Web women, and a Westlife weightlifter
Nicky Byrne is acclimatising to domestic life after Westlife, and accompanied his wife Georgina Ahern to the launch of the website her.iein Pink nightclub on Thursday evening. “We’re into the second week now since it all ended. It’s nice to be at home and I’m doing a lot of training.”
Byrne said that although he played professional soccer for Leeds United for a while, he’s not training in the beautiful game at the moment. “I’m boxing training and weightlifting.” He’s also cleaning. “I cleaned out the garage today, which I wanted to do for a long time. It’s nice to be around the house and to take the kids to summer camp.”
Ahern is one of the weekly contributors to the new website. “It’s all very light-hearted. It’s not rocket science and is all common sense,” she said. The Byrnes are heading to Portugal this weekend and are due to holiday at Parknasilla in August.
One of the main men behind her.ieis former Ireland and Munster hooker, Jerry Flannery. Two years ago Niall McGarry went to Flannery with the idea of launching a men’s sports and lifestyle website, joe.ie. Flannery said that he was drawn to it because they both spent a lot of time online. Now they’re trying joe.iefor the female market.
“Obviously, because we’re lads, it’s very hard to anticipate what women want,” Flannery said with a grin. “But we used the joe.iebusiness model and put people together.” He won’t have a hands-on role in the day-to-day running of the site. He just spent a couple of weeks in Ibiza with his girlfriend, Katy Barwell, and is in college at the moment, doing a master’s degree in sports performance at the University of Limerick. “It is relevant to what I’ve been doing for the past 10 years. It helps the transition from rugby into the real world.”
Today FM’s Mairead Farrell, another contributor to the website, arrived with her boyfriend, Louis Ronan. Farrell chatted to Sarah Williams of Arnotts, who was looking forward to attending her friend’s wedding. Dr Joanne Healy from Ovens in Co Cork will marry Nick O’Dwyer from Howth, Co Dublin, at Dromiquinna Manor near Kenmare, in Co Kerry, today.
Who we spottedRTÉ sports broadcaster Evanne Ní Chuilinn; Michael O’Doherty of VIP magazine.
What we drankMojitos
Miss Ireland, Mrs White
Former Miss Ireland Andrea Roche, who announced her engagement to Rob White in The Irish Times last December, will tie the knot in Ibiza next Sunday. White proposed to Andrea at the Eiffel Tower just before Christmas, when they went on a three-day trip to Paris and stayed in the George V hotel.
The former Miss Ireland, who took part in RTÉ’s Celebrity Bainisteoir, was previously married to PJ Mansfield. Close friends of the bride who are travelling to Ibiza this week include Pippa O’Connor, Rozanna Purcell and Tara Reynolds.
Happy waterdays
Seán Doran, the founder and artistic director of Happy Days, the Enniskillen International Beckett Festival, admitted at the programme launch that he realised only a few years ago that Samuel Beckett went to Portora Royal School, Enniskillen, during the Civil War. Oscar Wilde was also an alumnus.
It was also the alma mater of the late Beckett scholar Vivian Mercier, from Clara in Co Offaly, who followed in Beckett’s footsteps to Trinity College Dublin.
The launch took place in the Waterways Ireland Visitor Centre on Grand Canal Quay on Tuesday evening. The headquarters of Waterways Ireland is in Enniskillen. Its chief executive, John Martin, explained that it is one of the cross-Border implementation bodies set up under the Belfast Agreement. “Beckett was born on a Good Friday and went to school in Enniskillen, so we’re happy to be on board.” Happy days.
