David Robbins

My final problem – I have no clue what to write for my last column 

I am sitting at my desk, watching the cursor blink on my screen. It is the day I am supposed to file my column for the paper and, as usual, my mind is wandering.

Dave Robbins: Having a mistress in France is not compulsory, but it is almost expected 

It was a fine day in late summer and the air seemed full of hope. I was in France, driving east from Toulouse, and then tracking northwards...

How I got on with Joyce . . . not the girl at the back, but auld Specky 

There was a time, when you told people you were studying literature at UCD, they would lean towards you conspiratorially and ask: "How are you getting on with Joyce?"

My wife's heard all the excuses -- now it's phase out the cigarettes or else... 

The annual January campaign to persuade me to quit smoking is well under way.

Travel: Long, lazy month on the beach let the intensities of life slide away 

When I look back on it, I realise that 2013 was the year of travel. And that 2014 will be the year of paying for it.

Hazy Christmas memories bring back feelings of delight and pain 

In my mind's eye, I see a Christmas from when I was a boy. It is hazy, but there are sharp points of delight, and of pain.

Costume chaos and clumsy dads -- but the school play must go on 

It is the week of the school Christmas play, and my daughter is emitting spontaneous shrieks of excitement.

Dave Robbins: How the memory of Marcel brought me back to my student days . . . 

About this time 100 years ago, an asthmatic homosexual lay in bed in a cork-lined room at No 102 Boulevard Haussmann in Paris, correcting...

Here's ho, ho, hoping we won't stuff up the perfect Christmas this year 

It's not even December yet and already I'm stressed about Christmas. We're having 21 people for Christmas dinner. How many Brussels sprouts is that exactly?

Dave Robbins: Ad man's shameless exploitation of all we hold dear is just part of Christmas present 

Roland Barthes was a French philosopher, but there was a little something Irish about him too. He lived with his mammy for 60 years and had the kind...

David Robbins: O'Leary has me in his sights after his potshot towards stay-at-home dads 

Maybe I have been wrong about Michael O'Leary all along. Perhaps he is the wise and thoughtful leader we have been looking for.

Dave Robbins: Doggie Bleedin' Day Care – it'll be aromatherapy massages next! 

Our dog Pipsi . . . "Don't call her that," says my wife from the next room. "Why not? It's her name," I reply. "You only use her name as a...

David Robbins: My uncle's distrust of Haughey was instinctive and intuitively correct 

My uncle met Charlie Haughey only once. It was at an official government meeting and my uncle was assisting his departmental secretary.

Witches are old hat! The trick today is to be scary – but in a non-threatening way 

My daughter is dressing up as a plain, common-or-garden vampire. Dead brides are also popular among her friends, as are zombies, werewolves...

Maddie's sad fate terrifies parents because we've all left for 'a moment' 

In August 2007, we managed to blag a week at a relative's villa in France. It was a big place, with a main house, a pigeonnier and other outbuildings.

For the love of the game: Morgan's amateur attitude was a class above 

When the great Welsh rugby out-half Cliff Morgan was posted to Ireland in 1954 by his engineering company, he was faced with a dilemma.

He flashed the fire against my skin – flaming hell, that was a close shave! 

'You want shave?" asked the man, pointing to the two-day growth on my jaw.

Sometimes it's hard to be a man, especially on golf weekends away 

There is a friend of mine who has taken on the role of champion to the downtrodden, oppressed middle-class male. It is a subject he can – and often does – speak about with passion and at length.

Our daughter finally found her sea legs – the last day of our holiday 

It was our last day of holidays. We were packed and ready to get the ferry. We had cleaned the house and swept the patio, emptied the fridge and hunted down missing socks. Mentally, we had already left.

It will be a long, cricket-less winter, but nothing could burst our bubble 

There is a scene at the end of Martin Scorsese's film Gangs of New York in which the two warring gangs – the Natives and the Dead Rabbits – are locked in a battle to the death.

I do the shopping, my wife sniffs out dry rot. A role rejig might be in order 

My wife comes into the room. She moves towards the window. She sniffs the air and announces: "I think I smell something. I think it's dry rot."

David Robbins: Am I chasing after my lost youth by gatecrashing the hipster generation? 

My wife is fighting a rear-guard action against middle age, and she has enlisted me in her army.

David Robbins: It's time to tackle the old-fashioned argy-bargy between rival rugby fans 

There were two of them, pints in hand, bedecked in their red Munster jerseys. They were slouching semi-aggressively against one of the concrete pillars at the back of the stadium.

David Robbins: I am turning the ominous age of 50 -- how the hell did that happen? 

By the time you read this, I will have turned 50. I will be the other side of an invisible line, standing beside a sign which reads: "It's all downhill from here."

David Robbins: A golfing holiday can breed a new friendship -- but identity stays deep 

My aunt and uncle's idea of a holiday was to 'motor' somewhere -- they would never merely drive -- and watch a golf tournament.

David Robbins: Might as well jump -- my memories of Blackrock baths (and a diving Heron)... 

'There's 25p," my mother said, handing us our towels wrapped into a neat sausage-roll shape, with our togs inside. "I don't want to see you home until five o'clock."

David Robbins: Once more unto the beach -- cold comfort for those courageous tourists 

There is a certain kind of tourist who comes to Ireland much in the same way that David Attenborough might go into a tropical jungle: that is, in the spirit of scientific inquiry.

David Robbins: Listen up, ladies and gentlemen, I know how you can 'have it all' 

Societies in general -- and men in particular -- have been trying for centuries to work out what exactly it is that women want.

David Robbins: So, what's your perfect holiday: The Algarve or Inishbofin? 

The other night, we had a few friends over for supper. Or was it dinner? Apparently, whether you call your evening meal "dinner" or "supper" is a key indicator of background and class.

David Robbins: The hotels of Venice are grand -- but I'm not quite in their league 

The terrace of the Cipriani Hotel looks over the lagoon towards Venice. The slight distance is important: the hotel is of the city, yet not in it.

David Robbins: Forget Twitter and stare aimlessly out of a window instead -- it's just a thought 

A thought struck me as I was sitting and looking vacantly out of the window of the Dart this week. A small thought. Not a full-blown pensée, mind you, but the germ of an idea that could lead to great things.

David Robbins: My daughter is fit for a pedestal now -- while Dad, well, he's got feet of clay 

My daughter is enrolled in summer camp all this week. Although we are careful not to use the word "camp", and there is little call for the word "summer" either.

David Robbins: My dreams of plain sailing were dashed upon the rocks early in my career 

I realised fairly early on in my sailing career that I was not Volvo Ocean Race material. The prospect of nine months of heroic battle against the elements, followed by a hell of a hooley in Galway was, sadly, beyond my reach.

David Robbins: The man-made allure of the state Mickey built and Brazilians bought 

Outside, it was just another perfect day in Florida. About 80 degrees. Thunderstorm regular as clockwork at 4pm. People walking around, window-shopping, complaining about the heat.

David Robbins: Dr Johnson might not agree, but I relished that warm glow of patriotism 

The President was due any minute now. Outside, the town band was waiting. A couple of gardai were on standby. A lone piper stood on a traffic island. The town square in Listowel was bathed in late evening sunshine. "We're poxed with the weather," someone said.

David Robbins: What have Harold Robbins, Queen Elizabeth and my wife got in common? 

My family tree is more like a shrub. Or perhaps like one of those heavily pollarded specimens you see around French town squares, with foreshortened branches and knobbly trunks.

David Robbins: I got a real raw deal when I couldn't resist tasting the fat of the land 

It was at the top of the fridge, unobtrusive in unmarked Kilner jars. It was the dairy equivalent of the top-shelf magazine -- illicit and reputedly a risk to one's physical and moral well-being. It was raw milk.

David Robbins: Everything you wanted to know about hyphens but were afraid to ask 

I have just come up with a great idea for an academic thesis -- or perhaps even a book. Ready? Well, the title I have in mind is The Role of the Hyphen in Irish History. Catchy, eh?

David Robbins: We found ourselves lost in tragedy, but will we survive the Titanic class divide? 

My replica Titanic ticket informed me that I was John James Lamb. I decided to call myself "J J" for short.

David Robbins: Please form an orderly, British queue... or else! 

Queues are the crucible of human behaviour. If you can remain civilised in a queue, then you have reached a certain level of calm and wisdom. Queues have a way of testing our belief in our fellow man.

David Robbins: I'm not going to be anyone's whipping boy when it comes to writing about sex 

Despite frequent advice, inducements and even threats, I have managed to keep this column largely free of sex. It's true that there was that one mention of a swingers' scene at a local park, but that was for dogs.

David Robbins: I may have been a little Green - but I developed a soft spot for FF 

By now, the initial shock of the Mahon Tribunal's report will have diminished. More than a week later, deeper responses will be resonating in people's minds.

David Robbins: Strange how you can find happiness even in the most prickly of predicaments 

Spring is the deadliest season. Encouraged by warmer weather and longer evenings, people undertake all sorts of strenuous activities. The result is injury, embarrassment or, at the very least, a nasty chill.

David Robbins: Identity parade -- why I'm having the full Irish for St Patrick's Day 

If past St Patrick's Days are anything to go by, I am now sitting in my kitchen in a sea of green. I am wearing a plastic shamrock which my daughter has pinned to my chest. She is often a little over-eager, but the bleeding usually stops soon enough.

David Robbins: The sporting life -- it ain't as simple as coaches would have you believe 

You often hear professional coaches or analysts propound that their chosen sport "is a simple game". And, at one level, they're right: success is usually as simple as scoring more points than your opponent.

David Robbins: For years I was a hard-nosed hack. Then I became a dad -- and it all changed. 

Journalists have a hard-won reputation for cynicism. Things that make ordinary civilians go "ahhhh" usually make journalists go "yuk".

David Robbins: E-books may be the future, but you simply can't put a price on memories 

My brother was a keen student of psychology, even from an early age. He knew, for instance, that our father would never sign the book club order form for the complete works of Charles Dickens bound in red leather and embossed with gold lettering.

David Robbins: Dev was short for 'Devil' to Da - even when the Long Fellow became our neighbour 

The last of the de Valera line died and was buried this week. Like her father, Emer Í Cuív was blessed with long life. She lived to 93; he died just short of his 93rd birthday.

David Robbins: Though I work in the shadow of the valley of the trolls, I will fear no angry emails 

There is a certain advantage to writing a small and seldom-read column tucked away in the corner of an inside page of a supplement which is in turn tucked inside the main paper.

Death of a dream in leafy D4 

For over a century, it has been the most sought-after address in Dublin. Now, Ballsbridge in Dublin 4 faces an uncertain future.

David Robbins: Down memory lane with stay-at-home Harry's old suitcase 

The suitcase was old. The springs and latches of the locks at either corner didn't work. Here and there, the leather had scuffed. The letters H O'H were stamped into the surface near the handle. H O'H. Harry O'Hare.