ONE of this country’s most eminent judges once acted for me in a libel case. I had published a book about famous Irish murders, and, in my account of one of them, had accidentally side-swiped an innocent bystander. Said innocent bystander happened to read the reference in the book and sued me.

‘Two or three decades of formidable theatrical achievement is more evanescent than the froth on a cappuccino: half-remembered moments in the memories of committed older theatre-goers, but no contemporary currency at all.’

On the topic of carbon offset, would someone mind telling me why it’s legal to sell leaf-blowers, which use enormous amounts of petrol, polluting the atmosphere for several square kilometres, to disarrange fallen foliage which cries out for a sweeping brush, a rake and a bag?

Even when they’re a bit fractious, the worst option on a long flight is not a toddler.

Terrorism has transformed air travel into a bloody nightmare.

The immediate payoff for not having to invest each week in stickers for a wheelie bin is small but tangible.

Stigmatising those with HIV is the current manifestation of an unchanging human reality.

Fianna Fáil no longer wants nor needs one-party government.

Fine politicians like Denis O’Donovan were not the only ones to lose out in the election. Bookmakers lost out, too.

Not many experiences can be as brutal as having to speculate for viewers as to what the voters found rejectable about you and being cut off in mid-confession by a rake of statistics.