New figures reveal an increase in unemployment for July, Irish Water meet with stiff resistance in Cork as defiant residents block meter installations, a young woman tries to chop off one of her own fingers in a desperate bid to end chronic pain and an NCT tester is sacked over a breach of its code of integrity. Here’s today’s lunchtime irishexaminer.com round-up.

Tough choices ahead as back-to-school bill rises; Video footage emerges of giant Minion ’attack’ on Dublin; and Irish actor Pierce Brosnan tried to bring a knife on a plane. Here’s this morning’s irishexaminer.com round-up.

A big-game trophy collector from Idaho has ignited a firestorm of criticism from animal-rights activists for flaunting images of herself posing with the carcasses of a giraffe and other wildlife she killed during a recent guided hunt in South Africa.