I was never a great one for breakfasts.
The staple breakfast food at home in Cork when I was growing up was porridge, one of the very few foods which I cordially dislike.
I have strong memories of my Mother pleading with me to “Eat something before you go out for God’s sake” as I ran down the stairs for the bus. I would, with difficulty, swallow a glass of milk but for her sake rather than mine, or Gods.

This all changed in 1992 when, after about 26 years of puffing, a brain haemorrhage persuaded me to give up cigarettes.
Up to then my first waking action had been to light a cigarette.
(When as a student I used to live with my sister and family in Dublin my young nephew David used to wake me by pushing a cigarette into my mouth,
he understood my priorities)

Post cigarettes (I have never smoked one since then) I suddenly found myself with hunger in the morning for the first time ever. (I also found myself gaining weight for the first time ever but that is another story)
And so began breakfasts.

As I used to start in the kitchen at about 10.00 am when we had the restaurant and Sile left to teach at 8.30 am I have had wonderful leisurely breakfasts for the last several years. I have also been fortunate both in this house in Griffith Place and in Mary Street to have a good newsagent within easy walking distance. This provides one with the third essential of the perfect breakfast ; newspapers. Given that I now have the first two in control (leisure and the papers) that brings me to the third essential if the perfect breakfast; what to eat.

What started me writing this piece today was having a moment when I bustled around the kitchen, making sure that everything was laid out and ready for my sacred breakfast, when I stood back, looked at myself and laughed out loud.
I realised that I had become that sort of fussy, anal, curmudgeonly and selfish old man that is caricatured endlessly. And what is worse, I was enjoying it.

Here is what has to be on the table before I can sit down and enjoy it.

A table mat
A napkin (coffee, with a moustache, is impossible without it)
A china mug
A knife and fork
A black pepper grinder and a cellar of Maldon Salt (for the poached egg)
Two slices of toast (preferably of my own sundried tomato bread)
Milk (fat free) for the coffee
One percolator full of Espresso Coffee (wrapped in a cosy so the second cup will be warm)
One lightly poached egg (free range, teaspoon of vinegar in the water to keep the white together) sitting on one of the slices of toast
One jar of Bonne Maman Apricot Jam (for the second slice)
2 newspapers (Irish Times and the English Independent-when I can get it)
My reading glasses (obviously)
A biro (for crossword and/or sudoku)

Pathetic isn’t it ?
No wonder I laughed.
I hasten to add that this does not happen every day.
Just enough times in the week to remain a treat.
If this is what getting old is all about I reckon I can live with it.