Dennis Deery

Last night we were treated to a tour of one of three working oats mills in Ireland, Flahavan’s in Kilmacthomas, about 20 miles from Tramore. The mill has been in the same location, owned by the same family, for over 200 years, though none of the original buildings survive. Flahavan’s own about 56% of the market for porridge oats in Ireland. Their staff of around 45 people produces rolled oats, cereals, flour and snack products, turning out 2-3 tons of product per hour.

I must say, one of the things I really enjoy in Ireland is the many foggy days we get. True, after 4 straight months of rain this winter, it did get a bit old. But nothing beats a good foggy day for picture taking, especially in an ancient landscape. Click here for slideshow

A company called Moixa is offering batteries with a built-in USB connector for charging. They’re not cheap, but given that you don’t need to carry a separate charger, they’re a great solution for people who travel with a digital camera and a laptop. Check them out.

469 candidates vying for 165 seats - wow! Candidates don’t have to live in the constituency (district) where they’re running for office. So, some candidates can’t even vote for themselves - Taoiseach Bertie Ahern is one example. There has been no television advertising during this race - I’m assuming it’s against the law. The signs - man, it’s hard to describe how many signs are up around this country.

Today was election day in Ireland for national offices. People are headed to the polls to elect their local Teachta Dail (similar to U.S. Representatives). Because Ireland has a parliamentary system, this election will also decide, somewhat indirectly, who will run the country for the next few years. Citizens will elect the members of the Dail Eireann, the national parliament. Members elected to the Dail will then caucus to determine which parties will control the government.

According to researchers at North Carolina State University and University of Georgia, as of May 23 the earth’s population is now more urban than rural. As the imbalance shifts even more towards urban, it’s going to become incredibly difficult for rural areas and people to bring their issues to the forefront. Story

U.S. News & World Report has published a listing of the favorite books of several of today’s business leaders. Lots of good stuff here. Read the story.

Forbes.com has a great collection of articles where some of today’s best thinkers discuss the role that networks - both electronic and otherwise - play in our lives. Definitely worth reading! Special Report - Networks: Breakthroughs

Management guru Tom Peters has a great list of his favorite books up on his blog. I’ve read a few of them, and am currently working on the wonderful The Black Swan by Nassim Nicholas Taleb. I’ll have a write-up on that one when I finish it.

This past weekend Kath and I went exploring an area called The Burren in the western part of Ireland. The Burren is named from an Irish word that means “stone place”, and that’s what it is - mile after mile of stone-covered landscape. It’s really an interesting place, and contains a lot of different plant types. I’ll let the pictures speak their thousands of words on this one, rather than trying to describe it.

Our month-o-visitors continued with my sister Kathy, her husband Tim and my two nieces Caitlin and Brianna coming to Ireland. Our timing was just about as good as you could get it. I dropped the Peltons off on the departures level of Dublin Airport, went downstairs to the arrivals level and met the new arrivals just a few minutes later, while Kathleen scurried home to Tramore to ready the guest rooms.

So it seems that the first of March kicked off tourist season here at the Deery getaway in Ireland. Our first visitors were friends Mark and Shaun Pelton from Reedsburg, Wisconsin. We’ve learned from our own experience, and that of visitors, that when folks arrive first thing in the morning, it’s best if we can keep them up most of the day. With that in mind, we ran some errands in Dublin before heading out to take the long way home to Tramore.

Centuries of hatred give you ears that cannot hear An eye for an eye, that was all that filled their minds Another eye for another eye, til everyone is blind* There Were Roses, by Tommy Sands So a few weeks ago we decided to head for Brussels for the weekend. Instead we ended up in Belfast - ask Kathleen… We’d (okay, I’d) been wanting to get to Belfast since we got to Ireland.

The day we flew home from our Christmas visit to Wisconsin, we had the pleasure of meeting my niece Meghan coming in from her short visit to Germany. On break from school at UW-Platteville, she of course had to take advantage of the chance to visit Uncle Dennis and Aunt Kathleen while we’re overseas (just as I visited her mother in Germany when I was in college!). We were happy to have more company as it gives us the perfect excuse to get out and do more exploring here.

Last weekend we headed for Kildare, a town about three hours north of here, near Dublin, for the Féile Bríde, the Feast of St. Brigid. St. Brigid is often called the female St. Patrick, she is the second patron saint of Ireland. Brigid lived in Kildare in the 4th century, and the Brigidine Sisters this year celebrate 200 years since the founding of their order. We learned about the festival late in the week, and so missed several of the events.

The Christian Science Monitor has an interesting article today on Ireland’s Gaeltacht (Irish-speaking) areas. Click here to read it, then come back here for my thoughts on the subject. As mentioned in the article, Ireland is officially a bilingual nation, with Irish (you may know it as Gaelic) being the primary language. The overwhelming majority of the population however speaks English on a regular basis. All government materials, including road signs, are published in both languages.

Many pubs here offer regular traditional music sessions, or “trad” sessions, and we’ve been happy to find several close by. Our closest pub, O’Neill’s Bar, has a session every Thursday night, and we’re doing our best to become known as regulars. The awesome winds we’ve been experiencing here finally took their toll on the electricity distribution system, and we spent part of the evening tonight without power. Though our power was restored after only a half-hour or so, we were still without streetlights, and a glance down the street showed much of the town was still waiting for power.

Late this evening another Irish fishing trawler sank, this time near Wexford, about 40 miles up the coast from here. The trawler was participating in the search for one of the boats that sank last week. Thankfully, the two crewmen onboard were able to abandon ship in a life raft, and were rescued by a helicopter from the Irish Coast Guard.

I’ve commented before about the incredible wind and waves we’ve seen on the southeast coast this winter. What I don’t think I’ve mentioned is that many of the coastal villages in this area are fishing villages. As you might guess, that combination can often spell tragedy, and that’s been the case over the last few days. Last Wednesday night and Thursday morning, two fishing trawlers sank just north of here. Two crew members from one of the boats were rescued after 20 hours in a life raft, while two of their crewmates and five crewmen from the other boat are still missing and presumed dead.

Upon our return to Ireland, the first newspaper I picked up, the Irish Independent, had this headline on the front page: “US experts hired to fight the ‘dirtiest’ election ever” Ah yes, wonderful. We had the good fortune to leave the States before the worst of the election ads hit the air, but it seems the tactics are going to follow us. From the article: *“THE two main political parties have signed up US experts to fight the dirtiest election campaign of modern times.