Tristan MacManus

Tristan MacManus, the resident Irish pro on Dancing With the Stars who’s paired with singing legend Gladys Knight this season, is blogging regularly for Entertainment Weekly, which calls him an “amateur leprechaun.” (So funny we forgot to laugh.)

MacManus and Knight are hanging in there, and the 30-year-old native of Co. Wicklow said he had fun during last week’s shows comparing tongue sizes with Gene Simmons of the rock group Kiss.

Undoubtedly Simmons won the battle of the mouth organs – that’s one of the reasons why Kiss became so famous, after all – and MacManus said it was all in fun.

“I love Kiss. And I didn’t think the first time I met Gene Simmons, Gladys Knight would be putting’ a measuring’ tape over our tongues, know what I mean? It was fun. He’s a pretty cool guy,” MacManus told EW.

Though he’s contributing to EW weekly, don’t expect MacManus to amp up his interaction with the fans through Twitter. 

“I’ve never had a Twitter account. I don’t really know too much about computers, you know, and I’m not really on them all the time,” he says. 

“And I’d hate to have a Twitter, which is supposed to be an interactive kind of thing, and then never interact with anyone. I hate looking on it and it says, ‘I’m doing’ this, I’m doing’ that,’ know what I mean?”