Meanwhile…
Tomorrow Tonight.
A lockdown series.
Dan Boyle (top right), Green Party councillor in Cork City and a Broadsheet columnist, previews tomorrow’s front pages.
Clockwise from top left: Neil Curran, Marco Dias, Vanessa Foran and Derek O’Donoghue
Indeed and you probably are.
Broadsheet on the Telly returns at 9.30pm streaming LIVE above and on our YouTube channel.
Join old friends, new pals and our pets as we discuss the news of the week.
PLUS!
Vanessa Foran writes:
Sharon Lawless (right) of Flawless films is back with us as a special guest to talk about her upcoming two part documentary on Fr Niall Molloy (left) and his still unsolved murder for RTÉ…
Hosted by Neil Curran.
Hot Wheels
at
Behold the 2017 Alfa Romeo Disco Volante Spyder – one of 15 special edition ‘modern interpretations’ of the legendary 1952 Disco Volante experimental racecar. This vehicle, with a 450bhp Ferrari-derived 4.7-litre V8 engine and a six-speed paddle-shift transaxle was the last of seven based on the original Competizione Spyder.
With one careful owner and a modest 3,540km on the clock, it’s yours, complete with car-cover, documentation and its own bespoke luggage set, for an unspecified amount, on request.
This afternoon.
SAGE expert Professor John Edmunds warned most curbs on daily life are likely to be in force until the end of this year, while less restrictive curbs — like face mask wearing on public transport and indoors — could possibly be in place ‘forever‘.
The London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine epidemiologist issued the stark warning as he suggested a variant of the virus detected in Bristol had the ‘potential’ to reinfect vaccinated Britons. He said it could be ‘very dangerous’ to the UK’s mammoth jab drive if the mutant strain was allowed to spread around the country.
Inconsistent
at
Breeda Murphy – Second Best
Cork singer/songwriter Breeda Murphy has an important message to anyone doubting themselves in these times: don’t feel like you’re second best.
Her new single wears its Jamaican influence on its sleeve. Producer Kenny Dread “pulls out the stops with old school B3 bubbles, skank guitar, and an African style Rhodes piano line”.
Nick says: Murphy’s lure.
Taoiseach Michael Martin with Fergal Keane on BBC News today
This afternoon.
In a wide-ranging interview with BBC News, Taoiseach Micheál Martin said:
“I worry a bit about the post-Brexit noise from EU member states towards Britain and vice versa.
“I would tell one or two of them that they need to cool it, dial it down.
“This isn’t an ongoing battle between the UK and some of the bigger beasts of Europe. Let’s move away from that. They need to cool it. We’ll be collateral damage in all of that.
“Everybody needs to cool it a bit.”
Meanwhile…
He also indicated that any extension to the grace period for the NI protocol would be for a matter of months – “It can’t be a year,” he said.
The taoiseach also spoke about tensions in loyalist areas over the NI protocol and Irish Sea border in recent weeks.
Mr Martin said: “I don’t think the threats were as real perhaps, as might have been suggested, but you can see how it can tip over very quickly. And therefore we have to be very, very vigilant that it doesn’t,” he said.
He also talked about fears that such tensions could lead to a return to sectarian violence in Northern Ireland.
“If we handle this the wrong way, and if things are handled wrongly, you could provoke that response” he said.
Meanwhile…
Asked about the possibility of a border poll to decide the political future of the island of Ireland, the taoiseach said:
“If we just see this as a simple numerical majoritarianism, we’re going backwards, not forward. And I don’t believe the future of the island of Ireland is about majoritarianism.”
He said it would be a mistake to have a border poll in the next five years.
Brexit: Micheál Martin calls on ‘big beasts’ of EU to ‘cool it’ (BBC)
Pic: BBC
Behold: M53, aka NGC 5024 – one of the Milky Way’s 250 surviving globular clusters – a cosmic nightclub filled with stars, among them, late arrivals to the party, clearly under the influence of recent ‘refreshment’. To wit:
Most of the stars in M53 are older and redder than our Sun, but some enigmatic stars appear to be bluer and younger. These young stars might contradict the hypothesis that all the stars in M53 formed at nearly the same time. These unusual stars are known as blue stragglersand are unusually common in M53. After much debate,blue stragglers are now thought to be stars rejuvenated by fresh matter falling in from a binary star companion. By analyzing pictures of globular clusters like the featured image taken by the Hubble Space Telescope, astronomers use the abundance of stars like blue stragglers to help determine the age of the globular cluster and hence a limit on the age of the universe. M53, visible with a binoculars towards the constellation of Bernice’s Hair (Coma Berenices), contains over 250,000 stars and is one of the furthest globulars from the centre of our Galaxy.
Melon-twisting full sized image here.
(Image: ESA/Hubble, NASA)
The Mandalorian actress Gina Carano has been fired by Lucasfilm and her talent agency UTA following a series of “abhorrent and unacceptable” social media postings: https://t.co/qUr1REkKGn pic.twitter.com/Bvozphv9lw
— Consequence of Sound (@consequence) February 11, 2021
Learn her that will.
Gina Carano Fired from The Mandalorian Following “Abhorrent” Social Media Posts (COS)
This impressive stretch of ‘metalled’ surfacing – cobbling – has been newly revealed as part of the preparatory works for the redesign of Wolfe Tone Park – formerly the graveyard of St. Mary’s Church. It appears to be sited in the middle of Stafford Street on Rocque’s 1756 map. pic.twitter.com/5Wbjkyq652
— Dublin Civic Trust (@dubcivictrust) February 10, 2021
Jervis Street, Dublin 1.
Lovely cobblework, in fairness.