The old man says he thinks he might not live long enough to see Leinster win the European Cup again. I tell him I\u2019m only 46 years old and I\u2019m storting to feel the same way.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe best team won on the day. That\u2019s what I think.\u201d<\/p>\n
Yeah, no, this nugget of wisdom comes from Bernie, the old man\u2019s new squeeze, who he insisted on bringing to Bilbao and who ended up asking stupid questions for the entire match slash weekend.<\/p>\n
I give her a filthy and I go, \u201cIf your views on rugby were written across Gisele B\u00fcndchen\u2019s naked flesh, I\u2019d tell her to put some clothes on.\u201d<\/p>\n
The old man goes, \u201cRoss!\u201d because he\u2019s \u2013 for some reason \u2013 smitten by her and we\u2019re in the middle of the security screening area of Bilbao airport. I walk through the metal detector and I can still hear her behind me, talking S, H, 1, T. <\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m just saying,\u201d she\u2019s telling my old man, \u201cif they want to win, they\u2019ll just have to do better playing than the other team. It\u2019s as simple as that.\u201d<\/p>\n
You can write all the letters to the Editor that you want, I\u2019ve never said a word about Bray that wasn\u2019t a hundred per cent justified.<\/p>\n
I grab my sunnies from the tray and put them back on my head. JP, Christian, Fionn and Oisinn are waiting for me on the other side.<\/p>\n
Bernie takes a pair of sunnies off the display and \u2013 after looking over both shoulders \u2013 drops them into her hand luggage<\/p>\n
Oisinn\u2019s like, \u201cYou okay, Dude?\u201d <\/p>\n
And I\u2019m there, \u201cYeah, no, I\u2019m suddenly thinking about having to face Sorcha when I get home.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIn terms of?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIn terms of she didn\u2019t want me going to the match. She had some dinner arranged for our twenty-first wedding anniversary.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cTwenty-first? Is that a thing?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThank, you, Oisinn! People would want to cop on to themselves.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cSo, what, you just went anyway?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cShe locked him in the gaff,\u201d JP goes, \u201cso he got out of the bedroom window and climbed down the trellis.\u201d<\/p>\n
I\u2019m there, \u201cNobody can say I haven\u2019t put my body on the line for this Leinster team.\u201d<\/p>\n
The goys all laugh. There\u2019s no one like me, in fairness.<\/p>\n
Christian goes, \u201cWill she let you back in?\u201d<\/p>\n
I\u2019m there, \u201cWho knows? She\u2019s been texting me for two days solid, but I didn\u2019t read any of them. Didn\u2019t want them casting a shadow over my weekend.\u201d<\/p>\n
Fionn\u2019s like, \u201cWhat will you do?\u201d<\/p>\n
I\u2019m there, \u201cThe usual. I\u2019ll check into Fitzpatrick\u2019s for a few days until she comes to her, hopefully, senses.\u201d<\/p>\n
We\u2019re, like, mooching around in Duty Free and I can hear her voice again. She\u2019s going, \u201cThe other team were very good jumping high in the air, weren\u2019t they?\u201d<\/p>\n
I\u2019m like, \u201cFocking Rassie Erasmus there, huh?\u201d and the goys all laugh, in fairness to them.<\/p>\n
And that\u2019s when I see something that quite literally takes my breath away? Bernie takes a pair of sunnies off the display and \u2013 after looking over both shoulders \u2013 drops them into her hand luggage.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m like, \u201cWhat the fock? Did you goys see that?\u201d<\/p>\n
Fionn is like, \u201cLook, I didn\u2019t want to say anything, Ross, but about three minutes ago, I saw her do the same with 400 cigarettes.\u201d<\/p>\n
I\u2019m like, \u201cWhat? Are you serious right now?\u201d<\/p>\n
The five of us stand there, staring at her. She\u2019s going, \u201cThe Leinster fellas have to become better at throwing the ball and catching it.\u201d<\/p>\n
And of course the old man is hanging on her every word.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s like, \u201cI had no idea your knowledge of the beautiful game ran so deep, Bernie.\u201d<\/p>\n
Oisinn goes, \u201cShe\u2019s not going to pay for that bottle of Victoria Beckham 21:50 Reverie in her hand, is she?\u201d<\/p>\n
And \u2013 yeah, no \u2013 five seconds later, after looking around her, she drops it into her hand luggage with the sunnies and the 400 Israel Daggs.<\/p>\n
Bernie goes, \u201cDo you know what, Charles, I\u2019m not in the humour for shopping. Let\u2019s go to the gate and I\u2019ll pretend to faint so that we can board before everybody else.\u201d<\/p>\n
He\u2019s like, \u201cRighty-o, Dorling.\u201d<\/p>\n
Christian\u2019s there, \u201cWait a minute \u2013 won\u2019t the alorm go off when she passes the\u2013\u201d<\/p>\n
Suddenly, it\u2019s like, BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!<\/p>\n
Bernie literally freezes. <\/p>\n
Suddenly, there\u2019s, like, security gords swarming around them. I\u2019m thinking, yeah, no, let\u2019s see you talk your way out of this one.<\/p>\n
They decide to give the old man the benefit of the doubt, presumably based on their lack of knowledge of his history of criminality<\/p>\n
The old man goes, \u201cWhat in the name of Hades is going on?\u201d<\/p>\n
And Bernie\u2019s like, \u201cI think it\u2019s you, Charlie, what set it off,\u201d and then she turns to the security dudes and in a half-Spanish, half-English accent, goes, \u201cI theenk eet was my fedda what set it off.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cSet if off?\u201d the old man goes \u2013 all eyes suddenly on him. \u201cHow on earth did I set it off?\u201d<\/p>\n
And she\u2019s there, \u201cYou put a watch in your pocket.\u201d<\/p>\n
At this point, my jaw is on the floor.<\/p>\n
The old man\u2019s like, \u201cI what?\u201d<\/p>\n
She goes, \u201cYou put a watch in your pocket \u2013 a watch for a lady.\u201d<\/p>\n
The old man taps his jacket pockets, going, \u201cI\u2019m not so old that I can\u2019t remember if I\u2013\u201d and then he\u2019s like, \u201cGood Lord!\u201d <\/p>\n
He reaches into his pocket and he pulls out \u2013 yeah, no \u2013 a watch. It\u2019s worth a few quid as well.<\/p>\n
Bernie goes, \u201cI saw you do it. I just presumed it was a surprise for me \u2013 a lovely way to round off a romantic weekend.\u201d<\/p>\n
The security dudes are, like, glowering at the old man.<\/p>\n
\u201cYes!\u201d he eventually goes. \u201cYes, that\u2019s it! I was planning to pay for it, chaps! I think I have a touch of the famous brain fog! Age-related, of course!\u201d<\/p>\n
The security dudes talk among themselves in the local hokey-cokey, obviously trying to decide whether he was thieving the thing or whether it was an actual mistake.<\/p>\n
In the end, they decide to give him the benefit of the doubt, presumably based on his age and their lack of knowledge of his history of criminality.<\/p>\n
One of them goes, \u201cYou pay for this now \u2013 yes?\u201d <\/p>\n
And the old man\u2019s like, \u201cQuite right! I\u2019ll pay! Although I genuinely have no memory … Bernie, are you coming?\u201d<\/p>\n
Of course, she doesn\u2019t want to walk back through the scanner again. So she goes, \u201cNo, Charlie, I\u2019ll head for the gate. I\u2019ll tell them I\u2019m hyperglycaemic. Thanks for the watch. I\u2019ll see you on the plane.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The old man says he thinks he might not live long enough to see Leinster win the European…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":474456,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[61,60,11287,709,42327,112],"class_list":["post-474455","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-leinster-rugby","tag-magazine","tag-ross-o-carroll-kelly","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/474455","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=474455"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/474455\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/474456"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=474455"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=474455"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=474455"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}