Well, it was all pretty straightforward. We were lying in bed on the Saturday morning of Shelagh's birthday, we had organised a night out with all friends and family invited to celebrate it. I brought her up breakfast (can of red coke and a bag of sausage and tomato flavour crisps with 2 slices of bread to make a crisp sambo, I had my usual cup of tea and biscuit) before mentioning I needed petrol in my car and asking Shelagh if she wanted to come with me for a drive as we get all our petrol in southern Ireland because of the price difference and the saving you make as we pay in sterling you get more euro for your money.

Right so she agrees and we finish our breakfast, this calls for another lie down (we tend to be lazy on Saturdays as Rebecca is usually in her Daddy's from the night before) after some mutual pleasure we make love and in the few minutes recovery time afterwards we lie looking into one another’s eyes and telling each other silly nice things and this is when I mention that we could take a drive to Buncrana if she wanted, to which she replied 'why would we want to drive to Buncrana', (I should probably explain at this point, we live in Derry, we buy our petrol over the border in Donegal which is 5 minutes away but which is also on the way to Buncrana which is 20 minutes away which is where the Jewelers I had earmarked earlier for buying the ring was situated) a question to which I replied 'that’s where Callaghan’s (the jewelers) is'.

She said 'what’s that' and just then an advertisement came on the local TV station, Channel 9, advertising the wonderful selection of engagement rings available at Callaghan’s jewelers, Main st, Buncrana. So Shelagh jumped up out of the bed and had this shocked look on her face, but a shocked happy look and playfully hit me a few times but I held her arms, took her back down beside me on the bed moved on top of her, gave her a wee kiss on the forehead and asked her straight, 'Shelagh, will you marry me?' She gave me a wee soft gentle kiss first on the lips then replied 'yes, of course I will'

Jumped into the shower together, made love again then got dressed and headed of to Buncrana to pick a ring. The feeling of walking on air and excitement I can only compare to what I believe tantric sex to be, it lasted all day. When we picked the ring and had it measured we went to a cafe to have something to eat and pass the time until it was ready. We couldn’t eat, we couldn’t stop laughing, I felt sick, my stomach felt empty, but I couldn’t eat anything. We called back up to the jewelers about an hour later, still no ring. The feeling of excitement had got to a ridiculous stage where we could hardly walk or could hardly stop laughing. So we went to the pub to calm ourselves.

It did calm us down for a while, I let Shelagh have a drink as I had to drive. I was able to have a cigarette to help me relax, where as Shelagh doesn’t smoke. We had only just been able to stop laughing and catch our breath long enough to realise it was 4:00pm and the ring would be ready soon. So we headed off down the street again to pick up the ring. I will never be able to accurately describe my / our feelings that day. I felt so happy I felt like crying, so sick with nerves and anticipation, so worried she might change her mind, butterflies in my tummy, excitement like I hadn’t felt from I was a child I could go on but I think you get the picture. We collected the ring and went back to my car, I carried the box. When we got into the car I turned to Shelagh and took the ring out of the box, told her how much I loved her (we were both crying at this point) and put the ring on her finger. We had a big long hug. We were engaged. Wow, even writing this down I'm feeling on top of the world again, I haven’t thought about that day in as much detail since it happened.

Anyway while we were leaving Buncrana I felt an overwhelming urge to roar, I still don’t know why but I did, right out the window of the car like a mad man. I roared and shouted as if Ireland had just won the world cup, but they hadn’t unfortunately, although this was way better. This feeling of wanting to shout and celebrate lasted well into the night. When my parents arrived to celebrate what they thought was Shelagh's birthday was actually the announcement of our engagement. Then the same thing happened every time someone else arrived at our house, friend’s family. Wow.