Pro-choice supporters outside the Irish embassy, Grosvenor Place, in the last few minutes.
Via Elise Williams
Update:
A pro-life vigil outside the embassy tonight.
Via Clare Thanks Stuart
Fairly impressive, in fairness.
And the boat’s quite special too.
What!?
North Wall Quay, Dublin, this afternoon.
Via Sarah Francis
Ian Cairns [via BS app] sez:
Sizzling.
Yes.
We, too, have Gloria Estefan & Miami Sound Machine on cassette.
Pro-lifers and pro-choicers on Kildare Street, Dublin, this evening.
The vote on Protection of Life During pregnancy Bill is expected anywhere between midnight and 5am.
(Sasko Lazarov/Photocall Ireland) and Eoin Conway (last pic)
George R.R. Martin, author of A Song Of Ice And Fire (of which Game Of Thrones is the first volume) blogged recently about the Iron Throne he actually imagines when writing:
It doesn’t exist. I made it up. I said it was made of melted swords, but really, it was made of words, like all such fictional constructs. Ah, but it’s real to me.
However, pointing to the above illustrations by Marc Simonetti he sez:
This Iron Throne is massive. Ugly. Assymetric. It’s a throne made by blacksmiths hammering together half-melted, broken, twisted swords, wrenched from the hands of dead men or yielded up by defeated foes… a symbol of conquest… it has the steps I describe, and the height. From on top, the king dominates the throne room. And there are thousands of swords in it, not just a few. This Iron Throne is scary. And not at all a comfortable seat, just as Aegon intended.
Of the Iron Throne featured in the HBO series (above) he sez:
The HBO throne has become iconic. And well it might. It’s a terrific design, and it has served the show very well. There are replicas and paperweights of it in three different sizes. Everyone knows it. I love it. I have all those replicas right here, sitting on my shelves.And yet, and yet… it’s still not right. It’s not the Iron Throne I see when I’m working on THE WINDS OF WINTER. It’s not the Iron Throne I want my readers to see. The way the throne is described in the books… HUGE, hulking, black and twisted, with the steep iron stairs in front, the high seat from which the king looks DOWN on everyone in the court… my throne is a hunched beast looming over the throne room, ugly and assymetric…The HBO throne is none of those things. It’s big, yes, but not nearly as big as the one described in the novels. And for good reason. We have a huge throne room set in Belfast, but not nearly huge enough to hold the Iron Throne as I painted it. For that we’d need something much bigger, more like the interior of St. Paul’s Cathedral or Westminster Abbey, and no set has that much room. The Book Version of the Iron Throne would not even fit through the doors of the Paint Hall.
Decisions, decisions…
Choc Ice or Brunch?
Lucinda Creighton and Senator Paul Bradford outside Leinster House this afternoon ahead of the vote on the Protection of Life During Pregnancy Bill.
(Sasko Lazarov/Photocall Ireland)
Update:
Fine Gael TD Peter Mathews this afternoon.
(Sasko Lazarov/Photocall Ireland)
Including some unfinished Magdalene business.
Document here (click on E under ‘List of Issues’ in the row for Holy See).
UN rights body poses tough questions to Vatican over child abuse (Reuters)
UN questions Vatican over child abuse cases (BBC)
Previously: Cardinal Brady: More Than Just A Note Taker
(RTÉ)
Thanks Edel
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This may be interesting.
“The administrators of Quinn Insurance have been given the go ahead to serve a summons on PricewaterhouseCoopers, the former auditors to the collapsed insurance group.”
“The President of the High Court, Mr Justice Nicholas Kearns, gave his consent after a short hearing this afternoon where he was updated on the administrators’ preparations for the huge commercial action.”
“The collapse of Quinn Insurance is expected to lead to drawings on the Insurance Compensation Fund of in the region of €1.6 billion and has prompted the Government to establish a 2 per cent levy on all home, motor and commercial insurance policies.”
Quinn Insurance to sue PwC for damages (Colm Keena, Irish Times)
Sam Boal/Photocall Ireland
