Re-active

Thursday, July 12th, 2007 by Kevin Teljeur

Right, the site is back again, all is well. I’m going to try this again. Just to deal with the inevitable question(s), someone asked me to take down some photos of them and I since I didn’t have the time, I took down the site instead. I’ve now taken down the photos. If you have a serious problem with a photo of you on the site, send me the exact URL and I will take it down. I won’t like it, it will piss me off, but I will do it. I will obliterate it from my site, and I will replace it and the references to you with whatever I see fit. If it annoys me sufficiently, all this carry-on, I’m going to take down the site entirely and do something else.

So in the meantime, nothing much happened. The last thing I wrote was about the election in Ireland, here, here and here; well, it happened, I voted the way I said I would, and I very nearly (Nearly loves a drink down in the Could Have bar with Almost) got my preferred government of Fianna Fail and the Green Party. Well, that is, Fianna Fail got the numbers they needed, and got back in with the Green Party and the decimated Progressive Democrats (I was on the money there, and in a twist of fate their leader Michael McDowell was beaten by the Green Party’s John Gormley who is now Minister for the Environment – poetic justice, if you ask me) and a gaggle of ‘Independents’. They’re not so very independent, since most of them used to be in Fianna Fail, and a few are even rejoining them.

A poignant moment as Mags Murray's election poster, much like she and the majority of her fellow Progressive Democrat election candidates did, sinks never to be seen again. We wept. 21st May 2007 Click image to view larger version »A poignant moment as Mags Murray’s election poster, much like she and the majority of her fellow Progressive Democrat election candidates did, sinks never to be seen again. We wept. 21st May 2007. Click image to view larger version »

Fine Gael did rather well, but not well enough to get a majority, and Labour had more or less the same performance as in the previous election. Labour was clearly prepared to do business with Fianna Fail but they promised everyone (and particularly Fine Gael) that they wouldn’t go into a coalition government with Fianna Fail, so… They didn’t. With more than a little bitterness the leader of Fine Gael, Enda Kenny, eventually conceded defeat (that really took some doing, he clearly wanted the the job of Glorious Leader very, very badly. He won’t get a second chance, and he knows it.).

More on the long term consequences of this later on; there has already been a lot going on, and although it’s early days yet I think this is going to shape up to be an exciting five years in Irish politics. I think there’s a chance of real improvement, and so far, everything seems to be off to a flying start…

Some other stuff that’s been holding my attention other than my usual introspective self-obsession has been driving; as you may have gathered, I bought a new car a couple of months ago and I’ve been enjoying driving it. It’s an Opel Astra XE Comfort 1.4 litre 5-door (hatchback), 2001, spotless condition with alloy wheels and lots of electrics, a great car in fantastic condition.

My new Opel Astra - it's no racehorse, but a 1.4 litre engine, allow wheels, electrics and extras and great condition make it a joy to drive. It's heavy and reasonably spacious. I'll have to do something about those 'L-plates' though. 7th May 2007 Click image to view larger version »My new Opel Astra – it’s no racehorse, but a 1.4 litre engine, allow wheels, electrics and extras and great condition make it a joy to drive. It’s heavy and reasonably spacious. I’ll have to do something about those ‘L-plates’ though. 7th May 2007. Click image to view larger version »

Again, more on that later – it’s been a big deal for me, and more than makes up for my general lack of interests, hobbies and social life by giving me something new to do with my spare time.

And the rain. Dear God, the rain. It hasn’t let up in months. I mean, really, there have been a couple of days here and there without rain since the middle of May but by and large every day has seen rain, often in a volume which defies belief. Now, it’s been often said and held to be true that Ireland is a country of rain and generally miserable weather and sometimes this is true but of course, not all of the time. But not this year. This year, the whole summer so far has been wet and it shows no sign of letting up before September, when surely the water must run out? I believe that this for Ireland will be the upshot of Global Warming; the additional heat will mean more humidity and so much more rain during the summer months, with the good sunny weather appearing on either side of it for a couple of months, and a very mild winter. I actually previously believed that Ireland might experience serious droughts for the first time, but I realise now that I was wrong, and not taking into account how the heat might express itself with the amount of water in and around this island.

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