Usually it took a good seven days in Ireland for his fuse to properly melt. But this time his family were making a special effort to drive him to distraction. First of all there were his sisters, Joan and Maura, and their attempts to fix his “problems” with Jenny by simply talking about them incessantly. The thing was they didn't know Jenny very well, possessed scant information about what had happened, and didn't have any kids of their own. That didn't stop them from being experts, and they were handing out advice as if it were cups of tea. And in Eoin's parents' house there were a great many cups of tea. Then there was his mother Liz who, despite Eoin's repeated pleading, stuffed Damien full of whatever had the most chocolate in it or on it. And not to mention the leaky taps, the terrible coffee, the ugly wall-to-wall carpeting, the cars parked on the footpaths, people wearing their shoes indoors, and potatoes for every single dinner. Eoin understood that he was becoming Swedish.
