I remember when August 15 was the turning point in summer. A last festival, both holiday and holy day. It was the end of the builders’ holidays (and for lots of other businesses that closed for the first two weeks in August, too).

ON radio yesterday morning, Olivia O’Leary, who chronicled his era in power as a political reporter, recalled the time she danced with Albert Reynolds. He was, she said, a great dancer.

IT is hardly credible that the hue and cry in the aftermath of the Savita Halappanavar tragedy was to legislate for the X case.

The national conversation about 1916 is starting in earnest. What did it mean then; what does it say about us now?

SELF-AWARENESS is a virtue that should never, ever be taken too far. It can trip over into insanity.

BRIAN Purcell has taken a bullet for the State twice in his career. Once, when he was near the bottom of the pile, as a young official in the Department of Social Welfare, he refused payment to an applicant for the dole. That claimant was the notorious Dublin gangster, The General. Purcell was kneecapped for his troubles.

How do we restore trust in and credibility to our institutions, asks Gerard Howlin?

SODDEN, wet feet in smelly socks and squelching shoes remind me of secondary school.

IN A media-obsessing today about a government reshuffle, it is worth remembering that policy not personality matters most. There are exceptions. Some personalities are so strong that for good or bad they become the policy issue.

SUNNY DAYS, a World Cup, Gay Pride, and Mrs Brown’s Boys D’Movie have come together to melt the national mood. Nothing much — let alone anything fundamental — has changed, but the public spirit has lightened a little, for now.