Terry Prone reflects on our over reliance on technology and why instant messaging does not make us productive.

IF the neighbours weren’t used to it, they’d demand the destruction of my house. It is one of the ugliest buildings in the neighbourhood. In fact, it wins the prize for being ugly, leaky, and disfunctional.

The concept of the “must have” died off a bit during the worst of the recession. The “must have”, back in the days of disposable income, was a dress, pair of shoes or handbag advertised as such, in a catalogue or by a web retailer.

I WANT a mini. A mini car, you’ll be relieved to learn, not skirt. I really want a Mini. I have no chance of achieving a Mini. If the force is with me, I might be able to afford one in four years’ time, but financial constraints don’t stop me looking at that ad of the Minis, falling domino-fashion, and picking out the one I’d like to be driving tomorrow.

I had this client due in for a breakfast meeting the other day. A powerful and important woman, this client, albeit possessed of such physical fragility she looks like she eats a single rusk once a fortnight. She clearly needed building up, so I started to cook breakfast for her.

EVERY week, another report surfaces which establishes that the more time you spend on Facebook or Twitter, the more likely you are to be an unhappy, nail-biting paranoid.

A CHEF clutching a cluster of small copper saucepans is part of the promotion for the new four-part series about the Shelbourne Hotel being broadcast by RTÉ.

The recession and his degree arrived more or less simultaneously, so he went overseas for a job, landing in Wales. He was going to be part of a new wave of diaspora, connected by Skype but spun loose and lost to us, despite that.

Now that the Labour Party has had a good long look at its navel as part of its elongated but deeply democratic leadership election process, is there any chance they might get up on their hind legs and address the one issue that surfaced, and re-surfaced, constantly, in a form of unchallenged stereotypy, throughout the contest?

SO there I was, last Friday, ready to put on a Viking helmet and leap into one of the amphibious craft that were used to land GIs on the Normandy beaches during the Second World War.