Finished Citizen of Earth by Joseph Kassabian this week. Excellent #ScienceFiction #MilSciFi. This is book I of his Galaxy on Fire series, started into book II now and its super. Great characters, great setting, and great action. It's a cracker.
The island of Haulbowline is filled with history. Each stone and step, every nook and cranny, from the lowest ebb of the tide on now silent slips, to the lofty reaches of the visual signaling tower. This rich history can fade into the background, drowned out by the hustle and bustle of the modern age.... Continue Reading →
Got to read 'Steelmaking and stories from Haulbowline' by Jim Shealy this week. A really great book capturing the stories of generations of hard working men & women who made a life for themselves and their families from working on Haulbowline in Irish Steel. The extensive use of oral history adds, as always, an element... Continue Reading →
Got to finish 'Gleanings from Cork Harbour' by Anne Mc Sweeney this week. It's a fascinating read, Full of interesting stories about this wonderful harbour. Thoughtful and touching, capturing lots of snapshots of the smaller histories & details which add to the great richness of the place we call home. Plenty of copies to be... Continue Reading →
I had the great pleasure to take part in the Making a Living Podcast with Brendan Fitzgerald. On Brendan's own YouTube channel you'll find this information: "MAKING A LIVING WITH BRENDAN FITZGERALD", THE PREMISE - Choosing the right path for our future is never easy and the more insights we can gain from people who... Continue Reading →
Reproduced here with the kind permission of the Editor of An Cosantóir, this is my article which featured in Special Commemorative Edition on the occasion of the Naval Service 75th Anniversary. The celebration of the 75th anniversary of the Naval Service is a milestone in the long and rich history of service. No celebration could... Continue Reading →
Reproduced here with the kind permission of the Editor of An Cosantóir, this is my article which featured in Special Commemorative Edition on the occasion of the Naval Service 75th Anniversary. They were the ships onboard which a generation of sailors came of age, and they lead the way for others to follow. Built in... Continue Reading →
Did the souls of boys,Cut down in France,Come home again,To rest in lush ditches,By English country lanes,As bright summer poppies, So, each year unending,Free to dance once more,Joyful remembrance blooms,Heedless of the rush,Of passing motorcars,In home-counties soil, Red now their clothes,Heads sway rejoicing,On wildly weaving stalks,Stout-hearted amid weeds,No brown wilted youth,Inside worn frames, Ebullient life... Continue Reading →
Curvature of Cork,breaking free of static lines,blending ancient bridges,with sharp edged blocks,scraggly trees,and pavement gazing pedestrians. Rushing head long,into the event horizon,when distant melts,will raise the waters,wash out the swamp,for a final time. Pleas will be hurled,prayers incanted,as the great and good,are carried downstream,like petrified timber,ripped from the Gearagh. Concrete and brick crumbles,high tide lines... Continue Reading →
New Triangles. Wear the new triangles, Behind the chain-link fences, Orchestra of crying children, Dread anthem of the summer sun, Separate the little ones, No need to sew the yellow to their shirts, They wear their badge forever, On their skin, Build the wall and mend the wire, With bricks of fear send it higher,... Continue Reading →
Oh much maligned & ignoble art, Of this our long suffering craft, Lead me not unto defenestration, Though hard indeed is this draft, With bungled grammar & punctuation! by Ruairí de Barra
Twelve feet above the deck,The smell can make you gag,Five hundred salt water soaked,Unwashed humans in forty degrees, Make a few bad jokes to cover up your shame,That your stomach churned at scabies riddled teenager,Sunglasses will hide guilty eyes,To mask your revulsion, Overcompensate later by giving an extra ration,To a brown-eyed child,Draped from shoulder to... Continue Reading →
Paper Never Refused Ink! 
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