A Complete Explanation Of Everything

Wednesday, June 20, 2007

Btw, check this merde out...

clicky
posted by Christophe at 20.6.07 0 comments

You shall know my velocity...

Just back from Doolin, Co. Clare.

On the way to Bratislava, Slovak Republic tomorrow.

Will probably check back in Sunday night.

Lots to tell but nothing of any real importance.
posted by Christophe at 20.6.07 0 comments

Friday, June 15, 2007

It's like looking in the mirror, john...

The Rumble in Ranelagh

For posterity's sake, I haven't checked the quality of the video but I'm sure it's good enough. One of the headline events from this year's election was the infamous, "Rumble in Ranelagh".

Basically, for the uninitiated, it featured rival campaigners from the same constituency having a bit of a staged media event. Well, it might have been spontaneous from Gormley but whatever.

Anyhoo, in the right hand corner, you have the bulldog, the incumbent Minister for Justice and leader of the neocon Progressive Democrats, Michael McDowell. He is attempting to repeat his shimmy up the lamp post stunt from the election beforehand. At that time, he was trying to intimate that the PDs would somehow act as a counterpoint to Fianna Fail and indeed a watchdog. This particular day, I'm not quite sure what he was up to, more of the same probably... Or "left wing government: no thanks!" or something...

Now, in the left corner, we have "Honest" John Gormley, who was the Chairman of the Green Party and genuinely regarded amongst a certain middle class intelligentsia in irish society. John in this clip, is hopping mad. Why? Is it the PD and the government's track record on the Environment? Carbon limits? The proposed motorway through national heritage site, the Hill of Tara?

Erm, no.

It's a misquote in some PD literature about the Green party proposing an increase in the current corporation tax rate (tax on company profits, particularly important in Ireland due to our reliance on profit repatriation for Yankee Multinational Corporations) and by golly, is he upset.

Anyway, watch the clip, it's hilarious stuff.

The situation now is that McDowell lost his seat and is supposedly out of politics forever, "Honest" John is bigger than ever. The Greens the new makeweight taking over where the PDs have left off (they're still in the Government coalition but literally they are a spent force having lost 6 seats). So the Greens, are touting themselves as the new watchdog on the party of the corrupt, they're here to deliver sensible policies in relation to the Environment, Transport, Energy and the whole lot.

Nevermind the prinicipled stuff, no war machines through Shannon, out the window. M3 & Tara, we'll see what we can do but we're not promising anything. Ah, the politics of expediency and the slippery slope...

Really John, when you're shouting in McDowell's face, did you not realise you were looking in a mirror???
posted by Christophe at 15.6.07 0 comments

Bad news on every front...

Well, that's that...

Just been informed that my old aptitude standard currently ain't what the Dept of Foreign Affairs is looking for right at the moment...

So, there's nothing for it but to invest in the snooker cue and try and get down to the Sports Complex and see if I can get in a comfortable nine frames a day. It's pretty quiet down there in the afternoons and my top clearance hasn't broken 30 yet so there is still plenty of accomplishment there to be had.

In other news, a friend from my trip is coming over for a couple of days tomorrow and the weather has turned suitably irish or "cat" as we like to say.

Hopefully, it'll ease off enough to negotiate Dublin relatively dryly but I'm not getting my hopes up.

So, there ya go, I'm sure I've got more bad news I could post but I'm not quite in the mood.

I'm off to buy a snooker cue.
posted by Christophe at 15.6.07 0 comments

Tuesday, June 12, 2007

Policing rural Ireland...

"What's happening???"
posted by Christophe at 12.6.07 0 comments

Look out down under...

Casey Serin is in Australia!!!

clicky
posted by Christophe at 12.6.07 0 comments

Thursday, June 7, 2007

Let down...

Transport, motorways and tramlines, starting and then stopping, taking off and landing, the emptiest of feelings, disappointed people, clinging on to bottles, and when it comes it's so, so, disappointing.

Let down and hanging around, crushed like a bug in the ground.

Let down and hanging around.

This piece of miserablism is brought to you courtesy of Thom Yorke & Radiohead.
posted by Christophe at 7.6.07 0 comments

Tuesday, June 5, 2007

Some stag photos...

Courtesy of Brogan...




























Clears up everything nicely, don't ya think?
posted by Christophe at 5.6.07 0 comments

A la Mort Subite...

Spent a pleasurable Sunday in Brussels basically just taking things in prior to some work stuff on the Monday. There's not altogether too much going on there, outside of beer and chocolate but it's relatively clean, the transport works and people are pretty friendly.

Managed to check in early in the Hotel too, which meant the early flight was less of an inconvenience. What was the real inconvenience was my best mate Leon's Dad's sixtieth the night before the flight. Couple of kegs out the back garden, etc., etc.

So like I said, on the Sunday, just kinda toured around. Didn't bother with the map and proceeded to get hopelessly lost in a very not bothered manner, whenever a town has a metro system it's never too hard to get back on an even keel.

Eventually found the: A la Mort Subite cafe, which was apparently a second home to the legendary Belgian troubadour, Jacques Brel. I've often drank Mort Subite (sudden death) in France, it's a strong beer which has a bit of cider about it too.















And then I strolled past ye olde Mannekin Pis, who is still passing a fair amount of water undistracted by the legion Japanese flash photographers.

Back to the Hotel, a bit of a spruce up, found a decent bar nearby and settled in for a night of fun, conversation and frolics.

Yep, life was good sitting in the square in the wee hours, smoking some and chatting with the manager of the bar and homeless dudes alike.

If it wasn't for the mosquito bites, it'd have been damn near perfect.
posted by Christophe at 5.6.07 0 comments

Friday, June 1, 2007

Summer tunin'...

Quiet office today, so I'm mostly listening to:

Wilco - Sky Blue Sky

Which is coming across as a nice mid-point between Yankee Hotel Foxtrot and A Ghost is Born. Mellow, tuneful, songs have probably a more cohesive structure than the last record but I kinda feel like something's been lost in the translation, it's perhaps too safe a record.




















Ann Scott - We're Smiling

Irish chanteuse's second outing and damn the cover photography if Ann isn't getting more beautiful by the day. In any case, the songs are similar disjointed paeans that follow the same style established on her 2004 opus, Poor Horse, which recently placed in the Top 100 Irish records in that weighty tome, Hot Press. A very solid sophmore effort which is bound to grow on one.


















And finally...

Nina Hynes & The Husbands - Really Really Do

Nina's second full length album and her third full release, if you count the early mini album, Creation, which you have to really. It abandons the poppier wiles of Staros, her last record and goes for a more grouped family of tracks that play up the theme of the future, all understate and gloriously monotone with the occasional dance beat. It rather fails to kick out the jams in spectacular fashion, which, being long familiar with the Nina experience live, I'm desperate for her to do on a record but there are two further records up her sleeve due for release whenever funds allow. This is a nice stop gap but no breakthrough unfortunately for the Cinderalla of Ireland's indie music scene.





posted by Christophe at 1.6.07 0 comments