The voice came back at the weekend, thank you. And if you were one of the people who telephoned me last week and could hear nothing from my end of the line but heavy breathing, I do apologise.

Frank Luntz, the American pollster, pitched up on RTE One’s The Week in Politics programme last night, to take the political focus group — famously described by Bill Clinton as “a bunch of bull” — to a new and exciting level.

THERE I was last week in Court 5, the traffic offences boutique, clutching my receipt, ready to prove I’d sent €500 to a charity of the judge’s choice after my last visit to his emporium.

This Monday morning, in common with most email users, I will weed my way through offers of shareholding in companies so hot, they’ve doubled in value over the weekend, through offers of prescription painkillers sent in plain wrappers and through promises that my sex life will be vastly improved once I buy the product guaranteed to give me a bigger penis.

THE timing was ironic on many fronts. He died in his sleep, 17 years to the day after the Berlin Wall came down.

We’re a rotten shower. We think about nothing but money. As long as we get bigger and bigger salaries to pay for our SUVs, we don’t give a sugar about climate change.

Alcohol companies are in the business of shareholder value, like every other kind of company.

I RECENTLY was lent a baby overnight. This baby was distinguished by a sunny disposition and a willingness to give everybody and everything the benefit of the doubt.

WHEN Michael McDowell removed his teeth from Bertie Ahern’s leg long enough to whisper “We’ve survived,” it was an awful let-down to two groups.

It may not apply across a broad media front. It may not even apply right across the Irish Examiner’s front. A lowly columnist cannot be held responsible for what news editors and leader writers decide.