THE MAGPIE:PITY THE poor unfortunate Mexican chef who recently attempted to enter the UK illegally by claiming he was visiting a friend who owned a Mexican restaurant.
He was sent back home after immigration officials found a huge collection of Mexican food recipes and a good luck card for his “new life in the UK” in his luggage when he landed at Manchester airport.
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YOU KNOWthat things are getting really desperate when governments start scrimping on trinkets for the pensioners.
In Japan, for instance, as part of an economy drive, the government is cutting costs by reducing the size of the silver cups traditionally presented to citizens who reach 100.
Last year 19,769 people reached triple figures in the world’s most-rapidly aging country, compared with only 153 in 1963, the year when the cups were first presented.
The cups, presented each year in September, cost about €70 each and the plan is to cut the diameter from 10.5 to 9cm.
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THIS INTERNETthing is getting out of hand. In a recent survey in Germany, 84 per cent of respondents aged 19-29 said they would rather do without their current partner and their car than forego their connection to the internet.
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MAGPIE SUSPECTSthat someone in our diplomatic mission to the US might very much like to give up the internet after a recent and, amusing, little faux pas.
“New York CG [consulate general] would like to recall the message,” ran the intriguing subject line of a hurriedly dispatched e-mail the other day to some Irish-American media organisations. “PRESS RELEASE” it continued “Taoiseach looks forward to meeting with President Obama on St Patrick’s day. Close Guantánamo”
As a mole explained to a Magpie: “The perils of using a previous e-mail list with unrelated heading in subject bar!”
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BEST THINGon YouTube this week may be found by searching "Fianna Fáil, nine news". Up will pop that amazing February 28th 9pm RTÉ news broadcast from the ardfheis by David Davin-Power, surrounded by a clutch of our ruling party's finest. Clever clogs privatjoker285 and AssetTracker (dunno who did it first) overlaid much of DDP's broadcast with that great banjo and guitar riff from Deliverance.
The effect is gombeen muppets from hicksville go cyber . . . It’s had over 15,000 views and the viewer comments are almost as good as the video.
No deliverance from that lot in sight. Sadly . . .
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The other YouTube offering worth a dekko is George Karellas of Bettystown’s video application for the Best Job In The World (we’re back on the Great Barrier Reef again). George is the sole Irish person short-listed (with 49 others), each of whom has done a 60 second video about themselves.
George gabbles on about himself – and can he gabble – “10 years in media . . . writing scripts . . . it’s eezy-peezy,” he says quite engagingly. Lack of self-confidence is not one of our George’s handicaps.
His pitch might work too. As of last night he had over 7,000 wild card votes, in fourth place behind Clare from Taiwan with 37,352 votes. George needs help from at least 31,000 Irish Timesreaders.