Love In A Covid Climate dating site forum from the Lockdown Sceptics website

Oh.

This afternoon.

Seeking a rebellious mate?

Following criticism at the launch of a dating section on his ‘Lockdown Sceptics’ website…

…site founder Toby Young writes:

After I was contacted by the Evening Standard asking me to comment on the “adverse reaction online”, I had a chat with the Forum moderators.

Should we abandon the whole idea?

Would it be too much work to constantly weed out the pranksters, particularly if “Love in a Covid Climate” attracts a bit of publicity?

They heroically concluded it would not and set to work tidying it up. I can’t promise that no hoaxers will get through from now on, but we should be able to spot them fairly quickly.

Since we cleaned it up “Love in a Covid Climate” appears to have taken off, with plenty of legitimate users now posting messages. And I’m happy to weather the Twitter storm if readers think it’s a useful service.

The most common barbs revolve around the fact that lockdown sceptics are more likely to have the virus than other people, making them extremely unappealing as potential romantic partners.

I even got an email from a reporter at the Guardian asking me to respond to the charge that the forum could spread coronavirus and harm the individuals involved…

FIGHT!

Love In  A Covid Climate (Lockdown Sceptics)

Meanwhile….

“I don’t want a sterile world.”

Cheryl, a photographer from the Cotswolds, England asks covidly: how do you survive ‘without meaning’?

In fairness.

Your Style, Your Story

Irish-made stuff to broadsheet@broadsheet.ie marked ‘Irish-Made Stuff’. No fee.

Celebrations for The Feast of the Assumption, which attracts more than 20,000 people to Knock, County Mayo every year, have been cancelled

Going to Knock?

Not so fast, pilgrim.

Via RTÉ

In a statement the rector of Knock Shrine, Fr Richard Gibbons, said the Co Mayo venue will not open for the Feast of the Assumption on 15 August due to the escalation of the virus around the country.

Fr Gibbons said during discussions with church and State bodies it was decided the shrine did not have the resources to deal with the large numbers of people expected.

He said: “As the National Marian Shrine, we have been extra vigilant in living up to our responsibilities amid this pandemic in placing people’s physical and spiritual well-being to the fore.”

Knock Shrine to close for busiest day of the year over virus fears (RTÉ)

Pic: Knock Shrine

Together Animals – Kings And Queens

“We were kings and queens; we were idols.”

The second single from the forthcoming debut EP by Together Animals (comprising Dave, Chris, Hank and Paul) is an amped-up rocker that has an important message about melancholy and redemption.

The thought-provoking video features “a King and Queen leaving their castle behind them as they wander through a dangerous wilderness, plagued by dark forces and lost souls”.

Nick says: Animals magnetism.

Together Animals.

We never see Saturn presenting a crescent phase from here on Earth. What you need is a spacecraft. To wit:

This image of crescent Saturn in natural colour was taken by the robotic Cassini spacecraft in 2007. It captures Saturn’s rings from the side of the ring plane opposite the Sun — the unilluminated side — another vista not visible from Earth. Visible are subtle colours of cloud bands, the complex shadows of the rings on the planet, and the shadow of the planet on the rings. The moons Mimas, at 2 o’clock, and Janus 4 o’clock, can be seen as specks of light, but the real challenge is to find Pandora (8 o’clock). From Earth, Saturn’s disk is nearly full now and opposite the Sun. Along with bright fellow giant planet Jupiter it rises in the early evening.

(Image: NASA, ESA, SSI, Cassini Imaging Team)

apod

Dublin-born Elizabeth Anne Dwyer and her son Morrissey

At the weekend.

“With this broken voice I beseech you, my friends, to offer prayers of hope and prayers of intercession for the recovery of Elizabeth Anne Dwyer [born in Holles Street Hospital, Dublin] who is my mother, who is in trouble, and who is the sole reason for all the good and motivational things in my life.

I ask particularly my friends in Chile, Mexico, Italy, Peru, Paraguay, Brazil, the United States, Ecuador, Israel and Ireland to offer their prayers for Elizabeth – for she is all I have, and our collective pleas of petition might wake the sleeping gods.

She is me, and without her vahaan koee kal hal … there is no tomorrow. I ask no more of you… for there could be no more to ask.”

Steven Patrick Francis Morrissey. August 8.

Elizabeth Ann Dwyer (Messages From Morrissey)

Well the price of thon is a terra, in fairness.

What!?

Shut yer beak.

Why are you talking like this…

I’m totally scundered.

Sorry?

Blootered. Pure wick so it is.

OK.

Did i come down the Lagan in a bubble?

I have literally no idea how to respond.

Etc.

Earlier: Masks Or Chokey?