Evelyn Cusack for President

Evelyn Cusack. Isn't she just class? The epitome of straightforwardness. Last night she was being interviewed on the radio about the current inclement meteorological conditions. Asked about the outlook, she said it was going to be very cold. Her interviewer didn't seem to hear the boul Evelyn when she said it would be cold for the next week and a half. The interviewer said, "so it's going to be cold for the next few days". Evelyn's response was cool and matter-of-fact: "Eh, it's going to be cold for the next ten days." She had all the enthusiasm on this occasion of a snail preparing for a race against a hare. But she told it as it was.

No fudge. No bull. No nonsense. Just plain old straightforward honesty. Evelyn is not in it for the popularity contest. Nope, she just wants people to know about the weather, even if the weather's gonna be dire.

She could run for President, you know. Or even better, Taoiseach. She's a million times more intelligent than most politicians, and she might have told us exactly how it was months ago, unlike the current Government incumbents who seem to be clueless about the state of the economy and bereft of decent ideas to fix it.

Crucially, she might show a bit of honesty about the economic forecast. This time last year, some so-called "experts" were predicting the economy would pick up in six months or nine months. Now, we're hearing it might be a year or two. But let's be honest, anyone who has any clue about economics knows that, after a prolonged boom, recession is inevitable. And recession is no light rain shower. No siree. It's more like a continuous band of depressions cycling in from the Atlantic. If Evelyn was our leader, she might give us a more realistic, albeit somewhat gloomy, forecast. She might say we're in for five or six years of it. At least she'd be honest about it, even if her chances of being re-elected were severely damaged in the effort.

A few days before Christmas, Evelyn was being interviewed on 2FM and was asked what the chances were of a White Christmas. There might have been a hundred thousand people listening, or a lot more, and many kids besides. But here was no-nonsense Evelyn delivering the facts again.

"Eh, about zero percent chance," she told her enthusiastic audience, dashing all their hopes in four words and an "eh".

Well how could she be expected to say anything else? It was, after all, going to be about ten degrees celcius on Christmas Day. It would take the magic of an articifer god like the Gobann Saor to make it snow in ten degree heat. Certainly such a miracle is beyond my magic, and I am, after all, the chief of the gods.

You know, if we'd had Evelyn as our seer during the Táin Bó Cuailnge, we might have had a better chance of knowing how the battle was going to go. Our own prophetess was a bit of a tuppenny chancer. She would have made a great politician. Talked out of both sides of her gob, and never told us anything meaningful. Always playing to both sides. Put it this way, you wouldn't want to be asking her the winning Lotto numbers.

Snow

Hello there all and sundry and welcome to my new blog. My name is Lugh of the Long Arm from County Louth. If you've never heard of me, then here's a short description. Allow myself to introduce . . . myself, as Austin Powers would say. I am Lugh Lamhfada, Lugh of the Long Arm, and I've been hanging around these parts for the past few thousand years. I am probably most famous as a leader of the Tuatha Dé Danann and even more famous as being father of that little pup Cúchulainn, who goes around the place killing animals with his big stick and balls. County Louth is named after me. I am known also as Lugh Samhildánach, the "master of all arts", although to be honest I never counted journalism among my many skills. Still, nobody's perfect, not even an ancient Irish god.

Anyhow, I've learned English at last, having been speaking the native teanga for three thousand years, and I've finally caught up with the internet revolution. This is my place in cyberspace. I see an awful lot of stuff happening in my native county, and I'm not always too enamoured by what I see. So consider this my little commentary on worldly matters from this, my home, the Sidhe, in the Otherworld. It's a nice place here. I'd love to tell you how to get here but really that would be boring you.

I see it's snowing on my beloved county right now. While the snow is not "sticking", as they say, in Dundawk or Drawda, it appears to have created a nice little winter wonderland in places like Collon, Dunleer and Monasterboice. My advice is, if you have to use a car to get home and not the old-fashioned Iron Age chariot, do take care. Those roads are dangerous. Although not nearly as dangerous as the idiotic drivers who use them most of the time. Back in my day, there was a famous road leading north out of Tara called the Slighe Midluachra or something similarly unpronouncable. Fine thoroughfare it was, until some day some wise ass decided to build a "street" on part of it and called it "Clanbrassil Street". It's never been the same since, if you ask me.

Word is Dublin Airport is closed because of the old sneachta. Now that bothers me. No, not the fact that the airport is closed, but rather the fact that people have learned how to fly. There was a time when only the Tuatha Dé Danann could fly. Oh, and those feckers the Fomorians. Now everyone can come and go as they please, on these big fancy metal conveyors with wings. I'd love to know who this "Ryanair" fellow is. Is he one of the Fir Bolg, or perhaps a Fomorian. If he's a Milesian, I might worry though. They did defeat us after all, and cast us into the underground chambers until the end of time. Strong fellows from Spain they are. I reckon though that Louth would have the beating of them in a game of GAA. No problem. Sin é, as they say.

Well, not quite. You see I reckon this snow must be somehow connected with this big "Recession" that's going on. To be honest, I don't know what all the fuss is about. One of my spies tells me that lots of people are losing their jobs. Well, who wants to work anyhow? I hang around in the otherworld, courting fine maidens and gobbling down pig meat and swilling fine ales, and I can highly recommend it as a full-time occupation. If so many jobs are in jeopardy, why doesn't everyone just ask Ryanair to fly them to jeopardy?

Anyhow, enough rambling from me. There's a beautiful maiden sitting here singing up to me, so I'd better log off and tend to her needs, if you get my drift. Drift, get it ? Snow-drift? Ah, never mind ...

In the meantime, keep up with events in my home county by visiting www.dundalkdemocrat.ie