A definite shortage of bunting in Dublin 6 this morning but that’s no more than I expected. Ireland has been a republic since 1949, after all. Neither did I expect to see anything of The Wedding because we don’t have a television. My plan was simply to buy a copy of Hello mag next week…

Holy Friday. I should probably abstain from blogging as well as everything else but I’m sitting here, waiting on a phone call and, well, you know… In Ireland it’s called Good Friday of course, and is one of the two days of the year when the pubs don’t open. A strange locution, Good Friday. I…

  I’ve had a couple of conversations this week about my modus operandi. One of my readers rightly pointed out that I’m a classic case of Little Red Hen Syndrome. LRH, you may remember from bedtime stories of yesteryear, thought it would be neat to bake some bread and all her farmyard pals thought so…

Yesterday one of our new granddaughters was christened. If I make it sound as though we have new granddaughters lined up like DC10s on Runway 1 at Heathrow, that’s not far from the truth. After the ceremony we all trooped back to young Emily’s house for lunch and there we were confounded to find the sitting room curtains tightly closed. Outside…

Today is Handel’s Day in Dublin. April 13th 1742 was the day Messiah premiered at Neal’s Music Hall and Dubliners never let a year pass without marking the occasion. There’s a lot going, not least the customary lunchtime performance of an abridged version in Fishamble Street, right by the site of the old concert hall.  Neal’s Hall is…

April, when normal people haul out the lawnmower and pull the tarp off the patio chairs but Panto Folk start thinking about… their next costume. Yes, the Pantalon Players are at it again. Teatro Avogaria, Venice, January 12th to 14th. If you’ve had trouble getting tickets for Tosca wait till booking opens for this hot little…

  We saw off Tom on Monday morning and very lovely it was too, from the cardboard and rope coffin in dark racing green to Geoffrey Burgon’s setting of the Nunc Dimittis. Sandwiched between the eulogy and St John 11:17  a tenor sang Tom Bowling, a song that would be my undoing on the happiest of occasions.…

This week Baroness Neville-Jones, our Minister of State for Security and Counter-Terrorism spoke about her vision for the future of British society. Muslims, she said, must be made to feel they have a long-term stake in the country. Funny. I have the impression that’s the very thing they’re already confident of. I have the impression…