Clearing out some books the other day, this AOL flyer from the early 1990s fell out of one volume. Reminder of a vanished age? Or a harbinger of a new one?
Quote of the Day
“Irish history is something no Englishman should forget and no Irishman should remember.”
George Bernard Shaw.
Holy Catholic Ireland
A shop window in Killarney, September 2010.
Quote of the day
“You are only as old and boring as the people you surround yourself with.”
John Brockman
That’s one of the reasons why it’s nice to work in a university.
Clochemerle-on-the-Liffey
One of the Irish newspapers last week (I forget which but the reporter was Pat Leahy) had a revealing little vignette from the Donegal South West by-election — which was won by the Sinn Fein candidate, and in which the Fianna Fail vote collapsed. Leahy reported a conversation he had with a constituent in which he asked her how she intended to vote. She replied that she and all her family would be voting for Fianna Fail, the architects of the current economic catastrophe. “Why?” asked Leahy. “Because Mary Coughlan [Deputy Prime Minister and one of the other TDs [MPs] for the constituency] got my mother into hospital”.
This (and my own story about my father’s death) tells you all you need to know about Irish politics. Parish-pump politicians are not the kind of people you need to run a modern state.
Why the Establishment hates the Net
This morning’s Observer column.
Two disconnected events last week showed how far we still have to go in understanding our new communications environment. In one, an Anglican bishop was suspended for some remarks he made on his Facebook page about the forthcoming wedding of two graduates of St Andrews University. In the other, a 27-year-old accountant had his appeal against a conviction for posting a joke message on Twitter dismissed.
First, the bishop…
Still life with fire
Reflections in my sitting room.
Boom, bust and Ballybofey
Classic boom-‘n-bust story by the excellent Lisa O’Carroll in the Guardian.
It was the story of Ireland’s boom and bust in a nutshell: a newly built apartment block near the windswept coast of far-flung Donegal, once valued at €9.5m, was selling for €500,000 (£425,000).
But now, it seems, it’s not even worth that. Navenny Place, a 47-apartment complex, was withdrawn from auction this week after just one token bid of €5,000 – and that was after the auctioneer reduced the starting price to €300,000, or €6,383 per flat.
The apartments are situated on the edge of Ballybofey, a pretty town in the heart of Donegal, and are described by the estate agent as “architecturally superior”, akin “to the type of property found in London’s Docklands”.
Hmmm… Only a couple of things wrong with the story. Firstly, Ballybofey is quite a long way from the coast. And only an estate agent would describe Ballybofey as “pretty”. I’ve always thought it was a pretty drab little place whose main claim to fame was that it housed Donegal’s biggest department store.
On the doorstep
Walking through town early one morning I saw these on a doorstep and wondered about the story that lay behind them.
Live blogging works
Mick Fealty’s Live Blog of the count in the Donegal South West by-election is absolutely riveting.