Why Christmas Is A Special Time For Ian Bailey

“I’ll probably start with the Tiger King,” Ian Bailey laughs when I ask him how he’ll spend Christmas Day, “because that man is such a tragic attention-seeker? He’s a living parable about the dangers of taking yourself too seriously. Then I’ll see if there’s anything about me in the news before making breakfast.”

The former murder suspect and West Cork celebrity is in gregarious form and more than happy to share what he most enjoys about the festive season.

If there’s nothing about me, he muses, I may well tweet something low-key about what a special time of year this is?

“I like to get up early on the big day,” he says, smiling broadly, “and after breakfast, go for a good long walk. When I get back I’ll open a slab or two, to get in the proper Christmas spirit. Then, I’ll get my scrapbook out and go back over all the year’s interviews. I enjoy doing a rough word count and calculating how much has been written about me, since this time last year?”

“But eventually,” he chuckled, “I’ll stop being so self-indulgent and rouse myself to open the front door and shout at the neighbours. It’s become something of an Ian Bailey Christmas tradition round these parts because for some reason or other, and I really don’t understand this myself but…people just can’t stop talking about me?”