I had to go drinking at Molly’s with the male members of my wife’s family last Saturday night. Her cousin Shane was getting married, and this was the stag do for us old fogeys.

I really didn’t mind, having just navigated a stressful week and been hankering for a pint by that stage, but when I was leaving, Fionnuala asked was I not taking a jacket with me.

“Sure it’s dry out. I’ll be grand.”

“For God’s sake, it’s to bucket later.”

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I shook my head but acquiesced, and after a bit of thinking, I left the house to the beep-beep of the taxi wearing my battered old Jack Wolfskin raincoat.

And as I squashed in beside the lads, I was propelled back in time to another stag do about 15 years ago.

It was my cousin Bernard’s, and it was in Galway.

We arrived fairly tanked up at the hotel and got our rooms sorted. I was with a friend of........

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