Eimear_homepage

Irish-British writer Eimear McBride has won the inaugural £10,000 Goldsmiths prize for her “boldly original and utterly compelling” novel A Girl is a Half-Formed Thing, which was originally rejected by publishers for being too experimental.

Eimear McBride wins £10,000 Goldsmiths prize for literature (Guardian)

Wonderful.

One of our own and a credit to her –

“Being an Irish woman I am very interested in issues around sexuality. Growing up there as a female was a very difficult thing.” The utterly apposite term “girleen” which recurs in her book encapsulates perfectly these attitudes – the double diminutive speaking volumes.

McBride spent four years in Cork. This was not without its own difficulties. She found our second city very insular and clannish. “It was very hard to get to know people. If you weren’t related to them or went to school with them they didn’t want to know”. Also, her dealings with the local arts scene didn’t go too well: “everyone is so bloody territorial, nobody wants to help anyone else out”.

Ah.

Sunday Times Culture, November 3 via Ardmayle

Thanks Shayna

brand

On Wednesday evening social media was buzzing with rumours that the comedian Russell Brand had visited a loyalist protest camp in North Belfast.

It has been confirmed to BBC News NI that the visit did take place but no one on Russell Brand’s team wished to comment.

The visit was organised by Nobel Prize winner Mairead Corrigan Maguire.

Loyalists have been protesting out at Twaddell Avenue since July following a decision to restrict an orange parade.

Meanwhile, new subtitled footage (above) has emerged from his recent Newsnight interview with Jeremy Paxman.

Russell Brand visits loyalist protest camp at Twaddell Avenue, Belfast (BBC News NI)

ChristinaHess1ChristinaHess3ChristinaHess4ChristinaHess2ChristinaHess5ChristinaHess8Joan of BarkMarie Antoinippe
Illustrations by Christina Hess : Cat Queen (Elizabeth I), Napoleon Boneapart, Cleocatra, Jizo Bodhissatva, Henry V, Bruno The Brave, Joan of Bark and Marie Antoinippe.

(Yes, we’re aware that Bodhisattva and Joan of Arc were not monarchs. We just like the art.)

MORE: Historical Figures Playfully Portrayed as Cats and Dogs
(My Modern Met)

(H/T: Joanne)

revscam

Alan Mc writes:

“A new Tax scam site is up: itcrevenue.net. Sending out a text message saying to go here for a tax refund and to enter in the ITC code they have sent. Friend just got it sent to them”

Anyone tempted?

Update:

From de Revenue:

Anyone who receives an unsolicited text message purporting to be from Revenue and suspects it to be fraudulent or a scam should simply delete it. Anyone who is actually awaiting a tax refund should contact their local Revenue Office to check its status. Please see our Security page for further information.

 

Text Message Scam Warning (Revenue.ie)

 

optical-illusion-wriggling-dotsThe ‘Wriggling Motion Trajectory Illusion’ – recently discovered by three scientists at Keio University in Japan.

Every white dot you see in the six looped sequences above is moving in a straight line. They are neither swerving to avoid one another, nor colliding.

When hundreds of dots move in straight trajectories and random directions without colliding, the trajectories are perceived as wriggling rather than straight. We examined the nature of this “wriggling motion trajectory illusion” via six separate experiments. The illusion was most pronounced when there were a large number of dots. The illusion was independent of both the distance covered and the observer’s eye movements as well as the dot types. We also showed that the proximity among the moving dots plays a role in the illusion.

Full scientific paper here.

ohgizmo/sploid

Broadsheet.ie