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Billy Keane Opinion Even a dash to the Croke Park toilet wasn’t enough to get rid of space invader who gave me Covid

I did the time, but there was no crime. Banged up I was, under house arrest after two red bars showed up on the Covid test. I’m not too bad, thanks for asking. I have it down on a man who was nearly close enough to kiss me at the All-Ireland football final between Kerry and Galway.

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Billy Keane Opinion Deadly enemies are best pals and men are falling in love with their wives – all is well in the Kingdom of Kerry

The All-Ireland is won and July is barely done. All is well in the Kingdom. One wag paraphrased Marty Morrissey when he said: “There won’t be a child washed or a tourist milked this week in Kerry.”

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Billy Keane Opinion Don’t mind the muggy weather, it’s always sunny side up when it comes to All-Ireland weekend

There used to be an advert on TV for Harp lager, and it had this parched man sweating in some desert place where water was dearer than diesel. The ad would be banned today for giving people mind for drink. The strange thing was, I only ever got mind for fried eggs after watching it.

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Billy Keane Opinion Don’t be giving in to giving out – there’s always a solution, so keep on trying, no matter what

Sean O’Shea, or Seanie Shea, as he is known in Kerry, kicked the winning point against Dublin last Sunday from 53 metres out. The breeze was in his face and was strong enough to stiffen limp flags.

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Billy Keane Opinion Farewell, Garry – our births may have been separated by decades, but our friendship will last for ever

It was back in the days before the motorways when the only by-passes completed in Ireland were constructed by cardiologists and the country’s two-lane autobahn went only as far as Naas, fully 20km from Dublin.

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Billy Keane Opinion Yes, some hotels are guilty of overcharging – but they’ve brought us under the one roof and into the same bed

The days when the travelling GAA fans stayed with the neighbours and relations are back. There are more mattresses on floors than in the time of the Troubles. Tall men’s long legs hang off the end of sofas. Camp beds have been requisitioned from army surplus stores.

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Billy Keane Opinion Years as a barman taught me not to engage with someone who has a story too long to go into

The walled garden was in full bloom. It was the sort of a place where you would expect to find ‘Adam loves Eve’ carved into a tree. The man and his mother sat sipping apple juice in the gardens of Tintern Abbey in Co Wexford.

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Billy Keane Opinion Anxiety of an expectant grandad is hard to take. I’d the morning sickness without any drink

These are the weeks in June when the summer suddenly bursts out all over. The hedgerows on the roads barely travelled are a resurrection of wildflowers, in these the best days of their short but glorious lives.

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Billy Keane Opinion How Google Maps sent the art of conversation in new direction on our information highways

Hardly anyone stops to ask for directions anymore. It’s all sat-nav now or Google Maps. Connections are impersonal. The days of the extrovert are numbered. Long live the talkers.

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Billy Keane Opinion If Trump gets back in, there’s no chance he’ll nuke us – not when he owns a five-star hotel here

The Man Who Knows Everything (TMWKE) was certain he was right. “Ye’re after causing terrible trouble in the world,” he said, “what with pandemics, wars and the boiling of the bacon separate to the cabbage.”

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Billy Keane Opinion Man-eating tigers, cheetahs and polar bears have nothing on the gouger gander from Ballyfinboy

The Serengeti is home to voracious lions and cheetahs. What’s left of the Arctic is populated by ferocious polar bears. Indian tigers are man-eaters and the Amazon is full of nasty piranha. We too have our predators in rural Ireland.

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Billy Keane on the legacy of John B Keane: ‘Even though Dad didn’t last the test of time, his work did’

Dad — or John B Keane, as he is known to you all — moved on 20 years ago, on May 30, 2002 to be exact.

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Billy Keane Opinion One day you’re brandishing a pike on Vinegar Hill, the next you’re cheering on the English

The singing of God Save the Queen got me going. I was in the GPO in 1916 when Dublin was rubble, and up on Vinegar Hill in 1798 with a pike in my hand.

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Billy Keane Opinion The Alsatian crept under the fence. I raced for the car for fear of a terrible mutilation

This story of the near mutilation of me begins and ends at the Listowel Horse Fair. I took a wander through the horses. The big man holding the small horse said there were far too many people wearing yellow coats these days, and you wouldn’t know a garda from a man.

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Billy Keane Opinion Vicky Phelan may be tired at times, but she is never, ever weak

Vicky Phelan came home yesterday – she’s Vicky Kelly here in Mooncoin.

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Billy Keane Opinion You’re no one around here if you haven’t caught the Covid – there’s even a virus snobbery

The wan fridge bulb has finally shone through the gap left by the removal of the boxes of prawn skewers, duck rolls and various party platters. It was a Newgrange moment to welcome in 2022.

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Billy Keane Opinion Rejected by his family, abandoned by the State but adopted by an entire community

Jerry Ryan kept our town clean for a good many years. He ran to the shop for the older ladies, gave a hand in the bog, whitewashed, babysat and, if he did take a drink too many, most of us knew why.

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Billy Keane Opinion Vicky McCarthy Keane is my woman of the year – Vicky Phelan, my woman of every year

We all have our own private worries. The writer’s fear of exposure to ridicule and failure is one of the worst of the lot.

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Billy Keane Opinion I was charmed by the telly bigger than a rugby player, but herself might have had other thoughts

The televisions were wonder walls. Some of the big ones cost a couple of grand and a nice bit with it. Televisions are one of the few remnants from the old imperial system of measuring based on feet and inches.

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Billy Keane Opinion Memories of Mam, Dad and their customers strengthen my resolve to keep this old house standing

The alarm from Horan’s excellent health food store has been playing away on a loop. I get to thinking it must be the Omega 3 Thieves or the Cod Liver Oil Gang. A false alarm, it was. No harm done.

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Billy Keane Opinion I can be slow sometimes. I spray aftershave on my hand. There’s no smell. I have a dose of Covid

There was a suggestion the bin was knocked by a huff and puff urban fox, but it was a human that did it – it’s a well-known fact foxes don’t drink gut-tearing cheap cans of lager. You know the type of amber fire, 12 cans for a fiver.

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Billy Keane Opinion What I wouldn’t give for just one more song from my old pal Eric – ‘one dog, one bone’

It was the end for my boyhood friend. He was Harry Potter, Batman, Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn, all in the one man.

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Billy Keane Opinion My centurion godson, Jonathan: fearless, kind and honest, but tough too and very smart

The godson was a pool shark when he was eight. Even then he had the eye. The godson was a plotter and a planner.

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Billy Keane Opinion When even bumpkins are eating pumpkins, you know it’s time for an IPA – or perhaps a pale ale

When someone starts a sentence with “I’m sorry, but”, you know the person isn’t one bit sorry and a desperate giving out is on the way.

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Billy Keane Opinion Brendan was getting us ready for grief, and now we’re grieving the loss of a man who made us smile

Brendan Kennelly didn’t beat Alzheimer’s, but he recited poetry almost to the end. Small victories are the great glories of wars lost before they begin.

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Billy Keane Opinion The carer is a secret saint who has sacrificed a lot to keep people alive, so please get the jab for her sake

The Delphi oracle in me spoke out not long after the chance and tricky encounter with the man in the queue. This is the Delphi in Greece we’re talking about, although many is the wise word that has been spoken by the Mayo Delphi. Here’s the wisdom.

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Billy Keane Opinion The big winner of Budget Bingo is an 80-year-old publican with a baby and another child under eight

I usually pick the brains of some lad sitting on a high stool to help me write the annual column on the Budget, but seeing as we are not allowed to seat customers at the counter, I have to write the story of Budget 2022 all by myself.

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Billy Keane Opinion There isn’t much sex here this week, but it still might be best to move on immediately if you’re not able for it

The Woman Who Hasn’t Had Sex For 39 Years is now The Woman Who Hasn’t Had Sex for 41 Years.

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Billy Keane Opinion For those of us used to kicking old payphones, video chats with the grandkids are a modern marvel

The way we ask people to leave our company seems very polite.

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Billy Keane Opinion The stories I’m told in the pub prove that words are horrid important – and that’s no BS

Today is the last day of the Listowel Races of 2021. Is this the last Covid races?