RVJ Callanan

Today, the Rathluirc Irregular gave me the low down on a geological phenomenon known as the Iapetus Suture . Not to be confused with a fault line, it marks where two continents collided a few million years ago (give or take). The local variant stretches from the South West of Ireland up through Northern Ireland and Scotland. Apparently, it is often associated with mining activity. He also went to great pains to explain that this is the reason why Cork people are so different from the rest of their countrymen. Although they reside on the same superficial land mass, they are effectively on a different continent. And there was me thinking it was down to "superior" DNA!

Below is the original version of my huffy-puffy letter published in today's Irish Examiner. It is dedicated to a wise old bachelor of solid farming stock who has fond memories of being kept warm on cold winter nights by a worn-out blue garment bequeathed to him by his father. Ryle Dwyer’s attempt to balance the books on political betrayal is itself a betrayal of objective journalism. His selective nuggets lack context and give legs to lazy thinking that dismisses all politicians on the basis that one is as bad as the other. This lies at the heart of the apathy that informs our political debate and is one of the reasons why it is difficult for enlightened politicians to engage with the electorate in a meaningful way. The sleveenism that has infected Irish politics since the foundation of the state finds its roots in a single act of treachery which Mr. Dwyer alludes to without quite naming it as such. In skirting around Eamon de Valera’s great betrayal of our nation in 1921,

The Rathluirc Irregular informs me he just had a cold call from one of these newfangled telecos borne out of "the great leap forward" a.k.a. the unbundling of the local loop. It is important to emphasise that the caller was well-spoken with an impeccable English accent. For the sake of symmetry, we must also concede that the callee has long since mollified his Cork blás and now cuts a rather suave conversationalist in educated company. The brief exchange went roughly as follows: “ Brrrrrr … Brrrrrr …… Brrrrrr … Brrrrrr …… Brrrrrr … Brr —” “Hello?” “Hello! May I speak to the person responsible for your telephone account?” “That would be me” “Can you put me through to Me please” “Eh…speaking?” “Oh, hello Me , would you be interested in reducing your phone bill by up to sixty percent?” “Sorry, we are already tied into a contract” “Uh…okay Me . Thank you for your time. Have a nice day” “Eh...Goodbye!”