Picture by Doc Kazi There’s nothing like a laugh to set you up for the weekend. Here’s a heading from the BBC News website: “Queen Nazi salute film: Palace ‘disappointed’ at use.” It’s impossible to dispute that the future Queen Elizabeth gave a Nazi salute, and her sister, and her mother and her uncle, the […]
July, 2015
PALATABLE PALLETS by Harry McAvinchey
Right ! It’s time now to get down to brass-tacks . No more fudging or shilly-shallying .No more let the dear little half-wits have their huge bonfires and gradually burn the entire country to the ashes. I’ve seen the stacks of pallets that are annually consumed by flames in Norneverland. Never mind, the so-called […]
MPs’ £74,000 and the independence of IPSA
Picture by Ifeng 1014 Should MPs accept their pay-rise? The Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority says they should get a 10% raise, placing them at £74,000 a year. There has been huffing and puffing about this occurring at a time when civil servants will be lucky to get 1%. Some MPs have announced loudly that they […]
‘Is a ‘Twelfth’ free from sectarianism possible?’ by Declan Kearney
Declan Kearney is Sinn Féin’s national chairperson [Brief disclaimer: this is indeed not strictly speaking a guest blog – the piece below appeared in An Phoblacht earlier this week. But I think its argument merits consideration. – Jude] NUMEROUS Eleventh Night bonfires across the North are now bywords for sectarian hate crime – pure […]
FIRE AND WATER by Harry McAvinchey
Fire and water means something very different in the land of Norneverland. True to its name things are very different in this Magic Land Of The Absurd.Some believe , for example that the place is as British as Finchley although most of the denizens would scratch their heads in wonder at that statement, not knowing […]
The Twelfth period: a triple whammy for unionism
In the vivid if somewhat coarse wording of The Thick of It’s script-writers, this has been a cluster-fuck of a Twelfth for unionism. First there was the bouncy-bouncy dance of the Finaghy True Blues in Donegall Street, then the alleged murder attempt on the life of a young woman by car-driver and Orangeman John […]
The Twelfth period: a triple whammy for unionism
In the vivid if somewhat coarse wording of The Thick of It’s script-writers, this has been a cluster-fuck of a Twelfth for unionism. First there was the bouncy-bouncy dance of the Finaghy True Blues in Donegall Street, then the alleged murder attempt on the life of a young woman by car-driver and Orangeman John […]
DEMONISING CULTURE? WHAT’S WRONG WITH A FEW DEMONS? by Harry McAvinchey
We are in the middle of our annual summer season in Norneverland . Schools are closed at the end of June in readiness for the sunshine and celebrations to come. I’m sure the school -children in the rest of the UK look on with some jealousy as their own British summertime doesn’t begin until the […]
Burning the evidence
Last year around this time an effigy of Gerry Adams was hung from a bonfire. Mr Adams, I believe, asked his solicitor to report the incident to the PSNI on the grounds that it was a hate crime. Odd – I don’t remember anyone being prosecuted for that over the last twelve months. Do you? […]
INTO YOUR ARMS I WILL RUN by Randall Stephen Hall
INTO YOUR ARMS I WILL RUN. https://soundcloud.com/randall-stephen-hall/into-your-arms-i-will-run-13-7 When I was very young my brother had several Cowboy annuals. I still have a few of them. They were created and illustrated in England, looking to America, with tales of the Wild West. They were very vivid and bold looking with bright colours. They took […]