Miss Fitz It seems our fearless leader is going to announce he wants to fry bigger fish later today at the TUC conference in Brighton. La Haine is expected to lay out his plans and intentions for becoming Deputy Leader of the Labour Party. He faces a few problems, one of them of course being the absence of a vacancy. Not only are Labour not waiting for Blair’s body to grow cold, they haven’t waited for the burial. In any case, I …
It seems our fearless leader is going to announce he wants to fry bigger fish later today at the TUC conference in Brighton. La Haine is expected to lay out his plans and intentions for becoming Deputy Leader of the Labour Party. He faces a few problems, one of them of course being the absence of a vacancy. Not only are Labour not waiting for Blair’s body to grow cold, they haven’t waited for the burial. In any case, I …
The OWC website posted an e-mail this morning purportedly from Lawrie Sanchez. Radio Ulster picked up on it and are reporting that efforts are being made to authenticate the e-mail. Interesting. Miss Fitz
I have a real soft spot for Boris Johnson, the accident prone member for Henley on Thames. Of course, it has a lot to do with his looks and his similarity to my Old English Sheepdog, but I also think he is a much misunderstood man. He’s in trouble once again this week for these comments: ‘“For 10 years we in the Tory Party have become used to Papua New Guinea-style orgies of cannibalism and chief-killing, and so it is …
While aware that stories about fun and progress in Belfast are anathema to some, I will carry on regardless with tales from my cultural odyssey. First stop last night was the Conway Mill on the Falls Road where Frankie Quinn launched his photographic exhibition. The enigmatic Frankie has spent the past 4 years photgraphing the Peace Line walls, and his photographs are stunning and provoking. His work explores boundaries, and the definition of identity within the boundaries we create or …
I’m not often lost for words, or feel I cannot add a bon mot, but I felt John Baucher’s tribute to Geoff Harden stands alone, and I would like to share it with youGeoff Harden, journalist, broadcaster,music promoter and champion of community arts passed away on Monday morning after falling ill with heart disease and Pancreatic cancer. Geoff was a leading light in the resurgance of Community Arts in Belfast. He was at the vanguard of a carefully planned and …
See that Talkback will be celebrating its 20th birthday next Friday. Love it or loathe it, its quite an achievement for David Dunseith and his team. I don’t listen everyday, and there are times that I become frustrated, bored or angry when I do. However, it has provided a vital and energetic platform for debate, discussion and contrasting views for 2 decades and that has been invaluable. David Dunseith remains impartial and unflappable, although he can become exaperated with the …
Unfortunately, the diet didn’t take this year, and I will have to wait until next year for the svelte figure. Mind you, there are some advantages to the ‘traditional build’, like needing your extra tonnage to break out of a H-Block prison cell. The guide diplomatically explained to me that if one of the ‘smaller’ women had gotten locked in , it would have definitely been a Fire and Resuce job. It also comes in handy after a long session …
Brian Kennedy launched a ‘Call for Ideas’ for the Healing Through Remembering group yesterday in Belfast. A series of workshops have been organised to explore options and ideas for a Living Memorial Museum. HTR is a cross community group that was established to explore ways of emerging from the Troubles that would assist in the healing process. It has focused on 5 key areas: Network, Truth Recovery and Acknowledgement, Day of Reflection, Story Telling and the LMM. The website is …
We agree on very little here in Northern Ireland, and the story of our past is told and viewed from an array of perspectives. Possibly the only thing that could be agreed upon is the fact that there was a violent period known as the Troubles from the late 60’s to the early 90’s. I stand to be corrected, but I think that is the one uncontrovertible statement that can stand unchallenged. As we emerge from those Troubles, and the …
I posted a story about Mary Lou McDonald MEP in July, and at the time I voiced my reservations about her depth of knowledge, insight and understanding of Northern Ireland. The Sunday Independent carries a report on an interview she did with the Examiner last Tuesday, afraid I couldn’t find it. She is quoted on the issue of Jean McConville as having said: Suffice to say, from my point of view, what happened happened. Jean McConville can’t be brought back. …
My attention was caught by two articles in the Sunday Times magazine, completely unrelated, but I felt there were some resonances between both as well as some thought provoking ideas and contentions. First piece was about Casanova, and I noted the easy, laid back ‘guys are guys’ style of writing and an understanding of his sexual proclivity. I felt that the writer was telling us, ‘There’s more to this guy, he was a cleric, a lawyer, a businessman’, The man …
I was quite stung by some of the comments on my earlier threads about Laganside. Someone asked me what my interest was in the place, and although I answered, I also gave it a lot of thought. I wondered if perhaps I was wrong and was selling the good people of Ulster a pup. So up I got this morning, pulled on the boots, and went on a day trip to Belfast and Laganside. At the risk of boos from …
Lisa Dorrian’s family have spoken out quite dramatically, and have announced that they know who killed her. They have revealed that the alleged individual has no paramilitary connection, and her death had no paramilitary links at all. Indeed, they state that rumours of such a connection has done a disservice to the investigation, and scared people from coming forward with evidence. The alleged killer is in Maghaberry on unrelated charges. The family have now been told that her body was …
Rather than respond to the individual requests for information on John’s book, a general note to say that you can order it form his website: www.johnbaucher.com. The website is now up and running and looking good! Since I am so shamelessly flogging this, I might as well mention that the foreword is provided by Katy Radford, Social Anthropologist at the Irish School of Ecumenics at TCD. She notes about Laganside ‘This is a space where citizens may choose to look …
I’ve mentioned before that I lived in Dublin at the tail end of the 1970’s and 80’s. I am one of those people who didnt want to get tied down with a house in Sandymount for £30,000, but no bitterness there! I watched Dublin transform from a friendly, grubby, intimate city into the glass and brick international capital it is today. It has obviously gained much in all the materialistic ways, but lost its soul in the process. I have …
I was going to post something very chirpy to celebrate my 100th post, but another thread has reminded me how difficult and isolating this blogging lark can be. When the conversation started about the dearth of female bloggers on Slugger many months ago, I initially resisted, as I felt there were more reasons against it than for it. That hasnt changed all that much. As a woman on a predoninantly male site, it has been very challenging to blog here …
Okay, this is related to an earlier thread, but I wanted to make sure the link to this new site was available to anyone that wanted it. I was foolishly waiting for the month to end to upload photos onto Flickr, and had a flash of inspiration this evening. (I have never pretended to be bright). I have just opened a new account on Flickr, and added the photos that have been sent to me. I’ve promised to take a …
I find myself in the unusual position of disagreeing with almost everything I read today. I may be in disagreeable form after a certain team lost a certain football match in a sport we dont mention. Anyway, forgetting Laois’s dismal performance, I was reading Anthony McIntyre’s Dr John Coulter’s piece on Paisley in the Blanket and I find it doesnt make much sense. While I am aware that I know a little more about the Orange Order than your average …
I find myself in the unusual position of disagreeing with almost everything I read today. I may be in disagreeable form after a certain team lost a certain football match in a sport we dont mention. Anyway, forgetting Laois’s dismal performance, I was reading Anthony McIntyre’s piece on Paisley and I find it doesnt make much sense. While I am aware that I know a little more about the Orange Order than your average woman/catholic/nationalist/whatever, I would have imagined that …
