Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in mopti's LiveJournal:

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Friday, May 16th, 2008
2:13 pm	The Lisbon campaign party posters At the weekend, I saw the FG and FF posters for the Lisbon campaign. Then yesterday, I saw the PD ones. I commented to a friend that FF had gone straight for the message, but that FG and the PDs seemed to be using the Lisbon campaign to give their party leaders Enda Kenny and Senator Wotsisname some profile. Miriam Lord in today's Irish Times shares my view about the PDs.  Then I saw the Labour Party's posters this afternoon. Oh dear. At least with the other parties, you can tell at a glance what way they want you to vote. On the Labour Party poster, the word "yes" is in small print, and buried in a two-phrase slogan. (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Wednesday, May 14th, 2008
8:46 am	As my personal anti-contribution to "Say No To Ageism Week", I point you in the direction of some facts about how old John McCain is, compared with other things. For example, Alaska is younger than John McCain. And so is the Golden Gate Bridge. (Comment on this)
Saturday, May 10th, 2008
6:02 pm	Georgia  Getting a CD language course in Georgian in a Dublin public library is not an easy task. It doesn't help that the stock is limited and buried "in transit"; but the fun of identifying possible items is added to by the fact that a search for "Georgian" brings up the large stock of books on architecture. Oh, and I need to do some research on what wine to buy in what is the cradle of winecraft. (Comment on this)
Thursday, May 8th, 2008
9:40 am	Trust me, I protect your data. RTÉ reports today that the Data Protection Commissioner's Web site has been hacked, and that a document on it was obtained by a blogger before it was due to be released. Ouch. (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Tuesday, May 6th, 2008
4:22 pm	This small island: the top right-hand corner (on standard presentation) thereof The minutes of a meeting I was at recently stated that because of other developments, a DUP councillor needed to be replaced on the relevant board, and that NILGA would be contacted to get a unionist replacement. The Northern Ireland Lesbian and Gay Association seemed to be a particularly unsuitable organisation to ask for a DUP nominee, especially given Ian Paisley's "Save Ulster from Sodomy" campaign some years ago.  Then I realised I was confusing the Northern Ireland Local Government Association and the Northern Ireland Gay Rights Association. Not even the same acronym. (Also, I learnt that the topl-level Internet domain chosen by entities in Northern Ireland can be a sensitive issue. So it is not a huge surprise that the SDLP prefer an "ie" domain, and the DUP a "uk" one. However, the Northern Ireland equality and human rights commissions have both opted for "org" domains.) (Comment on this)
Thursday, May 1st, 2008
3:56 pm	Lesbian Three islanders from Lesbos — home of the ancient poet Sappho, who praised love between women — have taken a gay rights group to court for using the word lesbian in its name. Eh, a little bit late for that move, I think. (Comment on this)
Tuesday, April 29th, 2008
1:10 pm	Childher Mother to four-year-old as we descended to Dublin airport: "Put that seat belt on RIGHT NOW or the lady will put you off the plane." (Comment on this)
Thursday, April 24th, 2008
11:13 pm	Memory lane Eighteen years after I was first brought to it, I revisited the gay, vegetarian First Out Cafe in London. Ah, nostaligia: They were still playing Pet Shop Boys and Bronski Beat! (Comment on this)
Wednesday, April 23rd, 2008
10:39 am	Georgia on my mind (I suspect it is probably the other Georgia though.)  Elections will be held in Georgia next month (with any run-offs in early June). I've applied to observe. First hurdle is domestic shortlisting, and then selection by the OSCE. (Comment on this)
Tuesday, April 22nd, 2008
9:38 pm	Integration We don't have an integrated ticketing system for public transport in Dublin, but our great Minister has decided that while we're waiting on that we will have an integrated colour scheme. (Comment on this)
Sunday, April 20th, 2008
9:08 pm	Dial-up  So that's how is happened! (Comment on this)
Friday, April 18th, 2008
11:28 am	My country's (sort of) leaders I am glad to see that not all members of the Green Party are purists when it comes to recruiting. One of their youth wing gave some advice on how to go about recruiting people to the cause: During a discussion on how to attract more young people to the party, Louise Archbold of the Young Greens got a bit frisky. "When all else fails, we just put up some Eamon Ryan posters and watch the girls -- and some of the boys -- sign up," she said naughtily. ============= And then there's Michael Mulcahy, one of the Fianna Fáil TDs for Dublin South Central. A writer for GCN reported his experiences lobbying his five TDs on lifting the ban on same-sex marriage: Michael Mulcahy is my other Fianna Fail TD and he was a little more sinister. He called me on the mobile in response to my email and with the tone of an annoyed schoolmaster speaking to a stupid boy he pointed out that he agreed with equal rights but not equal marriage and that he was absolutely opposed to same-sex adoption. I pointed out that there were already children of same sex relationships, including relatives of mine, but he wouldn't respond to the point over the phone. He demanded a further written question on the matter. I duly sent him another email about children of same sex relationships but I have not had a reply yet.  He made an eejit of himself shortly after the elevation of Brian Cowen, and Miriam Lord reported it to the nation in the Irish Times last Saturday (subscription needed): [...] Take what happened on the Friday after Bertie's announcement. It had been confirmed that Brian Cowen was not going to be challenged for the Fianna Fáil leadership, and he was due to make a statement on the plinth.   Some of the party's photo-op jockeys lingered around the Leinster House car park, ready to jump in front of the cameras at a moment's notice.   Tánaiste Cowen's black Mercedes drew up at the Kildare Street gates, engine idling while the security ramps were lowered. A dark haired woman sat in the front seat beside the driver. She was the only passenger. Three heavily laden grocery bags rested at her feet.   Biffo's car purred slowly around the tarmac. Suddenly, a dark suited figure raced across the plinth.   The vehicle stopped at the main entrance. The man scuttled up to it at considerable speed. He made a grab for the passenger door. Did he open it? He nearly wrenched it off its hinges.   The female passenger shrank back in alarm. The man was grinning in at her like his life depended on it.   "Mary! Mary!" gushed the panting politician at the speechless woman, whose name is not Mary. "I've met you before!" Whereupon he made an energetic attempt to assist her from the car, despite being weak at the knees with excitement.   "Michael Mulcahy!" he trilled. "I've met you before!" The flummoxed catering staff member didn't know what to say. She had only popped over to Dunnes Stores to do a few messages. It transpires that Brian Cowen's driver was driving to the Dáil when he spotted her struggling along St Stephen's Green with her shopping bags. He stopped and gave her a lift.   And then the deputy for Dublin South Central jumped to the wrong conclusion.   It would appear the backbencher and practising barrister doesn't take much notice of the workers in Leinster House who do such an excellent job supplying him and his colleagues with their rashers, buns and gargle. Or perhaps it was a bout of interregnum hysteria that made Michael mistake the popular staffer for Mary Cowen, otherwise known as The Wife of Brian.   Still, Deputy Mulcahy's day wasn't entirely wasted. In the middle of his shameless overtures to the lady who is not Mrs Cowen, Mr Cowen pitched up at the plinth. Whereupon the gallant Mulcahy immediately abandoned the shell-shocked occupant of the Merc and sprinted off to Brian's side.   He finally got his reward: he appeared on the RTÉ news at 6pm, at his future leader's shoulder, smiling for Ireland.   (Comment on this)
Monday, April 14th, 2008
11:37 am	Italy votes Italy, noted for the instability of its governments since the Second World War, votes today and yesterday in a general election. But I bet that, whatever coalition is formed there, they won't see all parties in the coalition change their leaders within 12 months of the poll (which we here in Ireland have seen). (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Friday, April 11th, 2008
10:19 am	Promote that guy! I so want to see Dámaso Ruiz-Jarabo Colomer promoted to judge of the European Court of Justice. In his opinion as Advocate General of the court in the Maruko case, on pension rights under EU law, he reminds the court that "Don Quixote explained to the goatherds that the ‘order of knights errant’ was founded ‘to defend maidens, relieve widows, and succour the orphans and the needy’ (M. de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote, translated by J. M. Cohen, Penguin Books, Harmondsworth, 1986, The First part, Chapter XI, p. 87)" [from footnote 23 of the AG's opinion in the case] "That is why Sancho Panza complains to Don Quixote about the fact that he has not received the smocks which Altisidora promised him if he cured her: ‘Really, sir, I’m the most unfortunate doctor in the whole world. There are physicians who kill their patients and get paid for their trouble, though they do no more than sign a slip of paper for medicines which the apothecary makes up for them, and the trick’s done. Yet though bringing that maiden to life has cost me drops of blood, slaps, pinches, pricks and whippings, I don’t get a farthing…’ (M. de Cervantes Saavedra, op. cit., The Second Part, Chapter LXXI, p. 921)." [footnote 36] "In his 1975 film Love and Death, Woody Allen observes that there are homosexual people, heterosexual people and people who are not interested in sex at all and become lawyers" [footnote 86] (Comment on this)
Thursday, April 10th, 2008
4:49 pm	Note to Enda: And take YFG with you Young Fine Gael has produced posters for the Lisbon campaign. A male pos(t)er and a female poster. Oh dear. (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Wednesday, April 9th, 2008
9:52 am	I splutter in my cornflakes "Gay Rights Advocate Resigns as Irish Prime Minister" (Comment on this)
Monday, April 7th, 2008
2:21 pm	Parting message to Bertie Parting message to Bertie (wonder if I get a badge for this!) (1 Comment |Comment on this)
12:13 pm	I would love to have heard it Apparently, on a vox pop on RTÉ about our next Taoiseach, a Tullamore resident said that Brian "wouldn't be as suave" as Bertie. (Comment on this)
Sunday, March 30th, 2008
6:15 pm	My recent reading I may have noted before that one of the side-effects of doing the course was a drop in my ability to read a full-length novel. I think that skill was weakened by the system of reading a large volume of short journal articles in a constant hunt for the key point or argument and for comparisons and contrasts with other journal articles I had read. The one form of novel-length fiction I have been able to read is detective stories with a setting that is, for me and my background, "non-standard" is some way. The first of these were two books set in Athens (and available in English) by Petros Markaris (one novel has been published twice in English under two different titles -- I assume for the US(+) and UK(+) markets -- and unhelpfully, Amazon lists them as a two-book offer). Last year, I borrowed a Donna Leon novel from a colleague and since then have been going through the public library's stock. Her hero is a commissario of police in Venice. And last week I borrowed Law of Return by Rebecca Pawel from the library, which I started last night. I didn't finish ti today only because there was a family dinner! It is set in 1940s Spain, after the end of the Spanish Civil War and the main character is a right-wing police officer. (I discovered this afternoon that the writer is not Spanish.) (Comment on this)
Saturday, March 29th, 2008
6:14 pm	Lion Shit Amazon.co.uk notes that customers who bought lion manure also bought the DVD for Blood Diamond. (Comment on this)