The week began as many good things do with a coffee. I was standing outside Ragazzi in Dalkey, stuffing my gob with a jammy apricot croissant and an espresso when I noticed this powerfully built fella dressed in black, sporting massive biceps that were covered in tattoos. You would just know by looking at him that he was a tough cookie. He had a taut look to his mouth that said, “don’t mess with me”.
“That’s Ger Kennedy, the ice man,” says my friend Harriet. “Do you know him?”
I never met the bloke before but Harriet knew all about Ger, an endurance athlete who is famous for pushing his body to the limits by swimming under metres of heavy ice. That evening Harriet phoned him and asked him to call down to me at the cottage. And fair play to him, he did.