Graham

Graham died just over two weeks ago . He was 55 years of age . I had met him only about five or six times , but early this summer I had the privilage to get to know him a lot better .I saw him in action as a dad with his three grown sons . His deep concern and interest in their lives and welfare was something to behold and a great example to all fathers .
At his funeral service we learned about his life , growing up in Dover , his days spent on the beach and among the rockpools . An outdoor man who seemed to carry with him
an everlasting Summer . Most of the photographs of his life fearured him wearing his famous shorts and sandles and sun tan .
I'm sure it was no coincidence that the day of his funeral was one of the loveliest sunny days this summer . Even the wedding of his eldest son , five years ago , is still remembered as the hottest day in Ireland in many years . In the chapel during his funeral service his three-year-old grandaughter flitted about the chapel like a little pink butterfly .
Graham's favourite sport was , of course , cricket , the only remaining truly Summer sport .
It is hard to know the right words of sympathy to express to his dear wife and wonderful sons except that he will always be remembered by all those who knew him as a man of great courage .
Truly a dad for all seasons especially Summer .
Graham RIP.

'POP' ,goes the big red balloon....

I know three-year-old who does'nt like balloons . Well , maybe she is just wary of balloons . ''Papa , can we put the balloon outside " she says . She does'nt know much about Science or Physics and she has'nt really read many books on Politics or Economics .She just knows from all her years of vast experience that balloons have a tendancy to go 'POP' without much warning and give little people a great fright . Sometimes balloons lie in a corner and quietly disappear , but usually they go 'POP'.

There are some politicians and economists who have the 'savvy' of a three-year-old but it seems to me that most of them appeared to be completely oblivious to the growing threat of our housing balloon . They allowed a normal demand for 'a roof over our heads ' , that occurrs in all societies , to become the complete basis of our economy .
Landowners , developers , builders and indirectly national and local politicians benefitted from a deliberate Government policy to encourage a sunami of national HOME-building . Apart trom tax incentives , softening of Planning Permission requirements , regular meetings with the 'building lobby 'every effort possible was made by the powers- that- be ,to smooth the path of this lobby .
Queues formed at the launch of new phases of property developments , sometimes overnight , to buy grossly overpriced HOMES . Because of low European bank rates , money was easily available .These carefully controlled queues found that Phase 1 was sold out fairly quickly and the disappointed ones were introduced to Phase 2 . If any hopeful buyer had the nerve to ask "Whats the difference between Phase 1 and Phase 2 ?",they were informed arrogantly..."about TWENTY GRAND !".
About two years ago when some economists and some independent property experts began to suggest that , just maybe , some of these devalopments were overpriced and there was a possibility , just a possibility...mind , of a problem of negative equity 'down the road ', the incestous 'building lobby', which also included BIG SHOTS from the BIG BANKS , jumped in to ridicule the "nay sayers " as they were called . Our 'fundamentals' were sound , said they...how unpatriotic of these 'prophets of doom ' who are trying to 'talk diown ' our booming economy.Banks were allowed to introduce 100% or even 100% plus mortgages , they were allowed to spread mortgages over 40 years and to top it all off in case anyone might still think that the housing-balloon was overinflating , the spin doctors from the banks and government started to suggest that there would , at worst , be a 'soft landing'. Then our Tasoiseach (now former -Taoiseach ) , made comments such as ' these nay sayers who are talking down the economy should go off and commit suicide , that "If you had bought your houses last year they would be worth at least 10% more this year ", thereby pouring petrol on a bonfire .... puffing up further an already overinflated balloon .
So the balloon did not just ebb away quietly in a corner , it went 'POP' as my three -year-old grandaughter told us all that it would.....

Conspiracy Theory

A Large , I say a LARGE , Hadron Collider , is to be tested this week in Switzerland . This is due to take place on the 11th September , yes the 7th anniversary of 9/11.This experiment could have very serious effects on "life- as- we- know - it - Tim(?) "
The lunatic fringe , of which I am of course a fully paid-up member ; we feel that one of the side effects could be the creation of black holes (we in the L.F. know all about black holes , if YOU don't , read Stephen Hawking ).
These BH's are capable of swallowing up the universe . Of course WE know that the fact that this experiment JUST HAPPENS to coincide with a world wide recession is no coincidense at all .
All the money in all the financial centres in all the world will just disappear down this hole , and all the wankers ....oops sorry ..I mean bankers ........ of the world will tell the governments of the world that now that they have lost all their (our?) money , through NO fault of their own , please can they , the governments , give them a dig -out by returning their (our?) money to them a.s.a.p. so they can start scre..ing us all over again .
"Nonsense!" I hear you say.(hand cupped to ear )....
But haven't they ALREADY sunk € 5.5billion mil. in a hole in the ground.....gotta go ...can't talk now....eating...
.

The Woman from the North....

A man , who was about to become the leader of his country , was thinking who would be an appropriate second-in-command . He decided that in this day and age that this person should be a woman . That obviously she should have some political experience . Known , but not too well known . Young , with a family , and be good looking . But most of all she should be from a fairly remote part of the country , say the north-west ...

And that is why , in my opinion , BRIAN COWEN chose MARY COUGHLAN as Taniaste...

The Championship Season.

"Well , has he left or not ? " . This was the opening comment from an RTE presenter this AM . Not being a sports buff it took me some time to find out that the presenter and her sports-reporter colleague were discussing the movenent or non movement of Kevin Keegan form his position as a team manager . For the past week or so all the most of the sports reporting seems to revolve around some thing called the 'window' . Apparently at this time of year all transfers of players (and apparently managers as well ) in English soccer , and lets face it that seems to be the only game that REALLY matters , must take place within certain defined dates .

Although I'm definitely not a football fanatic I am prepared to suffer the drawn out second by second , and in GAA blow by blow reporting and analyses of football matches , provided they are reasonably important , but the interviews at the moment are all about MONEY.

The sports presenters , and RTE in particular , seem to have this fixation on the salaries , wives (and girlfriends ) , homes , cars , and lifestyle of these players .Not much is being said about actually kicking a ball . What is a football managers job anyway ? Their faces seem to be more prominant than the actual players .They appear on television against a now-compulsary background of sports logos , muttering the same inane garbage concerning a game that most of the viewers had already spent over 90 minutes watching and telling them all over again what they had just witnessed.The same scenario after each game ad infinitum , ad nauseum.

Suggestions ....why don't they use real four-letter words if they are unhappy with the result ?

Why don't they have the REAL fans standing behind them , instead of those silly logos , the youngsters .....who are the ones to whom all this stuff should be directed . Why don't the managers sometimes have a spitoon and chew 'baccy during the interview , occasionally lobbing a 'gob' into the spitoon to emphasise a point and to get people really animated ? Why don't these guys appear in their underwear wearing silly hats ? And why oh why do we not have WOMEN managers , as apparently there are so many incompetant managers out there whose teams cannot do better than one in a row? What do managers do ? What is the players job?

Please STOP talking money and start kicking the ball royghly in the direction of the opponents goalmouth. Bring back Matt Busby !