These spells seldom last longer than two or three days, but when they hit they hit like tonne of bricks. Like coconuts raining down out of trees. Did you know more people get killed by falling coconuts each year than sharks? Makes sense – sharks never fall out of trees.

The life-coach-cum-shrink in the family tells me these periods are to be relished, harnessed, made to work. Harness my bollix! I don’t have time – I’m solving equations in my head; I’m writing reams of code; I’m predicting the outcome of seemingly unconnected actions; I’m suddenly understanding concepts I could never get to grips with; I’m developing new methods of doing things. There isn’t time to record all this in any form other than unintelligible scrawls on the nearest thing to hand.

By the time these spells have passed and the brain slips down the gears into the crawler box the nearest things to hand are the furthest. Probably buried under a pile at the recycling centre. Jumping to the next idea I lose interest in the last.

Some I remember or took a proper note of. There are always so many I never know which to follow up with first and more often than not the overwhelming choice leads to confusion and none at all being tackled.

The last day or two my neurons have been in full flight. Chattering away incessantly among themselves like auld wans in a doctor’s waiting room. I’m dropping down off the bell-curve now and, for a change, I seem to have most of my ideas jotted down. That’s one advantage of a full milk carton. But, as usual, I don’t know where to start. Some have the potential to become stunningly insightful posts. Some aren’t be worth posting about never mind reading. Others are none of your business. Sorry, but it’s true.

So bear with me the next few days and we’ll see whether I have this “harness-relish-made to work” nonsense cracked.

I know his son-in-law since we were infants. In Infants. Baby Infants. I know his wife almost as long.

The Irish grapevine might get messages mangled more often than not, but if the message is important it spreads fast and clear. In matters of death, the Irish grapevine is 2.0.

As soon as I heard I picked up the phone. “Just heard the news. How’s herself holding up?”

Very shook. But she’s keeping busy. Things to organise. Ya know yerself.

“Was it quick in the end? Eh, I mean easy, painless”.

Well, he knew he was going. Just hours. He called us all together in the night. Family, friends, neighbours, the whole lot. Told the gang to look after their mother. My lads to look after their granny. Told us all he loved us and to look after each other.

“That must have been rough”.

It was. Yeah. Banshees all ’round.

Then the mother-in-law goes and puts a relic in his hands. “Here now, Patsy. Padre Pio is here with ya now. He’s going to take care of everything. You’re going to be right as rain again in no time with Padre Pio looking after ya”.

“Well”, says himself, “he’d want to get the fecking finger out then, wouldn’t he”.

I’ve been up in a parachute. Down in the dumps. On time. Off topic.

I’ve driven trucks. In driven snow. Drove a bargain. Worked a digger. Built holes. Mixed cement. Muddied waters.

A freelance marketeer: Your ad – on my arse. A freelance gynaecologist: Dr. Sneeze – at your cervix.

Fixed the wiring. Boiled it down to the kettle. Studied the past. Passed my studies. Tended a flock. Attended a ball. Balled an attendant.

Drank a toast. Ate some raw. Called it bread. Been on telly. Binned the telly.

Pulled pints. Pulled stunts. Been pulled up. Called out. Carried on.

Cut corn. Shoed a cob. Shooed hens. Chickened out. Been arrested, but released. Wasn’t charged. Have no record. Was charged twice for a record.

Made a break. Made a mug. Got mugged in Marseilles. Legless in Łódź. Walked on the tracks. Slept by a signal so I wouldn’t get lost.

Thrown off a horse. Onto my feet. Kicked by a cow. Kicked her back. Went in off the black. Ended up in the red.

Travelled by cardboard – a sign saying Anywhere and Home on the back. Hijacked a Tannoy and got barred from a field-day. Stayed camped on a pitch right through a game. Got barred from a town. Got barred from the bed and pitched the tent in her kitchen. Can’t go back to Kanturk.

Fell through dance floor one New Year’s Eve. Ambulance came. Told them to leave. Wore a suit into Maggie’s. Dogs’ abuse from the bikers but no broken bones.

Drove under the barrier into the yard. Unloaded the van and couldn’t get out. Sold coal to the Arabs. Sand to Newcastle. Bought shares in a nag, now called Pedigree Chum.

So … how much of the above do you believe to be true?