It’s good to laugh, especially these days.

But someone failed to see the funny side when a Cork family were ordered to remove a novelty birthday banner from their front door in Summerhill North near St Luke’s during the Level 5 lockdown recently.

The Maher family purchased the tongue-in-cheek sign reading ‘Quarantine Birthday Party: None of you are invited’ to mark an 18th birthday they were celebrating within the home.

“My mom bought it on Amazon.” Emily Maher told us, explaining that because of the restrictions, they couldn’t find an 18th birthday balloon to mark the day for her brother.

As per the sign, shared on Instagram by @rarelyseenincolour, no guests were invited – the ‘party’ was the five immediate family members living in the household only.

 

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A post shared by Rarely Seen In Colour (@rarelyseenincolour)

Still, that didn’t stop an anonymous person from reporting the sign to the Gardaí, who asked the family to remove the banner.

“The Gardaí came and told us to take it down because someone complained,” said Emily.

Emily and her family say their neighbours saw the funny side, so the anonymous complainer must have been a passer-by.

“The street is pretty busy and most of our neighbours texted and laughed about it. Maybe they really were offended because they weren’t invited!!”