't stand it when people start with the "heating's staying on" or "no summer this year!" nonsense because we get a chilly day in May (looking at you, most of Irish Twitter). But I don't mind it now because I like autumn. I like autumn...

I was going to start this post with the phrase, "The one thing nobody tells you about becoming a parent…" but it would, in fact, be a lie, because everyone tells you. They take great pleasure in telling you, and it might, in the beginning, almost feel like they're lining up to tell you. You tell them – and by "them" I mean ‘people who are already parents’ – that you're expecting...

I have done well, I think, at choosing my friends. I don't have many of them, but for the most part they are sainted, kindly folk; generous with their time, attention and resources and if there's a heaven above us, they are assured of a place there. It's just a shame that I've started to suspect that many of them are big fat liars. Nowhere is the smell of flaming pants more...

As soon as I finish writing this week's post we all have to take a trip into town. I used to love getting into the city, and for the most part I still do. I'm a true blue Dubliner and despite my occasional protests that I'd rather be in London or Paris or Chicago or Barcelona, the sights and sounds and smells of my native city do it for me every time. I'm sure my kids think, or...