Recent columns | Jim O'Brien

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May 6
3 min

Still stranded without landline

We have reached the end of our tether with Vodafone and ComReg. In early February I wrote a piece about difficulties we are having with...

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Jim O'Brien

Apr 28
3 min

A legacy with strings

There was a time when the only legacy that mattered was one that could be calculated in acres of land or bundles of cash. Mercifully, we...

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Jim O'Brien

Apr 19
3 min

When tomorrow comes now

For the procrastinator tomorrow is a great day, but sometimes it comes too soon. I have been talking about getting the exterior of the...

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Jim O'Brien

Apr 13
3 min

Punctuality - nature or nurture?

Punctuality is much regarded in highly organised societies. There is great admiration for the man or the woman ‘you could set your clock...

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Jim O'Brien

Apr 13
3 min

Our rural future

There is always a lift to the spirits after Easter - daffodils, primroses and buttercups bring a badly needed splash of colour to field,...

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Jim O'Brien

Apr 13
3 min

Pull over, lads!

I’m reading the first instalment of Barack Obama’s memoirs at the moment. Entitled ‘A Promised Land’ the book is over 700 pages long, not...

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Jim O'Brien

Mar 28
3 min

Waiting my turn

I remember being out for a pint with a friend, in the days when such things were possible. We sat at the counter in a local hostelry...

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Jim O'Brien

Mar 28
4 min

Vaccine envy

I am told by those who are or were teachers that the optimum time to get consensus in the staffroom is September. Over the years, many...

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Jim O'Brien

Mar 10
4 min

Rumblings in the gastronomic memory

Every now and again a cry goes up urging us to go back to basics, a move trumpeted as the antidote to everything that ails us. I must...

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Jim O'Brien

Mar 10
4 min

The Human Touch

The current consort and I have become so accustomed to our nightly commute from the dinner table to the television, I’m wondering if we...

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Jim O'Brien

Mar 10
3 min

The winds of change

After the pub, the forge was probably the most popular gathering spot for men in rural Ireland. At the forge you could laze around with...

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Jim O'Brien

Mar 10
4 min

Retail Therapy

I shop for clothes once a year, and only wish my visits to the dentist were as infrequent. An afternoon during the January sales will...

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Jim O'Brien

Mar 10
4 min

Shop around? Be warned!

We are constantly advised by consumer gurus to shop around for goods and services and make a switch when we get a better deal. That’s all...

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Jim O'Brien

Feb 3
4 min

Poitín, a vaccine for the ages

A note from the ESB told us we would be without power for a few hours on Wednesday last. Even though we had time to prepare, when the...

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Jim O'Brien

Jan 27
3 min

The Power of Words

It was a fine autumn afternoon in 1969, the schoolyard was full of whooping children enjoying the two o-clock break. I should have been...

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Jim O'Brien

Jan 18
3 min

One day at a time

There is no such thing as a slow news day anymore, something momentous is always happening. Every day there appears to be a reason to run...

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Jim O'Brien

Jan 18
3 min

The right time will come

It is only the tick of a clock, a blip on a digital screen, the twitch of a second hand that takes us from one year to the next. Every...

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Jim O'Brien

Jan 18
3 min

Missing the communal bits

There was a beautiful yellow flower growing in the lawn during the summer. It bloomed in the morning but disappeared every afternoon at...

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Jim O'Brien

Dec 15, 2020
3 min

The great silence

Over two Monday nights I watched that excellent two-part television programme, The Hunger: The Story of the Irish Famine. Broadcast on...

6 views0 comments

Jim O'Brien

Dec 15, 2020
3 min

Haunted by If Only

Apparently many of us wake in the night and obsesses over things we can do nothing about. It’s a common affliction, this descent into a...

4 views0 comments

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