John Ó'Ríordáns Blog

Myself and Lorri will be in Canada soon. I made this video, during an admittedly quiet weekend, to prepare my Canadian friends for the epicness of our arrival. :-) Best with sound

When I move to Canada I think I’ll miss driving on Irish Roads in the Spring.

Visited the small fun fair in Blackpool today. It could’ve been taken straight out if Fr. Ted.

I hear today that the Irish Banks now require over €70 billion of Irish Tax payers money to pay of their gambling debts. How nice of their buddies the politicians to volunteer my money to pay it. Maybe I’m wrong but I thought Irish banks were private companies. Why are they getting public money? Another private business would simply fold.

The first 2 minutes of this video sums up really well what else we could be doing with that money. Including sending half a million Irish people into Space. I know my girlfriend would love that.

This is why I’m moving to Canada next month. I’d rather pay tax in a country where my money goes to universal healthcare.

Looks like me The Dalai Lama & Gerry Adams will have to sort this place out.

I was out in Canada this weekend for a few drinks and the accent definitely attracts attention. Little did I know that the Irish accent is officially the sexiest accent in the world.

“There was a time when a Frenchman only had to order a pint of beer and women would collapse at his feet with desire. Well those days, they are, ‘ow you say, fini!

The Irish accent was yesterday voted the world’s sexiest – knocking the Gauls off the top spot they’ve held for decades.

Men with an Emerald Isle brogue, as promoted by stars like Colin Farrell and James Nesbitt, came top in a poll of 5,000 women worldwide.”

Why aren’t we doing this?

“Iceland’s special prosecutor into the banking crisis has confirmed that raids have taken place today and that arrests have been made. The Central Bank of Iceland is among the institutions under investigation.

Special Prosecutor, Olafur Thor Hauksson told Visir.is that house searches are taking place in at least three places today as part of investigations into the central bank, MP Bank and Straumur Bank.”

This is funny. The hard-line loyalist party founded by Ian Paisley was hacked recently by “Hector O’Hackatdawn” and translated into Irish. On one, Peter Robinson was shown introducing himself in the language.

“Is mise Peadar Robinson agus tugaim tacaíocht don Acht na Gaelige” is translated as “I am Peter Robinson and I support an Irish Language Act”.

My favourite DUP story was during the last election in the North. They used a stock photo that they got off the internet for their billboard ads asking people to vote for them instead of the Conservative Unionist Party. The Conservative party realised this and got a different picture of the same woman and used it for their ads with the line “Actually…on second thought…”. Classic!

The video below tells the story of a group of US soldiers who watched a game of hurling on their way back to the US from Iraq via Shannon. They were so impressed with the “warrior aspect” of the game that they started their own team when they got back to the US. In an area with no great Irish influence and no prior hurling team they founded a team with no Irish members. It shows that Hurling could be a much more popular game if promoted more heavily outside of Ireland. But that is very difficult due to the small numbers of people playing. Which is a real pity.

There was a documentary made by the US Military about these players which is well worth a look. You can find the video entitled “Two Fields, One Team” below.

Found on The Journal

I’m down in Millstreet for Christmas and the mother has no water. So it was off to a local volcanic well for me. My hand is freezing from submerging it in the water.