Mind the Gap

This photo is taken from the road bridge that crosses the Connolly-Raheny railway line at Venetian Hall apartments in Killester.

I was passing by the other day when I saw workment putting up the wire mesh.

"What's that for" said I, "are young lads pegging stones down on the trains?"

"No" said they, "people dumping rubbish".

You wouldn't believe it possible if you hadn't been told. I suspect they might have been spotted by the security cameras installed when the the new apartments went on fire some time ago. Or maybe the train just ran aground on a mound of rubbish. Anyway the mesh was to sort all this out.

It was only later that I realised a gap had been left in the middle of the mesh, on both sides of the bridge. Now, what is that all about? Beats me for sure. Ideas welcome.

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So we're sorted then?

The gap has been closed and all is well.

I gather a mistake had been made.

The gap should have been much wider.

So now it's been closed.

Sleep tight.

Piggybank

I got a most evocative stocking present on Christmas morning.

A piggybank.

Now these were designed in the past to encourage thrift.

"What's thrift?" I hear you ask.

Well, it was a pre Celtic Tiger virtue which meant you saved some of your income for a rainy day, or a family emergency, or to buy something you couldn't quite afford yet.

The piggybank always had a zero or positive balance.

It has, unfortunately, been replaced by the credit card. These, contrary to what their name implies and unlike the piggybank, always have a negative balance. In fact if you have more than one of them they can add up to an exponentially negative balance. They should more appropriately be called debit cards, but then we already have debit cards and they have a positive balance, don't they? Very confusing.

But that is all for another day.

Back to the piggybank.

My new one is well suited to saving in a period of reduced income. It is no bigger than a table tennis ball, so it can quite adequately cope with the likely volume of savings.

In fact, the deposit slot at the top will accept nothing greater than a 20 cent piece in €urocurrency.

It also has a withdrawal hole on the underside which is normally bunged up lest any savings leak.

However, when you get to the stage of withdrawing your meagre savings, you find that not even a 1 cent piece will pass through the hole.

So, to get at your savings, you just have to break the bank.

QED.

Still Bloomin'

Sweny's
still on the go
in one form or another
despite all its travails over the years.

Mattress Mick

Dublin's latest new character: Mattress Mick.

The mind boggles.

Waiting for Godot

This is the crib in the RC church in Raheny before midnight on Christmas eve. Like most church cribs it is observing the tradition that the babe is not put in the crib until Christmas Day.

Unlike the ending to Beckett's play, this one is heading for a happy ending, for the moment at least.

Cappanahanagh

Murroe and Boher is a Roman Catholic parish in East Limerick. Murroe is perhaps best known as the birthplace of Canon Hayes, founder of Muintir na Tíre, and as the location of Glenstal Abbey where many a well known Irishman went to school.

My interest is in the townland of Cappanahanagh where some of my ancestors come from. So far I have traced them back to the time of the French Revolution and am not sure I'm going to get any further in that direction. But never mind, the family is replete with interesting characters as it is.

I visited there some time ago, at the invitation of a relation, Nora Meehan (née Fogarty), who is assiduously following up both her own and my family history in the area. The result of my visit can be seen here. Nora suggested that I might contribute a piece to the parish annual, which I was only too glad to do. It is an excellent publication with a very high standard of presentation. But the meat is in the content. Murroe has a great community spirit and has developed a vast range of community activities and interests. You can get a flavour of these from the annual and also from the website which has been going from strength to strength since its inception a few years ago.

The cover of the current annual is reproduced above and you can click on it for a larger image. The year 2011 saw the visits of President Mary McAleese, JP McManus and Archbishop Dermot Clifford, and, of course, the annual Mary from Murroe festival - all themes taken up on the cover of the annual.

You can read my piece in the annual here or a purely text version here.

Saecula Saeculorum

Just a few secular night shots of Christmas in Dublin in 2011,
starting with Grafton Street viewed from St. Stephen's Green.

Carols from Santy's helpers,
male, female and lay, in Grafton Street.

Joseph O'Connor's Mickey
in a Grafton Street shop window.

Not forgetting Minnie
in the same window.

A fairly elaborate Santy
in Griffith Avenue, Dublin 3.

Telemetree

GCHQ, Vernon Avenue, Dublin 5

Top o' the Mornin'

She may never have existed, but then neither did he.

While the City Council are attempting to give the city a bit of character with some excellent street sculpture around the place, this cretin is trying to turn it into a Hollywood set.

And he's holding out his hand for money for just standing there and ruining the view.

[Before I'm attacked by the s/he brigade, I am doing the ladies a favour by assuming that it's not one of the fair sex inside that thing.]

Pray God and pass the blood-pressure tablets.

Happy Christmas 2011

from Downtown Raheny

Johnny Xmas

My first thought, when I came across this object blocking my path outside my local supermarket, was that it was a jet engine which had fallen off a passing plane.

Then I wondered if it was one of those drones which appear to be landing where they are not supposed to. A distinct possibility when they are being pilotted from the USA west coast by people who couldn't find the North Pole at Christmas. Let's hope, for Santa's sake, that they don't find it before the 25th at any rate.

Then the context hit me.

Christmas is coming, my local supermarket is hosting the usual Christmas tree sellers, and this is just a packing device - like the funnel on a sausage machine or a rubber johnny.

No mystery here then.

Happy Christmas.

A Dry Christmas?

Combining local interest and a worthy cause, All Saints' (CofI) parish in Raheny, Dublin 5, are selling A5 size Christmas cards in aid of the roof repair fund.

This is the gem of a church which was built by Lord Ardilaun for his estate at St. Anne's, subsequently became the local parish church and in more recent times hosted Bono's wedding and a complete reading of the bible on the 400th anniversary of the issue of the King James version.

The card above is the Great East Window depicting the Nativity, one of a set of four. The others show the window depicting the baptism of Christ, the church exterior in the snow,and the Duck Pond in St. Anne's. The images come by kind permission of Leo "George" Devitt.

The cards are €5 for a pack of 8 and can be got from Paper Pieces and Best Sellers in Raheny shopping centre, Adams's chemist on Main St., and Mace opposite the Cedars Lounge at Assam's Park.

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I am happy to report that the amount of funding required to repair the roof and fix the old bell mountings is now estimated to be only half the amount originally envisaged and that virtually all the required funding has now been obtained. Work on the bell has already been completed.

I learned this at this afternoon's service when the christmas tree lights were turned on and the bell rung for the first time in a long while. You can see a short video here.

Reverend Jim was in fine form and thanked all who had contributed both to the current service and the repairs fund.


He then joined the group of parishioners below for a souvenir photo.