Irish Mammy: an honest mistake

The story so far: Denis and Ann Devine are about to go on their first sun holiday for a good while. Denis has insisted on getting the party started early and having a few “because we’re on our holidays”. This has repercussions later.

Mowldy. That’s the only word to describe him now on the plane. The flight was two hours late and Denis had got mixed up in the Stag weekend at the pub in the airport. He wouldn’t be used to that at that hour.

I just knew we’d be right in the middle of the stag weekend on the plane. They thought Denis was “great craic altogether for an ould lad”. So now I’m married to an ould lad, what does that make me? I might be a grandmother but I’m not an ould wan yet.

They were asking him where were we staying and he didn’t know so he says: “Ann, wherewestaying?” And I must have had a face on me at that stage because the next thing they were all singing: “Ooh ooh oooh oohh who’s in the dog-HOUSE?”

I was trying to ignore it all. I should have nearly had the wine Denis was trying to load into me because then I wouldn’t have noticed as much. But when you’re sober as a judge and the man with you is in flitters, you notice everything.

One of the air hostesses had to shush him during the safety announcement.

“Sorry guard,” says Denis, and the stags were all laughing at him, thinking he was a FIERCE CHARACTER. I was never so mortified. You think your children would be the ones to embarrass you the most, and that when they’re grown up you’d be out of the woods. And now Denis is probably going to get himself on a No-Fly List. Which is just as well because the next time I go on a plane, I’m going on my own. Like Shirley Valentine.

By the time we landed, I was the one bursting for the toilet because I didn’t want to be getting out from the window seat and only giving Denis and the stags something to be talking about.

So Denis was to find the bags. We had two bags. One was mine and the other was Denis’s, although we could have fitted Denis’s gear into mine. He wouldn’t have that many outfits. I waited for a while in the toilet to get my composure. When I came back, he had the bags all loaded up on the trolley and he must have been sobering up because he was starting to look a bit ashamed of himself. Which was some consolation anyway.

“Sorry Ann. I got a bit carried away.” He says.

“We’ll say no more about it,” says I, although I knew I would. You don’t go throwing away these kind of incidents. You wouldn’t know when you’d need to bring them up again.

We got to our hotel and of course Denis conked out on the bed after his ordeal at the hands of the stags and the early pints. But he managed to surface before we were going out looking for somewhere to have dinner.

“Where did you get that jumper?” says I.

“I bought it the other day for the holidays.”

“It’s a bit tight on you is it?”

“A bit. But I didn’t know that until I got home and then it was too late to change it.”

I had my doubts. Denis hasn’t bought his own jumpers for years but I didn’t want to be quizzing him on our holidays. We paid enough for them.

There was a man in the lobby of the hotel looking at us as we came down. He had the sunglasses and a notebook. He came straight over to Denis.

“Senor … Devine?”

Denis looked scared.

“Senor I am Detective Pablo Escobar undercover airport police. I am arresting you with stealing luggage.”

Denis went white. He looked at me. I looked at the jumper. It wasn’t his jumper at all. The eejit had taken the wrong luggage. And then as if he was seven, tried to hide it. The name Pablo Escobar seemed familiar to me though.

“I … I mean I didn’t know … I,” says Denis

“SHUR THE FECKIN JUMPER DOESN’T FIT YOU LIKE HOW COULD YOU NOT KNOW,” says ‘Detective Escobar’.

It was one of the stag crowd and the next thing they all came out from around the corner laughing. Bringing Denis’s actual bag.

“What I’d like to know is,” says the Detective, or Johnny as his real name was, “what were you going to do with the rest of the stuff in the bag. It turned out the bag was full of oul jokey stuff for the stag weekend. Fake boobs and the whole lot.

“I’ll take it from here detective,” I says. They were laughing with me now.