Nicola

Painting of three daffodils on a dark blue background.

Happy St David’s day 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿
Dydd Gŵyl Dewi Hapus!

Pathetic. No moral courage at all.

going to the doctor when you're chronically ill is weird. It's like imagine everything in your house is on fire, and you're standing there and the fire department come in like, describe the fire to me and maybe we can find what caused it and put it out. and you can't just say everything so you're like... well the fire in the curtain is the biggest but the fire in the photo albums might be doing the most damage also the fire in the couch is really inconvenient occasionally the fire guy is like, well your tv is on fire so it might be electronic-fireitus but that would cause other things like fire in the dvd player and you're like, oh yes. that's been on fire for years. I forgot to mention it because it's always been a relatively small fire. It's right next to the bookshelf which has much more fire. and then the fire guy is like, oh. I wouldn't worry about that. book shelf fire just happens sometimes.

Or alternatively, we could recognise the insanity of measuring success using economic growth while the planet collapses around us.

Mandelson’s Fifth Column The British government’s business department exists to undermine democracy.

1. In 2009 I wrote this. I argued that Peter Mandelson's department “functions as a fifth column within government, working for corporations to undermine democracy and the public interest.”
This thread explains what I saw, and reaches a startling conclusion.🧵
www.monbiot.com/2009/05/04/m...

The UK government didn't want you to see this report on ecosystem collapse. I'm not surprised | George Monbiot It took an FOI request to bring this national security assessment to light. For ‘doomsayers’ like us, it is the ultimate vindication, says Guardian columnist George Monbiot

Please spread this far and wide, as stories don't get much bigger than this. When the government blocks even the intelligence services from telling us we're heading for environmental catastrophe, you know we have a problem. A very big problem.
Thank you.
www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Night sky picture montage with the northern lights

Aurora Borealis from Wexford, Ireland

Original painting of a blue teapot with a mug and three satsumas.

Original painting of fruit in a copper bowl with a cut apple casting a highlight.

In a time of uncertainty and upheaval, creativity is not a luxury, it’s essential. (Which is a long-winded way of saying I’m finding solace in painting everyday objects)
Afternoon tea and light on copper.

Sunset over water with trees

Evening light

Picture of a still river running into the sea with clouds tinted pink by the sunset

Sunset, Wexford

So she got more than all the rest out together - and yet the spoiled votes are the main story?

So, Catherine Connolly is someone who does the job in front of her to the best of her ability, regardless of personal views on a matter, and can hold two conflicting ideas in her head depending on what her role is in a process?

Is that the extent of the negative spin here?

Sunrise over harbour with lighthouse

Sunrise, France

Sunset over the sea, France

Sunset in France

If you want the best laughs today, read #SmeartheBejaysis tag.
( context for non-Irish folks: A ghastly politicians said his tactics to destroy socialist Catherine Connolly's presidential campaign would be to 'smear the bejaysis out of her- you'll see how people approach mockery here )

The reason the Right are so invested in the myth that the arts have no value isn’t because the arts don’t generate wealth (they do); it’s that studying the arts teaches people to imagine better ways of judging the value of an idea than by counting how much money it makes…

Appalling. What will world governments do? #sumudflotilla ##saoirsedonphalaistín 🇵🇸

If this intends to make it legally compulsory for every adult in Derry to carry something called a "Brit Card", then I'm willing to offer some high-paid consultancy on why this plan might be flawed.

In fairness to Maria Steen it's a tough tightrope to walk to find nominees who hate women enough to support the Iona Institute but not so much that they wouldn't nominate one.

How hot is the North Pacific?

The latest data from ECMWF for August, 2025, puts the average sea surface temperature at 6.212 standard deviations above the 1951-2000 average.

If SSTs were normally distributed (they aren't), that would be about 1-in-3.8 billion by chance.

Our lead ship on the Global Sumud Flotilla was droned and caught fire. The six who were onboard are safe, and our mission will continue. They know international opinion is turning inexorably against them. Bombing peaceful humanitarians won’t exactly help that, but it’s the only response they’ve got.

Waking up terrified in the middle of the night, unable to visualise any kind of future. It’s the lack of security that wears you down.

Middle-aged renters: ‘At this age, unless I won the Lotto, how would I afford anything?’ Average asking rents are now twice what they were at the peak of the Celtic Tiger period. At the 2002 census, 27 was the age at which more than half of householders owned their own home. In 2022, it w...

I actually cried reading this, because I think it's the first time I've seen my own situation highlighted in the media, and all the feelings of shame and anger that go along with it.

"I’m a 45-year-old person who has been working my entire life. I should not be in such a situation."

Lush 😊

QUACK! QUACK!
Secretary of Health RFK Jr. said a paper that found no link between aluminum in vaccines and disease must be retracted. The journal refused.
In an extraordinary move for a U.S. public official, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has demanded the retraction

How European, American, Canadian and Australian politicians see climate change.

Google developer #1: "That's it. Our search engine is simple, efficient, and reliable. It's perfect. We're done."

Google developer #2, presumably: "But wouldn't it be *more* perfect if the first search result was always a robot who mansplained your search results to you incorrectly?"

Finally!