Funny men make the cats laugh

THEY can tackle hecklers like they were bowling pins and deliver punchlines to the back of the net with pinpoint accuracy, but the skills of Ireland’s comedians proved a little less sharp on the football pitch.

The annual Comics Festival Football Match played in Kilkenny yesterday as part of the Murphy's Cat Laughs comedy weekend saw the Irish take on the rest of the world and present no real threat of global domination.

A 5-3 drubbing left them resigned to the fact that the day job suits better and the tens of thousands who flocked to the comedy capital for the ninth Cat Laughs festival couldn't agree more.

Ticket sales for the mixed bag of stand-up, improv and other comic presentations were up 20% on last year, making it the biggest so far, and with a day of laughter to go yet and the sun making a scorching late appearance, previous attendance records are set to be shattered.

"It's unprecedented," said festival spokesman Kevin Fitzsimons. "The weather, the turn-out, the line-up it's turning out to be just wonderful and everyone's loving it."

Elsewhere, summer made a guarded rather than grand entrance over the weekend but the turn of the calendar into June territory was sufficient to put the nation in sunshine mood as crowds flocked to a host of festival and fun events across the country.

Despite rain in the west, the only blues at the Castlebar Guinness Blues Festival were in the title. Oblivious to the showers, crowds queued outdoors to get into a multitude of free gigs in the town's pubs where bands from the US, Britain and Ireland performed. Of the paid events, the box office was under pressure from demand for tickets for the annual Blues Ball in the Royal Theatre which, like any self-respecting ball, defied the Cinderella syndrome and kicked off at midnight this morning.

The fun was repeated at arts, music and community festivals in every province, with Co. Cork hosting the Bandon Music Festival and the Festival of the Galtees in Mitchelstown while Drogheda and Carrick-on-

Shannon staged arts festivals and Bruree and Leixlip also officially welcomed summer with local festivities. Racing in Tralee and Naas also drew out the crowds while the Leinster senior football double-header at Croke Park ensured the capital wasn't entirely devoid of life while much of the country took to the roads for the great bank holiday getaway.

Much of the festival fun continues today while those seeking more exertion than relaxation have the Dublin Women's Mini-marathon to look forward to. More than 35,000 women from all over the country will take part this afternoon, mostly for the benefit of charities, making the event the biggest of its kind in the world.

The weather is expected to be reasonably kind, and to open air events in most places, but heavy showers will break the sunshine in spots, particularly in the east and northwest.