Ask Audrey: 'A friend with benefits asked me to dress up as Barbie for the cinema in Mallow'

I said, ‘I was worried about ye Budgie, all we have on the news here is record-breaking temperatures and photographs of good-looking old dolls dipping their heads into the Trevi fountain.’ 

He told me that’s all Green Party propaganda, you just need to stay indoors between 4 am and 11 pm and you’ll be grand, it do be bearable outside of that. 

I didn’t want to ask him what he got up to all day, indoors with my old doll, because I do have a jealous streak in me.

But the Irish summer is a flop altogether this year, it would barely melt a Loop the Loop down over your hand. 

Now, I’m due to go away for a dirty weekend with Budgie’s old doll (again, very complicated) and we’re torn between Killarney and somewhere a bit warmer. 

My two main interests are pizza and organised crime, so I was thinking we’d go to Sicily. Do you know any good Irish bars there?

- Dowcha Donie, Blackpool

I had three nights of non-stop sex with a guy from Palermo once, I get funny even thinking about it. What was your question again?

It’s getting fun on our WhatsApp group, Douglas Road Stunners Wondering What We’ll Buy with The Money We Saved on Our TV License. 

Fifi said she was going to treat herself to a cocktail in Fake Everything, the must-visit new cocktail place for Douglas Road Stunners. 

Ellie Mac was straight back in saying you’d barely afford a second one in there for your €160 and we all posted clips of ourselves laughing our arses off, because it’s true but we don’t care because €160 like, come on. 

Things took a dark turn then though. Lori said it’s no laughing matter bee-atches, you have to have a license, it’s the law. 

Otherwise, you’ll have some nobody with a clipboard knocking on your door and lording it over you for non-payment, even though they don’t have a degree, I’m kind of shuddering here just writing it. 

Pinky agreed with her and said this is a shortcut to lawlessness and we’d be no better than northsiders or culchies, dodging our obligations. 

We must have been in a charitable mood because no one mentioned that her Ken has been dodging his tax obligations for years from his place in Dubai, but she might just have a point. 

So Audrey, are we just common criminals if we don’t get a TV license?

- Jenni, Douglas Road

My friend is a barrister, I don’t talk to him that much because he bills by the second. I said, is license dodging a crime? He said, how are they all at home? I said, stop trying to get 300 quid out of me for a bit of small talk!

Hello dear. I’m a 76-year-old woman but you wouldn’t know it by looking at me, I can still turn a few balding heads in the tennis club, but that’s as far as it goes unfortunately. 

Now, I have a granddaughter, she’s a lovely thing, 11 this year, but hasn’t the bitch taken a turn against me because I told her mother that I caught her cursing. (The c-word actually, and I don’t mean Carrigaline.)

Anyway, my heart is broken as you can imagine, so I’m going to do what any grandmother would do, and buy back her affection. 

She’s foolish for this pop one, Taylor Swift, who is playing in Dublin next year, so I bought a VIP ticket, nearly €800 mind you, but I can afford it. 

I told Henry at bridge last night and didn’t he offer me 3 grand for the ticket, he wants to win over his new step-daughter, she has taken to calling him Shit Daddy, it’s very funny really. 

Do you think I should push on and ask for five grand maybe?

- Poppy, Blackrock Road

Don’t. You’ll end up with a reputation for gouging and you’ll never Shake it Off. Geddit? Probably not.

Hello, it’s Rosealeen here in Ballydesmond. 

I’ve had some strange requests from bachelor farmers in my time — half of them just want you to make sandwiches during the harvest — but this week broke new ground. 

A friend with benefits inside in Kanturk asked me to dress up as Barbie for a trip into the cinema in Mallow. 

He says he has a big surprise in store for me if I do it, which is intriguing alright. 

So two questions. Should I do it, and where would I get a Barbie outfit?

- Rosealeen, Ballydesmond

I have a Barbie outfit here if you want it, size small, not sure if that will fit because I know ye can be big-boned up in north Cork. As for the other question, I have a simple rule in life. Never go to Mallow. So it’s a no there, but maybe check the cinemas in Cork City, where people won’t even recognise you!