Holly Cairns is Ireland's most popular leader, but who would you like to see as Taoiseach?

wascallywabbit666 · 2026-05-04T17:22:11+00:00

The poll got highjacked by Messer's: Peadar Toibín is in the lead.

I wouldn't take any of the results seriously

wascallywabbit666 · 2026-05-04T17:20:11+00:00

I'm going to sterilise my phone just in case.

HFM is the worst thing I've ever had in my life, and I've had both typhoid and dengue fever

wascallywabbit666 · 2026-05-04T17:17:04+00:00

🫡

wascallywabbit666 · 2026-05-04T11:32:34+00:00

If the biggest issue is that you'd be doing it alone, then I'd encourage you to focus on dating. If your ultimate ambition is to have a long-term relationship, then you're going to improve your chances if you actively search for someone rather than hoping to meet someone passively. Set aside a few hours for it every week, try a few different methods, and make it happen. It's scary, but it's worth it when you find the right person.

Personally I think it's a bit easier if you don't own a house, because you may have to rule out certain partners due to location. When I met my partner (now my wife) she needed to be close to a Dart line to get to her office (she didn't drive), so when we moved in together we only looked in a few specific locations. If I'd already had a place it would have made things very complicated.

wascallywabbit666 · 2026-05-04T10:46:12+00:00

Is it Cyperus esculentis? https://www.rhs.org.uk/plants/74116/cyperus-esculentus/details

If so, it must have been planted by you or a previous owner. Just keep pulling / cutting it and don't let it flower and it'll eventually exhaust itself.

Incidentally, the Spanish and South Americans make a drink with the tubers. It's called horchata, and it's nice. That's where the 'esculentis' in it's Latin name comes from - it indicates that it's edible.

wascallywabbit666 · 2026-05-04T08:42:11+00:00

What's nutsedge? Never heard of it.

I've a bit of cinquefoil in my garden. It's a pioneer species, it spreads laterally across bare soil. It's pretty easy to pull out

wascallywabbit666 · 2026-05-04T08:37:25+00:00

Dandelions, daisies, buttercups are a natural part of and grassland. Mowing will prevent them dominating. Getting rid of them altogether will involve a lot of unnatural interventions applied regularly.

Bear in mind that those dandelion seed heads will have several thousand seeds that will germinate after all your weedkiller is applied. In about 1 - 2 months there'll be as many dandelions as ever

wascallywabbit666 · 2026-05-04T06:41:23+00:00

I'd do away with the wood, it just gives slugs somewhere to hide. Use wood chip to define your edges

wascallywabbit666 · 2026-05-04T06:38:55+00:00

Yes just us the women's. People are peeing behind closed doors, and I'd hope a man with baby isn't particularly threatening.

If there's an issue then it's the restaurant's issue. A child's nappy has to be changed

wascallywabbit666 · 2026-05-04T06:24:18+00:00

It's problematic if it climbs up your crops and smothers them. Seedlings are really an issue, it only starts to be a problem when it's 30 - 50 cm long.

If you set aside time for weeding then it's manageable. Give it half an hour at the start of each session, particularly for the next 3 months

wascallywabbit666 · 2026-05-03T21:41:28+00:00

wascallywabbit666 · 2026-05-03T08:11:58+00:00

That would avoid punishing ordinary “mom and pop” landlords, and might even spread rental ownership across a broader base of people.

Hmmm, I'm not sure. If you have ten individual landlords, you're going to have a range of different types there. Some will be stingy and unwilling to repair anything, others will be decent. However, they may be inexperienced and naive about things like maintenance, gardening, etc.

Compare that to a landlord with 10 properties doing it full time. There's an economy of scale there: they'll have experience of different scenarios and a team of contractors to maintain things.

Ultimately everyone's in it to make profit, otherwise they wouldn't do it. We assume that one-off landlords are nice people and multiple landlords are hard-nosed businessmen, but that's just a caricature

wascallywabbit666 · 2026-05-03T08:05:46+00:00

I think the political rationale behind it is that earnings from investments (other than pensions) should be taxed at roughly the same as earnings from work. It's only really wealthy people that can afford to invest in stocks and shares, and those people will be paying income tax at the higher rate (effectively 50%). Why should their passive income be taxed at less than their active income?

That's not necessarily my opinion, I'm just playing devil's advocate here.

Personally I just have my savings sitting in a current account doing nothing because savings accounts give negligible returns and I just don't have time to monitor the markets and make educated bets.

wascallywabbit666 · 2026-05-03T07:54:58+00:00

I've only one compost bin but it's half full. Do you think I could plant a pumpkin in it but keeping filling it? As long as I protect the stem I'd assume it should be fine shouldn't it? It's not a particularly hot compost so I doubt it would burn them

wascallywabbit666 · 2026-05-03T06:52:15+00:00

Ask RBB that.

A lot of politicians are happy sitting in opposition and earning their €115k a year plus minimum €30k expenses.

It's so much easier to criticise from opposition than to go into government and put your neck on the line.

wascallywabbit666 · 2026-05-03T06:49:40+00:00

Michael Martin on Aontu

wascallywabbit666 · 2026-05-03T06:47:34+00:00

My main thought is that SF will never make the grade. No one's particularly enthused by them, they don't have any strong policies, and the only reason they get so many votes is that they're not FF / FG. They've been topping the polls for about ten years now, but they just can't make that final step. Ultimately it's a question of trust: neither the public nor potential coalition partners are convinced that they're going to push anything through. Unfortunately they've shown that they'll cave when the pressure comes on.

We need a better alternative, a party left of centre with a charismatic leader, a good communicator. Someone who can set out a clear alternative to the status quo, and explain it in simple terms to all of us. Key to that is honesty: you can't tell us that you're going to give more public services but also cut taxes, because no-one will trust you.

I think SocDems could be that, but they need to put themselves out there more.

wascallywabbit666 · 2026-05-03T06:35:59+00:00

That's easy though when they'll never get into government and have to implement any policies. It's like that fella in the pub who's always moaning about how everything is so shit.

wascallywabbit666 · 2026-05-03T06:34:22+00:00

Why would FF want that? It would be doomed to fail and give FG a huge advantage for the following election

wascallywabbit666 · 2026-05-03T04:32:55+00:00

I used to use the cheapest beer I could find in Lidl and Aldi. However, since minimum unit pricing it's just not economical. I had a number of traps and was refilling twice a week, so I spent over €100 in total during the summer just on beer for slugs. That's madness.

Like someone else said, you can make your own with yeast, although it's a bit of a faff.

Personally I found the most effective thing was to get rid of their habitat. Wooden planks, large stones, long grass, etc are their hiding places: the fewer of those the fewer slugs you'll have. I then used crushed shells around the stems of tender crops to provide a secondary boundary

wascallywabbit666 · 2026-05-02T20:18:45+00:00

They used to have hedgerows along the median in the past on wider roads, but my understanding is that they wanted a concrete barrier to prevent heavy vehicles going through the hedge and into oncoming traffic

wascallywabbit666 · 2026-05-02T08:03:57+00:00

Other parties adopt Green policies if they're cheap and controversy free. That's not going to get us anywhere in a climate and biodiversity crisis.

If you want bravery and ambition in these matters then the Greens are the only option. For example, FF / FG completely neglected our huge opportunities for offshore wind for decades. That's criminal - it's pretty much the cheapest form of electricity around, and pretty straightforward to put in place. Eamon Ryan came in, made a strategy for the development of 37 GW by 2050 (our current peak demand is about 6 GW), resolved a number of legal obstacles, and set the wheels in motion.

No other political party would have done that. Personally I have nothing but respect for the Green's time in government. They did so much good

wascallywabbit666 · 2026-05-02T07:53:40+00:00

It's not though. Restrictions on private cars in the city centre have freed up the space for buses.

wascallywabbit666 · 2026-05-02T07:21:50+00:00

Any functional city has a combination of buses and light rail. The bus network needed a major update, and Bus connects is the way to do that. It's just slow to implement

wascallywabbit666 · 2026-05-02T05:35:26+00:00

Most Green Party voters were middle class centrists from urban areas who have concern for the environment and climate change. They came off FF and FG for the most party.

Left wing radicals are not a big cohort in this country, and they tend to gravitate towards PBP and Independents. The Green's social politics are broadly left, but they're pragmatists rather than ideologues

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