Maurice’s mother here again. My little boy in Lisnapookybawna is making very slow progress, he had three funerals last week and they played hell with his study, he lost at least four days. As a councillor, if one wants to hold on to one’s seat you have to attend funerals, if you don’t, you’ll be reminded the next time you go looking for votes. Maurice’s three funerals and all this talk about Brexit, reminds me of the lead-up to our joining the EEC in 1973. There were meetings up and down the country about what would and wouldn’t be acceptable when we joined ‘Europe.’ I remember my late husband coming back from a meeting in Clonmel and declaring that this EEC would be the death of rural Ireland.

“A fella in a long coat, greased back hair and rimless glasses stood up and told us the first thing that will have to stop are the long rural funerals,” he said. “The man told us that with all the grants comin’ from Europe farmers will be like civil servants, clockin’ in and clockin’ out. There certainly will be no such thing as disappearin’ for two days to bury a neighbour or a distant relation.”

I remember the shock and horror at that notion, but I also thought it had merit. Country funerals can be a disaster, with fellas losing two days’ work and small fortunes on the consolation that can only be found at the bottom of a pint glass.

Nowadays the drink-driving laws and the breathalyser have put an end to much of that carry-on, but it has made little difference to my resident councillor as he doesn’t drive. When he goes to a funeral, there is nothing to stop him swallowing the price of a small farm. Even the prospect of facing me with a sour face and a sweeping brush isn’t enough to quell his thirst and limit his intake.

Whatever about Brexit, I hope we don’t follow the Brits. I don’t care if the EU wants to straighten our bananas, make our eggs round, our apples blue or our spuds oblong, left to our own devices we are likely to do anything. It’s more regulation we need, not less.

I think Maurice’s grandfather, auld Maurice, had it right. He was as cantankerous a man as ever pulled up a trousers, but he often spoke the truth. He regarded himself as a sociologist and historian, who gained his qualifications, as he said himself, “in the university of the common man, better than Harvard, Yale, Oxford or Cambridge any day”.

He regarded the Celt as ungovernable. “We were hunted out of everywhere,” he would say. “They hunted us out of the Caucuses, up through Europe, but when we hit the Cliffs of Moher they couldn’t hunt us any farther, so they left us here.”

Well we have had the EU and its regulations for nearly 45 years now, and there is still a lot of discussion about it. For instance, these farmers’ markets have blossomed despite all the regulation, but not everyone is happy with them. There is one held in Glengooley every Friday morning and people come from all over the place to sell and buy. Myself, Lily Mac, Nell Regan and Madge McInerney took a trip to the market last Friday and had a great day.

I bought a dozen lovely free-range eggs and some fresh vegetables, while Lily Mac bought boxty, potato cakes and goat’s cheese. Madge McInerney splashed out on a lovely wicker basket.

Nell Regan didn’t as much as open her purse. “Did you see those eggs,” says she, “hens droppings all over them. I wouldn’t touch them. And the carrots with lumps of earth stuck to them, and as for that goat’s cheese, it smells to high heaven, it’s like having a dirty auld puck following you around. Disgusting. I though the EU had regulations about that sort of thing.”

“The EU has regulations about lots of things,” says Madge “but they can’t stop hens from producin’ droppin’s, they can’t insist that carrots shouldn’t grow in the earth and surely you’d expect goat’s cheese to smell of goat – if it smelt of anything else you’d be worried.”

“Oh for God’s sake,” says Nell, “this back-to-nature lark will have us all driven mad. If we want things to be natural why do we bother cutting the grass or trimming the hedges? Indeed, why do we bother showering or bathing, why don’t we go around smelling like old goats? In fact, if we really want to go back to nature, why do we wear clothes? Shouldn’t we go around naked and to hell with all rules and regulations from the EU, the Church, from everyone?”

“Now you’re talking, Nell,” says Madge, “maybe this auld Brexit thing isn’t as bad as they say. It could be fun.” CL