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Today, I wrote about my lockdown project, to catalogue all of my & #39;Larry David Moments& #39;, the times in my life when I experienced extreme discomfort or excruciating embarrassment. And so, with toes already curling, here goes - a thread of the twenty publishable ones...
1. One Saturday afternoon, back in the 1980s, I spotted Christy Moore walking down Grafton Street. My uncle Fran was a huge fan and I couldn’t let the opportunity pass without getting his autograph. I bought a pen and a notebook from the newsagent at the top of Grafton Street...
... then hared after him and asked for his signature. “My uncle listens to you all the time,” I told him. “Morning, noon and night. He’s your biggest fan.” He smiled, thanked me, then signed the notebook. I looked down at the signature. It was Larry Gogan.
2. I handed a taxi driver a €50 note to pay a €48 fare and I didn’t hang around for change. He was shocked. “What are you doing?” he asked. I told him, “It’s a tip.” He said it was way too generous and I was being ridiculous. We argued back and forth for a few minutes...
... until he eventually agreed to accept the money, sticking it into his shirt pocket while telling me he wasn’t comfortable with this. I was thinking, “A two euro tip? Way too generous?” About six hours later, I realised that I’d already paid for the taxi through Hailo.
3. For two years, on and off, I wore an aftershave that turned out to be women’s perfume.
4. I once chaired a debate in Trinity College. Afterwards, I went to the bathroom. While sitting in one of the stalls, two students came in and had a conversation about how “surprisingly unfunny” and “actually boring” Paul Howard was in real life...
... To spare them any awkwardness, I decided to remain in the stall until they left – about twenty minutes later.
5. In October 1992, I was in Italy to report on the European middleweight title fight between Steve Collins and Sumbu Kalambay. Before the fight, Paddy Byrne, one of Collins’ cornermen, rushed over to the press box and told me, “There’s no water in the corner!"...
He asked me to get him some. I ran to the shop at back of the arena and shouted, “Acqua!” one of about five Italian words that I knew. “Senza gas?” asked the man behind the counter. “Con gas?” Keen to return to my seat, I nodded my head and replied, “Si.”...
Collins lost on points. After the fight, he spoke about sinister forces trying to nobble him. “I went back to the corner after the first round,” he said, “took a drink of water and it was fizzy.” I said absolutely nothing.
6. One night, while friends were around for dinner, I noticed a mouse emerge from behind the sideboard. Not wishing to alarm our guests, I didn’t mention it, but I kept an eye on him out of the corner of my eye...
... I saw him slip out of the room, excused myself and followed him up the hallway into the bathroom. I locked him inside and returned to the table. Thinking on my feet, I told our guests to avoid using the main bathroom as we were, em, storing our emergency chairs in there...
... Even as I said it, I knew it sounded like I’d just done something unspeakable in the toilet. As everyone contemplated the strangeness of my request, my wife broke the silence by saying, “What are you talking about? We don’t even have emergency chairs?”
7. It was my first time in America. I was in New Jersey and I was trying to find my way back to my hotel, which I could see in the distance. I asked someone for directions and they pointed the way. What I didn’t mention was that I was making my way there on foot...
... I followed the directions and found myself walking up the middle of a dual-carriageway, which very quickly turned into freeway. Totally green, I kept walking, as motorists screamed at me from their cars: “Are you f**king crazy? This is the New Jersey Turnpike!”
8. When I was five, I was saved from drowning by a nun after I ran into the water in Clacton-on-Sea, unaware that swimming was a skill that had to be learned in advance.
9. In 2017, I was in Rome. My wife and I bought tickets for a European Champions League match between AS Roma and Atletico Madrid. There was a carnival atmosphere outside the Olympic Stadium...
... A smiling woman walked towards me with her arms outstretched. Instinctively, I hugged her. My wife said, “Paul, she’s trying to search you.”
10. A phone went off at a register office wedding while the bride and groom were exchanging vows. I spent thirty seconds looking around me, wondering who could be so stupid as to not switch their phone to silent, before I realised that the ringing was coming from, yes, my pocket.
