Review: “The Grapes of Wrath” starring Sorcha Cusack and Damian O’Hare

Apart from “I love you”, perhaps the most dangerous statement in the English language is “Things couldn’t get worse”. In my experience, uttering this phrase is an invitation for evil to arrive. Indeed, I have wondered if the present Prime Minister has said it more than a few times. Faced with a teetering economy, he […]

The Virtue of Silence

We live in an era that is addicted to communication. I thought about this last night whilst having a chat about talk shows: the person I was conversing with and I were disgusted that certain members of the general public are willing to divulge even the most gross personal details of their daily routine. For […]

Oh, Mandy

I’ve lately taken to referring to Gordon Brown as “Prime Minister Crackpot”. Part of it is due to his mad insistence on clinging to power when no one believes he can actually accomplish any further good. Beyond this, however, he has shown even greater signs of mental disturbance: for example, he has tried to squash […]

Iran’s Ceausescu Moment

Dictatorships are a waste of everyone’s time. There is no instance in which one has been imposed and it did not prove self-defeating in the end. Hitler thought he was building a Reich to last a thousand years; it lasted twelve. Germany afterward was a devastated country which was chopped into two and has lived […]

Michael Jackson Mania

As much as I would have liked to remain on vacation, it’s impossible to escape current events in this day and age. Switch off the television, and news pursues one onto the radio. Turn off the radio, and there’s the internet. Unplug the computer, and there are the news stands. And then, even if one […]

Keep Calm and Carry On

I recently purchased a new mobile phone; generally speaking, I’m not one of those people who needs to replace his handset more often than he replaces his socks. However, I managed to save a fair amount of money on my monthly bill in the process and thanks to its wi-fi connectivity, now I am never […]

Prime Minister Faustus

As a supporter of the Green Party, the results of the Local and European elections have rather been like receiving the same birthday present for the second year running, with the exception of getting a nicer card to go with it; it’s an indication that one is more well regarded, but the overall utility of […]

The Verdant Revolution

One of my favourite words is verdant. In order to spare any readers the agony of consulting a dictionary, the word is defined as: 1. green with vegetation; covered with growing plants or grass: a verdant oasis. 2. of the color green: a verdant lawn. 3. inexperienced; unsophisticated: verdant college freshmen. All three definitions are […]

Review: “Cyrano de Bergerac” starring Joseph Fiennes

It’s atypical to write a review of a play after it closes: perhaps such an item bears closer resemblance to an epitaph. However, it’s impossible for me to let a production of Cyrano de Bergerac to pass unnoticed. I admit this is partially due to the fact that I am a Cyrano aficionado: this work […]

Happy Birthday, Charles II

I heard on radio this morning that today, May 29, is the anniversary of the birth and accession to the throne of Charles II, King of England, Scotland and Ireland between 1660 and 1685. In this instance, the mention was just a preface to playing a piece of music from the period; however, I had […]

Me And My Blog

Picture of meI'm a Doctor of both Creative Writing and Manufacturing and Mechanical Engineering, a novelist, a technologist, and still an amateur in much else.