“It was petty crime that forced me to grow up and emigrate. I remember one time, back in Sligo, I got convicted for stealing the same slab of butter twice in three days from our local shop. I was only caught, because it turned out I was allergic to dairy and they found me in a distressed state, vomiting and crying for mammy, in a ditch by the side of the Galway road. Since I landed in the US I’ve barely been in trouble. Once I got cautioned for throwing underpants onstage at a Tom Jones concert, but I’d forgotten to take them out of the hard plastic wrapping, and it hit poor Tom’s drummer in the eye”. Bernie 51, Arizona, formerly Sligo.