For the next few weeks, we spent our lessons preparing for our trip to Fota Wildlife Park. We made out checklists of what we would need to bring with us on the day, which included a drink, a snack, sunscreen and a hat. We would definitely NOT need a bottle of anti-venom, which was Ronan’s idea. He said that we would need it if one of us got bitten by a POISONOUS snake that somehow escaped from its cage and crawled up someone’s trouser leg.

Múinteoir Emer said that would never happen, and I agreed with her because sure everyone knows that St Patrick banished all the snakes years and years ago. Only then Oisín said that the story about St Patrick chasing all the sLITHERING snakes out of Ireland was just a legend and in fact there were snakes in Fota, including a two-metre-long boa, which made Liam cry, but not enough for Múinteoir Emer to include anti-venom on our list.

We also wrote out fact files on all the different types of animals we would see there and googled all the different continents they had come from. This was the one I did on KANGAROOS.

Múinteoir Emer even made out a large countdown calendar that we ticked off every day all throughout April so that Cian could see for himself how many days were left to the trip and could quit asking her every few minutes.

Then, finally, it was 4 May, the last day before our trip. Múinteoir Emer warned us going home that evening that we all had to be at school by 8.40 a.m. as the bus was leaving at 9 a.m. ON THE DOT, with or without us.

That evening, at home, I asked Mam if she could help me pack my rucksack, but she said I’d have to wait until she had ‘stacked the dishwasher, fed the cat and tackled some more of that never-ending bloody pile of laundry’. I was much too excited to wait that long, so I decided to ask Ryan for help since he was always going away with the Boy Scouts, so he had lots of experience packing for trips.

That is how I ended up with a drink, a snack, a compass, a whistle, bug spray, a flashlight, batteries, a rope, a hot water bottle, a can opener, two tins of baked beans, a camping stove, a survival blanket and three rolls of toilet paper in my rucksack.

Only, when I showed it to Mam, she took one look and said, ‘No way, Milly, there is not a chance you are bringing any of this on your trip.’ And even though Dad tried to convince her that I couldn’t possibly cause any bother with a flashlight, he was no match for Mam.

So, we took out everything except the drink and the snack, and Mam placed a hat and bottle of sunscreen on the table for me to put on in the morning.

Then I went to bed. I set my alarm for 5.00 a.m. and by 5.05 a.m. I had the entire house AWAKE.

Mam was not impressed and was giving out because ‘it’s bad enough having to get you up, out the door and at school by nine every day but twenty TO nine is just pushing it TOO far!’

And to be fair she was right, the kitchen that morning was crazier than ever.

Mam was shovelling porridge into Baby Izzy’s mouth, while Zack was having a meltdown because the spoon he was eating Weetabix with had Weetabix on it. Then she was shouting at Ryan that he better get out of the bed and get himself dressed because ‘if Milly misses that bus and I have to drive her all the way to Fota Wildlife Park there’ll be hell to pay.’ Then Dad was shouting that we all needed to calm down and stop shouting and start getting on our shoes so he could get to work on time too.

Finally, when we were all in the car and driving to school, Dad turned off the radio and asked me what animals I was going to see at Fota. I told him that there were lions, kangaroos, giraffes and tonnes more. Then he asked if I thought I might see any bagels, rolls or sourdough because he had heard that lots of animals are actually … bread in captivity and then he laughed out loud and slapped his leg and snorted, while Ryan said, ‘GOOD ONE, DAD!’

That was the worst thing Ryan could have said because, once Dad got some encouragement, he just kept going. Next, he warned me not to play cards with any of the big cats because they could be CHEATERS, then he told me that the only reason snakes are measured in inches is because they don’t have any feet. But it was when he confessed that he would have liked to be a zookeeper, only he wasn’t koala-fied, that I said, ‘Enough, Dad, please just stop!’ Of course, Ryan and Zack thought he was hilarious but Mam just looked at me and rolled her eyes because she is used to Dad thinking he is a stand-up comedian and telling awful Dad jokes.

Finally, we arrived at Scoil Eoin and, amazingly, I was on time and not late as usual. Even Múinteoir Emer was impressed and said, ‘Wonders will never cease’ (which I think meant me being wonderful would never stop, which was a great thing for her to say).

And what happened next was great too.