I’m left devastated after my boyfriend collapsed and died suddenly.. please appreciate the time you have with loved ones
Aisling on loss of GAA captain Greg, 30
THE heartbroken girlfriend of a GAA captain who collapsed from Sudden Adult Death Syndrome while training has urged people to appreciate every moment with loved ones.
Aisling Heffernan, 28, and the family of her “soulmate” Greg Hogge want to install a defibrillator in his name at the historic Hill of Tara where many Meath sports clubs go to practice.
The popular electrician, who had just been made captain of his beloved Bective GAA senior team, was out running on May 8, 2019, when he collapsed and died despite the efforts of members of three other clubs who were there.
The 30-year-old from Navan had been chatting to Aisling on his way to the hill and was cut off due to poor reception but when she tried to ring him back, her whole world collapsed when his phone was answered by a paramedic.
She said: “Greg’s club training had been cancelled so he was going for a run at Tara. We were chatting while he was driving there but then we got cut off.
“A while later I texted him and when he didn’t come back to me, I rang and his phone was answered by a paramedic who said he had been taken ill.
“My life changed within minutes. We had been going out for four years and had begun talking about our future and our plans to buy a house.
“I’ll never forget
the shock of finding out he had died. never get over that or forget it.
“Greg was an amazing person, so kind and thankfully we had a relationship that we weren’t afraid to tell each other all the time how much we loved each other.
“Greg would always tell me he was looking forward to seeing me the following day.
“I’m heartbroken to have lost him but so grateful to have had him in my life.
“He was my soulmate and I have no regrets to look back on during my time with him. If he knew how devastated
I’ll
I am and how much I’m grieving, he would be very upset so I try so hard to be strong but it’s not always easy.
“There is a gaping hole left and some days, I get stuck in that hole.
“The sharpness of grief can strike at any time.
“It’s so important to appreciate all the loved ones in your life because you never know what the next minute is going to bring. Little did either of us know when we were chatting that night it would be the last time we talked.”
Greg’s sister Sinead said: “A lot of teams go to the Hill of Tara to train.
“The evening Greg died, there were three different groups and one of them had a defibrillator in the car which they used on Greg to no avail.
“He had literally been running and collapsed in minutes as some other runners could see him in the distance so he wasn’t on his own for long.”
Sinead and her siblings Shane, Ciara, Brian and Stevie as well as her parents Pat and Jean are now looking at ways to put a defibrillator at the Hill of Tara and are embarking on a walk to Croagh Patrick in aid of CRY (Cardiac Risk in the Young).
■ You can donate at www.idonate.ie/fundraiser /11397770_-rememberinggreg. html.
My life changed within minutes. I’ll never get over finding out he had died AISLING HEFFERNAN CO MEATH YESTERDAY
ELON Musk’s latest rocket careers across the sky after exploding in a huge fireball.
The unmanned Spacex Starship – SN10 – met its spectacular end following a “successful” test flight.
It was the third prototype to explode in three months, after SN8 and SN9.
Tesla founder Musk, who hopes the ships will one day carry people and cargo missions to the moon and Mars, said: “RIP SN10, honourable discharge.”
Despite the ending, Wednesday’s test at Boca Chica, Texas, broke new ground with a first upright landing for Spacex. The joy was short-lived as it blew up minutes later, firing
itself skyward again.
FROM the Beverly Hills Cop franchise to the Shrek movies Eddie Murphy is partial to a sequel. But it’s taken the American funnyman 33 years to do a sequel to Coming To America.
And that’s despite the 1988 box office hit – about an African prince pretending to be poor to find love in the States – becoming a cult film with fans shouting “sexual chocolate” out to him, seeing the characters used for Halloween costumes and even a president emulating a mic drop Eddie argues originated in the movie.
The star, who turns 60 next month, said: “At first there wasn’t going to be a sequel. It was just going to be the one movie but then I still kept hearing people quote lines like ‘sexual chocolate’, dress up like the characters for Halloween and do a mic drop even though it had been something like 30 years since the movie came out. I was aware that Coming To America is on TV all the time and people were still loving it. It has become like a cult movie.
“That’s really why the idea of finally doing a sequel after 33 years came about.
“It was something I really wanted to do as both producer and performer but it took a while.
“We wanted to make sure we got it right because we really didn’t want to f*** it up!”
Coming To America was the final film of Eddie’s great 80s run. It had started in 1982 with 48 Hrs and included Trading Places and two Beverly Hills Cop movies.
Eddie played Prince Akeem Joffer who, along with best friend and aide Semmi, played by Arsenio Hall, travelled to New York to find a girl who would love him for himself and not for his wealth and status. The pair rent a rundown flat pretending to be foreign students and get jobs in a Mcdonald’s rip-off fast food restaurant Mcdowell’s. Akeem then finds love with the owner’s daughter Lisa, played by Shari Headley.
While the film is a love story, it’s best remembered for its banter and Eddie and Arsenio playing multiple characters. As well as the prince, Eddie plays barber shop owner Clarence, Jewish customer Saul and Randy Watson, singer with Sexual Chocolate, who in one iconic scene drops his mic at the end of a performance.
Most famously President Obama dropped his mic at a goodbye dinner before he left office.
And Eddie insisted he began the trend in Coming To America.
He said: “I don’t know what anyone is debating about, ‘cause I heard somebody say – somebody was like, ‘Oh, it started with the rappers.’
“The very first mic drop ever, ever, where it’s like, ‘What I said was so fly, there’s nothing left to say, and I’m dropping the mic, that’s Randy Watson.”
Eddie, who has 10 children by five women including Spice Girl Mel B, claims the idea for Coming To America happened after his heart was broken.
He said: “It was back when I was young and in the early days of being successful.
“I was on a tour bus and I had just broken up with my girlfriend at the time so I was feeling sorry for myself. I got
into a conversation about how cool it would be to find a girl who loved me for just being me and not because I was famous. That conversation turned into the origin of what became of The Quest which then eventually became Coming To America.”
For Coming 2 America, Eddie’s Akeem is set to become King of Zamunda when he finds out he has a previously-unknown son, played by Jermaine Fowler, living in Queens. Honouring the dying wish of his father ( James Earl Jones) Akeem returns to America with Semmi to become acquainted with his son Lavelle. Another
new character is General Izzi played by Wesley Snipes. Izzi is the brother of Imani Izzi who had been due to marry Akeem in the first movie before he went to America. So Izzi doesn’t much like the man who jilted his sister.
The new movie also stars Eddie’s seventh child, Bella Zahra Murphy, as one of Akeem’s daughters.
Eddie admitted: “Bella, my 19-year-old actress daughter, plays my warrior princess daughters in the movie which was amazing. I can’t even put into words how proud I am of her.
“She auditioned, ran lines and got the part herself so there was no element of her not doing it for herself. She did an incredible job.” For Eddie it wasn’t difficult to return to the character of
Prince Akeem after 30 years but he did struggle with the make-up needed to play multiple characters, particularly in the barbershop scenes.
He said: “The hardest thing was having to be in makeup for six hours at a time. That was tough.
“If we had an actor for each character for something like the barber shop scenes, they would probably take a day to shoot.
“It took us a week because you can only play one character per day because of all that makeup.”
Rather than cinemas, which have been closed around the world because of the pandemic, the new film will be streamed on Amazon Prime.
It’s the latest in a remarkable career which includes voicing Donkey in the Shrek films, playing soul singer James “Thunder” Early in Dreamgirls and playing multiple characters again in two Nutty Professor films. But he insisted you won’t see the real Eddie Murphy on screen in any of his characters.
He said: “I feel like the real me is totally separate to the person you see on screen. I don’t think I’ve ever really been just myself on screen.”
For fans of Beverly Hills Cop – it looks like a fourth instalment will happen after the Covid pandemic.
The third film was released in 1994 and like Coming 2 America, Eddie admitted he’d been talking about another crack at Axel Foley, the wisecracking cop.
He said: “We’re closer than we have ever been to getting it done. I feel really good about it, but we’ll have to see what happens after the pandemic. We’ll see.”
Speaking of the pandemic, it seems Eddie has been enjoying family time with his fiancée Paige Butcher, who he’s been dating since 2012 and their two children.
He said: “Like everyone else, I have been home with the family just staying safe and recharging my batteries. I feel lucky to be in a good spot.”
Coming 2 America is streaming today on Amazon
Prime Video.
of Charles and Diana, the birth of princes William and Harry and the marriage of Prince Andrew and Sarah Ferguson, that the Queen hit upon the toughest time of her reign.
In the Queen’s “annus horribilis” in 1992, Prince Andrew separated, Princess Anne divorced, Andrew Morton’s book on Diana was published, a fire gutted Windsor Castle and the Prince and Princess of Wales announced their split.
The Queen had expected Diana to fit into the Royal Family because she was born into privilege.
Royal expert Ingrid Seward wrote: “The Queen believed her future daughter-in-law knew what was expected of her.” When Diana gave
SAYS
the BBC interview to Martin Bashir in 1995, when she revealed there were “three of us” in her marriage, the Queen knew she had to act.
Watched by 22.8 million viewers, Diana described the prince’s camp as the “enemy” and said that the monarchy was in desperate need of modernisation.
A letter handwritten by the Queen arrived weeks later.
Delivered in person by a royal messenger, it left Diana in no doubt about the Queen’s annoyance.
“I have consulted with the Archbishop of Canterbury and with the Prime Minister and, of course, with Charles, and we have decided that the best course for you is divorce,” the Queen wrote. That was it – Diana was out.
It was the death of Diana in August 1997 that rocked the Royal Family more than any event since the abdication – and for once the Queen got it wrong. So, Clive believes, it is important she gets it right with Diana’s son and Meghan.
The “men in grey suits” seem to be doing their worst with allegations of bullying flying from the palace.
He says: “She fully and clearly understands that whatever the mess underneath her, the monarch had to be above it. You see this right now, with this enormous mess going on, that you won’t find the Queen’s fingerprints on anything. She must be very preoccupied with Philip’s condition, he’s very important in her life and one wonders if she’ll want to go on being Queen after he dies.
“It’s going to seem like another episode in this great royal soap opera that she’s going to want to stay out of. She is above all that, she’s safely in her bubble. However this unfolds, no one is going to blame the Queen.
“I suspect that is how she wants it. If the monarch is untouched, the monarchy will survive.”
■ The Last Queen: How Queen Elizabeth II Saved the Monarchy, by Clive Irving, is published by Biteback.
The Queen believed Diana knew what was expected of her
INGRID SEWARD ON THE HOPES AROUND PRINCESS