Jeremys #4: Healy

Fourth in a “series” of short tributes to well-known people called Jeremy There was a short period of time when Jeremy Healy was a hero of mine. Back in 1982, before I really knew what clothes were for, I was smitten by a pair of musical designer tramps called Haysi Fantayzee, featuring Jeremy ‘Jeremiah’ Healy […]

Why is a taxi driver’s time more precious than anyone else’s?

First, a disclaimer: I know that not all Dublin taxi drivers have over-bitten, vinegar-soaked fingernails, nor do they all wear chafing hessian underpants – in other words, they’re not universally irritable, intolerant, impatient, racist, shoulder-chipped prole chauffeurs. I also understand that, as self-employed people, time generally equals money in their line of business. And I […]

Mind the step…

Have you seen this print ad? It’s for a well-known ‘value’ furniture store who probably thought it’d be really cute to advertise its stair carpet and underlay service with a sleeping toddler, presumably to show you just how snug it would be. Unfortunately, it only looks as if the child has slipped down the stairs and ended up […]

England is (still) not Britain

The arrogance of The English (formerly known as the England football team) and misguided opinion of their own importance continues to show it knows no boundaries or sense of perspective. Not only have they launched a new and expensive football kit when their popularity is at an all-time low, and even their most stupidly die-hard […]

Coals To Newcastle, balls to Christmas

The starvation diet, the back-of-sofa coin-searching and the redemption of those saved-up bus change tickets now begins in earnest; the best Scots band ever Orange Juice release a 7-disc box set in November. Full details are here, but the release does, regrettably, mean that several of my family will be receiving only Christmas cards this […]

The effluent society

I was making my way home on Saturday night (quickly, to the strains of ‘Funky Town’ by Pseudo Echo), and, despite fully expecting the streets to be swaying with drunken idiots, and peppered with discarded snack boxes and copious pools of chunky semi-digestion that operate as sole-mines all over Temple Barf, I still found myself being absolutely repulsed by […]

Sure, crisps and rugby are a sexy combo

There’s quite a storm in a crisp poke about the new Hunky Dorys billboard adverts, which feature curvy young women in supposed-rugby gear alongside slogans like “Are you staring at my crisps?”, “Others Haka, we Hunky” and “Tackle these”. For those of a certain vintage and persuasion, I’m sure they’re a comforting throwback to the sexist humour of such […]