John O’Donovan

“You could even say it glows”

(My anxiety wants me to clarify that I mean Starmer's cynicism, despite the rest of me being sure you'd clock that)

Jesus Christ. The cynicism is breathtaking.

Have I missed something specific or is it a general appraisal?

nOthIng can surPass the mySTeRy of stilLness

The curse of internet literacy is that it’s hard not to read e. e. cummings in the voice of that SpongeBob meme

Text from a blog post that reads: "So where am I writing from now? In the back room of the cottage I live in, not too far from the village I grew up in, but further out in the countryside, sitting in forestry country in the hills beneath Mount Callan in West Clare. The sun is out, the mayflies are leering around the bogland, the blossom’s white on the apple trees. A relentless cuckoo is practising his cadence. The wrens are building their mossy cave nests and the robins are throwing shapes at the heaps of drying grass. The daffodils have gone in and the dandelions have turned to dust but the bluebells are out like ladies who lunch and the whitethorn and the blackthorn look like Whitsun brides. Pollen drifts about like calm winter snow and the bees and the horseflies work the dock leaves like busy stevedores gathering cargo. The spruce push out their pinecones, the blackcurrants green up and grow, the cherry and plum trees look poised and serious before the season ahead. Everywhere there is work to do. And I have work now too."

I was asked to write a simple little blogpost about where I was writing from but found myself turning into a pastoral essayist instead

Midge Ure

Midge from Vertigo

Midge from That 70s Show

Marge Simpson with Moe who calls her “Midge”

Every beautiful evening on the Bogland

I moved to the countryside last year and waking today heard the cuckoo for my first ever time. After nearly 40 years living in built-up areas, it's maybe unsurprising I should have thought at first that it was the beeping of a bin truck backing up.

Collage showing Mr Tayto at the famine

Don Conroy teaches you how to draw a lion but it ends up being Liam neeson

Had fun at the art workshop this afternoon

Number of Ireland-born living in Australia passes 100,000 The number of Ireland-born residents in Australia has passed 100,000, according to official figures.

The data shows that 103,080 people born in Ireland were living in Australia as of last June, up from 94,540 the previous year, an increase of more than 8,500

A table showing the number of imes teams have won the Premier League in ascending order. The sequence goes 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13 - the first seven terms of the Fibonacci sequence.

As Liverpool win the Premier League for the second time, they complete the opening of a quite remarkable sequence, 33 years in the making.

#Fibonacci

Vladimir: Stop, Gogo.

a clip is used as a sting on a radio podcast I like, so I hear it a lot but haven't seen it in situ original.

in the original context is he asking about the waste disposal thing or the crisp?

YouTube video by FourJamLions The Pope

I got the word order wrong www.youtube.com/watch?v=fZZ5...

The pope? You're joking. Oh my god.

Beastie Boys

🎶 We were worried about our (MUM!) / Jacker came out and pulled a (GUN!) 🎶

SORRY. Sorry.
Have we seen this *incredible* news video coming out of Queensland? Wait for the witness/witnesses statement

Front cover of Leonard and Hungry Paul by Rónán Hession

One of the kids in the writing group I mentor wants to write stories about autism where experiences are accurately described but not overtly named/pathologised. I didn't realise this great example was out there already. What a lovely read it has been

I've never seen a fallen one before. Are there any stories behind how it fell?

Honestly, I’d just send copies of Mister Invincible out to every school.

Number two: this guy sitting

Given the illustration could this be number one on a list of contradictory covers?

Reading about the rising attempts to discredit neurodivergency feels like another symptom of the old order's absolutely homicidal resentment towards having to consider other people, even in language.

They want no concessions for anyone but them, no mercy for anyone but them.

Not just the 13th but Friday the 13th; not just Friday the 13th but Good Friday the 13th. The boy arrived on brand.

A page from the short story ‘Anglo-Irish Relations’ by Maeve Kelly

The front cover of short story collection ‘Orange Horses’ by Maeve Kelly, published by Tramp Press

Steely Dan Bar

Loved Nobber, can't wait for this