Row over place on audit committee
THERE was a clash between Fine Gael and Fianna Fail in the council chamber over filling a vacancy on the Wicklow County Council Audit Committee at last Monday’s meeting.
Fianna Fail proposed Cllr Gerry Walsh for the position which became available after former councillor Pat Casey was elected to the Dail.
Cllr Shay Cullen proposed his Fine Gael colleague Cllr Irene Winters.
Cllr Kennedy commented that the procedure normally followed by the council was that any vacancy would be filled by a member from the same party as the outgoing committee member.
However, Cllr Winters responded that she had discussed the matter with a Fianna Fail member who told her no one in the party wanted the position.
Cllr Pat Vance said the vacancy should go to a member of Fianna Fail as was tradition, adding that he wasn’t aware of whom in his party informed Cllr Winters that no one was interested in sitting on the committee.
An incredulous Cllr Winters stated: ‘Some people have a very selective memory. It was you Cllr Vance who told me no one was interested.’ Cllr Vance rejected the accusation. Cathaoirleach Pat Fitzgerald, deferred a decision on who would fill the vacancy until November’s council meeting in order to seek clarification over whether it was permissible for both councillors to sit on the committee. AFTER 46 years on this planet, I have finally come to the conclusion that I hate exercise. All exercise! There are no exceptions. It isn’t because I haven’t found ‘My Thing’, or because I haven’t given it a chance, nope. I’m just allergic.
And believe me I have tried everything, except running. I haven’t tried running because my boobs are too big and I don’t want to give myself a black eye.
Other than that I have tried the whole damn lot and I hated every second of it all.
First there was swimming but I gave that up because I don’t like taking my clothes off and my hair goes frizzy. Then there was yoga, which just made me laugh or fall asleep. I tried Pilates but I couldn’t find my pelvic floor.
Many years ago I gave step aerobics a go but was actually asked to leave because my lack of co-ordination was making everybody else laugh.
I had a brief encounter with boxing which I actually did sort of like but it was too sweaty for me. Then there was kettlebells and to be fair I lasted a whole year at that. But my teacher changed the classes to a Monday morning. I’m bad every morning but on a Monday I’m catatonic so that was never going to work.
Himself tried, God love him, to get me to play tennis. I think he likes the idea of me in a short skirt and head band. But the God’s honest truth is I can’t hit the ball. And when it comes anywhere near me I shriek, or curse, or both. After making a holy show of him a couple of times, he conceded that maybe tennis wasn’t my thing.
If shopping was a sport, I’d be Olympic standard but other than that there doesn’t appear to be any hope for me. Instead I sit around with my friends drinking coffee and lamenting the fact that we’ve put on weight in middle age and how could that possibly be?
‘It has to be hormonal. Seriously,’ says my friend, shovelling a doughnut into her gob. I agree as I demolish a Danish pastry in one foul swoop. We can spend hours talking about how we need to lose weight and what we’re going to do about it. We are like our own little Quango–all talk no action.
The guilt hits on Sunday night after a particularly greasy takeaway has been consumed. I text my friend, M. ‘Fancy doing cardio tennis in the morning?’ I’m not quite sure what cardio tennis entails but it doesn’t sound pleasant. M texts me back. ‘Cardio and tennis in the same sentence? You’ve got to be kidding?’
She’s right, I think as I snuggle under the duvet. Anyway at our age it’s either face or figure. I’ll go for face!