Ciarán Casey

I want to watch the video now. The bit that really pushes me over the edge is the monotonal repetitive shouting- it's like nails on a chalkboard

Even allowing all benefit of the doubt the logic here is dizzying

That's really interesting thanks. The official reports oscillate from sounding reasonably humane to jarringly callous. I'm suddenly remembering why I didn't read too much of this before now

From an inspector of boarded out (foster) children in 1932. Saying the quiet part loud

There's a brilliant poll reported in the Independent in 2005. People were asked what they thought was likely to happen to house prices in the following year. Only one in five hundred expected significant falls

Ok, that is cutting

We're still at the cutting edge Deirdre

I've never been able to work out what their issue was here. Even in the article it sounds so weak

If aliens come there's a good chance it won't be to meet us

I wonder what's it's like to live in a country that doesn't constantly try and get round its own rules

People aren't sufficiently concerned about grade inflation in the 1920s and 1930s. Those kids were wasters

Interesting! In 1930 there were about 20 million train journeys taken in Ireland, compared to 50 million last year.

Daily reports from the UK on the outrage of the BBC playing inappropriate chants from Glastonbury alongside daily reports of actual outrages committed at Gaza.

The marriage rate in 2024 was 3.8 per thousand population. Interestingly, it's not dramatically lower than a century ago

Births weren't officially registered in Ireland until 1864 and then the census returns were burnt in the Four Courts, making it really hard for people in the 1920s/30s to prove their ages to get a pension. The acceptable alternative documentation included dated birthday cards

The aerial view... I can't be alone in seeing it

Cost to take priority over ‘aesthetics’ in future State infrastructure projects Minister for Public Expenditure Jack Chambers was in London where he spoke of a new “disciplined” approach to investment

Because our infrastructure projects to date have been excessively beautiful?

Cost to take priority over ‘aesthetics’ in future State infrastructure projects – The Irish Times share.google/nZ0R23nt4Fen...

The absolute best time of year

This is uncomfortably close to reality

Yeah there is a poetry to it I think

Surprisingly worked out!

A toddler that won't sleep and a bucket of cement rapidly setting as the sun goes down 😔

I get there are bits of real artistic achievement but don't believe more than a handful of people get much of it for about five hundred pages. The Sandycove stuff is fleeting, accessible and at the start. That it's celebrated there speaks volumes. Agreed, Dubliners, O'Casey and Behan every time

I'm with you. The chapter where he riffs on two dozen Irish writers was the subject of a study and people were apparently very impressed that someone worked out who they were. The question then becomes how anyone enjoyed it without knowing that.

How Ireland became the Saudi Arabia of siphoned-off global profits The Emerald petro-state is riding high off tech and pharma—for now

Oh good.

How Ireland became the Saudi Arabia of siphoned-off global profits share.google/KTGeuahTzkBJ...

Part of me is shuddering at the thought of keeping at it now!

Forget Bath and Bloomsbury – the greatest Georgian architecture is found in Dublin At the heart of the Irish capital, Merrion Square has the finest collection of Georgian buildings in the British Isles

I was enjoying this until the claim at the end that the Act of Union enriched Dublin. I've read elsewhere that Mountjoy Square plummeted afterwards because the society set wanted to live near a parliament

www.telegraph.co.uk/art/architec...

The memoirs are starting to pile up, with more on the way. If anyone has any recommendations for Ireland, 1922 to 1945, please send them on

Really shocked by this- in 1928 the infant mortality rate (under a year) in Ireland was five times higher for 'illegitimate' children than for the remainder, at over 30%.