Latest news with #grumpy
Irish Times
13-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Irish Times
‘Over the years, I've lost a little sense of my calmness. I wish I were a little bit more patient or cool-headed'
How agreeable are you? I'm someone who always tends to go with the flow, so I'd describe myself as agreeable. Maybe other people wouldn't. They'd perhaps see me as a bit grumpy, but part of it is that as you get older, you tend to know what you want and don't want, and so you're more vocal about it. What's your middle name and what do you think of it? My middle name is John, named after my dad. It's not too complicated a name that you need to talk about or explain where it comes from. Other than seeing it on my passport now and again, it's very quickly forgotten about. Where is your favourite place in Ireland? I'm from Adare in Co Limerick , so that always holds a special place in my heart. I don't get to go down there too often nowadays, but when I do, I remember how lucky I was to have grown up there. It's a beautiful village. Another place is Valentia Island, where you feel like you're on the edge of the world. Describe yourself in three words. Calm, generous, reserved. READ MORE When did you last get angry? I don't tend to get angry all that often. In my personal life, you could say I get angry about sports when there's a bad result for your team, but it's actually more disappointment, and that fades. What have you lost that you would like to have back? My initial reaction is to say, what have I lost, literally, that I would want to get back. But then I think about the broader side of it, like losing energy or losing patience. I feel that over the years, I've lost a little sense of my calmness, and I wish I were a little bit more patient or cool-headed [like] I was maybe even five or 10 years ago. What's your strongest childhood memory? I have a very strong visual image of me being in Montessori class; I was one of the Wise Men for a Nativity play. Other strong memories are when we would go on family holidays. My mother is from Wales, so we would go there quite a lot. I remember the excitement of waking up at four o'clock in the morning, packing up the car. It used to take about four-and-a-half hours driving through every town and village on the way to get to the ferry, but they're memories I always remember. Where do you come in your family's birth order, and has this defined you? I'm the youngest of four. Growing up, I learned quickly what to do and what not to do. I definitely observed situations, and calmly measured the approaches, I suppose, and then decided how to participate. That has definitely defined me, but in a positive way, I would say. What do you expect to happen when you die? There was one quote I stumbled across a couple of years ago. I'm not sure who it was, but the quote was that what happens when they die is that the ones who love us will miss us. There's no expectation from me as to what happens, but I hope that whoever loves me will miss me. I think that's a sign of a life lived well. When were you happiest? In general terms, I'm very happy now. I have a dream job and a healthy family. The days of unbounded joy include my wedding and the birth of my three kids. Another happiest day was when Limerick won the All-Ireland in 2018. Like marriage and kids, it was a release of emotion. Like, Jesus, this is something special. [ Limerick 3-16 Galway 2-18: Five match defining moments Opens in new window ] Which actor would play you in a biopic about your life? I'd always look at Dominic West, from The Wire – he had a fairly good Baltimore accent in that. He lives in Glin in Co Limerick, so he might get the accent right. [ Dominic West on his natural swimming pool: 'When I'm in the mood I do a spot of underwater gardening' Opens in new window ] What's your biggest career/personal regret? I'm lucky not to have too many regrets. Business-wise and career-wise, I seem to have struck gold every time I've moved to a different job or company. One of the things that sticks with me, however, is that I never did an executive MBA. I meant to do it in my mid-to-late 20s, when I had the time. Now I don't have the time, but I will get to it some day. Have you any psychological quirks? I can't sit in a room and relax or work if it's messy. It could be chaos outside of the office, but in that particular room, if I have to work or sit and watch something or just chill out, I have to do a quick tidy up. The distraction of having something messy doesn't sit right with me. In conversation with Tony Clayton-Lea
Daily Mail
04-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Daily Mail
Lingo contestants miss out on ITV jackpot after word riddle leaves them scratching their heads - but would YOU have sailed to victory?
A pair of Lingo contestants competing to scoop the jackpot prize were left gutted after narrowly missing out with just seconds on the clock. The fan-favourite ITV quiz show, presented by Good Morning Britain host Adil Ray, continued this week with all new episodes. Fans watched as one couple tried their hardest to bag themselves the cash prize that was on offer, a cool £7,240. Lingo, which was rebooted in 2021, sees hopefuls solve mystery words, with the team in control given the first letter in a bid to correctly crack the riddle. For one couple, they were given the letter 'G' to work with, and tasked with guessing what the six letter word was. They had just 11 seconds on the clock and only five attempts as Adil, 51, willed them on. Fans watched as they guessed the word 'grates' which was wrong, though confirmed to them the second letter was an 'R'. They then guessed 'ground' which also wasn't correct, but the failed attempt revealed there was a 'U' in the word. On a roll, they then blurred out the word 'grunts' as their third guess, but they ran out of time and the game came to an abrupt end. Visibly defeated, Adil then told the pair the correct word was in fact 'grumpy'. Unfortunately, it meant they were then sent home, empty-handed, losing the £7,240 prize they had accumulated. Lingo originally ran for one series all the way back in 1998 on ITV, with magician Martin Daniels as host. The hit game show also had a short-lived celebrity series on the network, which was fronted by Drag Race host RuPaul. It ran for just one series before being axed by bosses, as an ITV spokesperson confirmed to MailOnline in 2023 there were no plans to commission a further instalment. Fans watched as they guessed the word 'grates' which was wrong, though confirmed to them the second letter was an 'R' Meanwhile, episodes of Lingo as well as other ITV game shows have a brand new home on their new channel fittingly called ITV Quiz. The digital station, which launched last month, replaced reality-focused channel ITVBe which closed down after more than a decade. Shows such as Who Wants To Be A Millionaire, Tipping Point, The Chase and Deal Or No Deal are broadcast back-to-back. However, so far it's received a mixed reception from divided viewers as they took to social media to comment. On X, one penned: '#itvquiz is dire, it needs retro itv game shows not just modern, challenge tv.' Another wrote: 'Too much same schedule episodes of same shows together too often, need more variety !! @ITV #itvQuiz Aussie version of #TheChase be good addition.' While someone else suggested different shows should be added and said: 'It's pretty decent so far. Hopefully some classic gameshows could be shown in the future. 'This would help make it more competitive with Challenge. And maybe show The Chase in the future too. But, having The Chase on ITV1 on weekdays also works well.'
Irish Times
14-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Irish Times
Prof Ian Robertson: ‘My father was more like a brother, and my brother was more like a father'
How agreeable are you? I'm probably excessively agreeable, but I'm also capable of being grumpy and bad tempered. If I'm involved in some project or some thinking, I find it hard to disengage from it. If I have to disengage from it, then my mind can be elsewhere, and it's when my mind is elsewhere that I could be grumpy. What is your middle name and what do you think of it? My middle name is Hamilton, and that's my mother's maiden name. I was brought up in Scotland, and it's a common tradition, a nice tradition, to take your mother's maiden name as your middle name. I like it. It reminds me of my mother, of course – Annie Hamilton, someone who was very, very intelligent, but who had to leave school at 14. All her life, she longed to be a nurse but never had formal training. To her great satisfaction, much later in her life, she ended up working as an auxiliary nurse and a care assistant. She adored that. Where is your favourite place in Ireland? My favourite place in Ireland has to be where I live, which is Dalkey. We've been here for 26 years, and I have to pinch myself every single day that I live somewhere so amazing, so beautiful, a proper community. And it is a mixed community as well. It's not all rich people. Describe yourself in three words. Driven. Dalkey. Likes-to-be-liked. READ MORE When did you last get angry? The thing that makes me most angry these days is what's happening in Gaza and Ukraine. I get angry with brutal men doing brutal things in the world. And that's real anger, not irritation, a profound anger at the ruthlessness of powerful men who lose track of all humanity. [ At the heart of Netanyahu's delusion is the belief that his interests are the same as Israel's Opens in new window ] What have you lost that you would like to have back? It sounds so pathetic in a way, and it's not smug, but the older I've got, I've been fortunate enough to remember only the gains and not the losses. There are things I don't do now that I could before. In my 60s, I ran a few half marathons, but then I had to get a new hip. I can still run, but not fast. That's not a loss, though – maybe it's relief. What is your strongest childhood memory? I may have been as young as three or four, and I'm on a bus with my parents to visit my brother and his friend, who were camping on the outskirts of Glasgow. I have this vivid feeling of a glorious summery evening, building a dam on a little stream with my brother. It was just sheer joy. Where do you come in your family's birth order, and has this defined you? I'm the second of two boys, but my brother is 10 years older than me. As we got older we became brothers, but during my childhood he was more like a dad, a kind of father figure. My father wasn't a hugely confident man but he was very affectionate, and I was very close to him as well, yet paradoxically he was more like a brother. It's funny, but right until this moment, it never occurred to me that my father was more like a brother and my brother was more like a father. What do you expect to happen when you die? The atoms in my body will spread across the cosmos from whence they came. I expect to have no consciousness or specific immortality, but I do have confidence in a continuation in chemical and informational form, beautifully scattered across the universe. When were you happiest? Now. I've never been more blessed and happier than I am at this time in my life. Which actor would play you in a biopic about your life? Oh, God, I'm terrible at actors. I'm trying to think … What about Brian Cox, who played Logan Roy in Succession? [ Want to understand what money does to your brain? Look at this photo Opens in new window ] What is your biggest career/personal regret? I didn't do my PhD until my late-30s, and that had positives as well as negatives, but career-wise, I wish I'd done it earlier in my life. Regret, however, is a useless emotion, and it becomes more useless the older you get. I'm just so lucky to have been married for over 40 years. If I hadn't met Fiona, I'm sure I'd have a lot more regrets to tell you about. I'm a lucky, lucky man. Have you any psychological quirks? The psychological quirk I would admit to having is that before arriving in Ireland, I had a strange affinity for it in my mind. I don't know where that came from. Normally, people come to Ireland, get to love the place and want to stay, but I had this strange attachment to the place before I ever came here, before I ever met anyone Irish. In conversation with Tony Clayton-Lea Ian Robertson will be at Dalkey Book Festival with Mark Little on Sunday
