Sunny Tuesday

A beautiful day here today plenty of sunshine and pure blue skies. Can't say there wasn't a cloud in sight but you get the picture. The tourist season is in full flight as it should be by this time of the year. There is a glut of visitors at the end of July beginning of August time but by this early next month it will have all dropped off. Traffic jams, no parking, queues in the shops, packed footpaths all part of daily life for the next three weeks and we should be glad of it too. Tourism is the lifeblood of our town and without it the winter would be very long indeed. We all get annoyed at our town being taken over but we have to remember how important to our economy tourism is. More importantly these people are on their holidays and have to be treated as we would like to be on ours. As I say tourist numbers will drop off anyway in a months time, not too drastically thankfully as our tourist season is almost at the all year round stage which is a great boon to the town. The great thing, or one of the great things, about living here is that people visit from all round the world. Its great that friends and family come to visit lessening the burden on us having to travel to see them! In fact I've met people I haven't seen in twenty years  just by the chance that they came here on holidays. What is true for our little town is the same for the country all over. Tourism brings in a shed load of money for very little outlay and the more than can be done to attract them the better it will be for the country. Failte Ireland or whatever the marketing people call Bord Failte these days should realize that tourists love our two greatest natural resources...the people and the scenery. A photo of Paddy and Brigid sitting at Slea Head looking out on the Blasket Islands will bring more in than any "focused campagn" ever will!

TV:

I'm still watching Frasier. Its on nightly on Comedy Central and no matter how many times I've seen each episode I still laugh as if its the first time. Its nearly ten years now since it finished but its still streets ahead of most programs for consistently good lines and acting. Hopefully I'll still be enjoying it in another ten years.