I Wonder Who Won???

There was supposed to be racing of some sort on Ireland's second national TV channel yesterday afternoon, but the recent monsoons put paid to that.

Instead, some genius at RTE decided to show the 1965 classic 'The Great Race' instead, to be followed at 4:30pm by International Football (Ireland Vs Georgia).

Simple enough, you say?

Yes indeed; until one considers that the movie started at about 2:15pm and has a run time of approximately 160 minutes.

Surprisingly, no-one at RTE seems to have noticed this until about 4:25, with about 40 minutes of movie left and sports coverage due to start in 5.

And sure enough, the movie was pre-empted by a continuity announcer saying '...and there we have to leave The Great Race for the time being, because now it's time for...' etc., as she introduced the football.

The announcement gave the impression that RTE might return to the movie after the match, but the post-match schedule was already pretty full, so I don't think that happened.

The irony is that The Great Race has a built-in intermission anyway, which RTE could have taken advantage of, had they given the matter any thought.

Push the button, Max...

It'd Be Funny If It Wasn't True...

Yesterday was my mother's birthday (Happy Birthday, Mom!).

As a dutiful son, I went in search of a birthday card at Eason's, Dublin's largest bookseller/stationer, whose card dept. is on the first floor. As I got off the escalator, imagine my shock when the first display turned out to be Christmas cards!

Unbelievable!

I mean, I know the summer's been bad and all, but we haven't had snow yet, and the kids have only been back in school a week - it's just wrong.

At this time of year, Eason's, like many stationers, make their money from third-level students preparing for the college year as well as from book sales, magazines, etc. Nobody's going to be buying Christmas cards at this time of year, so if anything, they're only wasting space with the floor displays.

And calling it 'Gift Ideas' instead of 'Christmas Greetings' isn't fooling anybody.

I've just kicked off an email to the store's general enquiries address (sales@easons.com) but I'm not expecting much in response.

I just sometimes despair, y'know?

Is everything just about money?

Doesn't anything retain it's original meaning anymore?

I don't know; the cynical answers to those two questions would of course be 'Yes' and 'No'. But I've gone beyond cynical at this point - now I'm just angry.

Angry at companies who pull this kind of stunt and consistently get away with it; angry at legislators who let them, angry at consumers who don't seem to want to do anything about it.

But most of all I'm angry at myself, because I don't usually get angry, especially over stupid stuff like this...

Damn it all.

I Need A Holiday - Again...

It's been a horrible summer - miserable weather, work, not winning the lottery, work, having to expand my patrol sector to include Sedna...

I mean, Sedna! Not even Pluto, but some rock billions of miles from the back end of nowhere that some stupid scientist discovered by accident. And all because the Patrol Magistrate got pissed when I tried to explain that - look, there's no way to put 'Uranus' into a sentence without someone getting a laugh out of it, but suffice it to say that he misinterpreted my assertion that I didn't feel the need to patrol there and, well...

Anyway, it's been almost a year since my last holiday, and I have 16 - count 'em! - 16 days to use before the end of December.

The question is, where to go?

Further research is indicated...