Saturday, April 30, 2005
river fest and budweiser global beats!!
Or maybe that should be Budweiser global beam em ups if things get out of hand , just like the good old days of the 2fm beat (em up) on the street that used happen at taits clock!! But anyway i digress.... its a bank holiday and after an excuse for a piss up last year over the may bank holiday weekend when all the hoo ha was going on about the entry of 10 new countries to the eu, its back and bigger than ever. Budweiser Global Beats - Limerick 05 will see 33 live concerts take place in 12 city venues over four days of the bank holiday, beginning on Friday April 29. Also look forward to RiverFeast, the world BBQ Cook-Off that will be served up with help of the Irish Barbecue Association’s Pat O’Sullivan. "Last year’s RiverFeast was a tremendous opportunity for interaction between Limerick people and the 50 nation’s involved, and opportunity for all nationalities to meet around a real barbecue fire and cook food”. There is a french village around Bank Place and other stuff going on includes River Shannon-agans which will showcase activity with the Irish Army, UL Kayak Club and St. Michael’s Rowing Club, the highlight of which will be an exhibition from Limerick’s Olympians, Sam Lynch & Andy Lee in competition with members of the Munster Rugby Team.Other events will also take place at the University Concert Hall, St.John’s Church, the Belltable Arts Centre and Dolan’s Warehouse.The Festival finale is a spectacular river Fireworks display at Steamboat Quay on Monday 2nd May. Some photos will follow
the weekly Limerick round up
Things are still relatively quiet in Limerick at the minute but there is plenty of activity happening down around the local courthouses according to the papers. Some of the highlights include a man who pleaded guilty to robbing an off licence on the ennis rd who got 8 months at the states leisure in mulgrave street after he "apologised profusely for his actions”. A young lad carrying a walking stick in Moyross which had a detachable 12 inch sword hidden inside got six months he maintained that it was just an ornament! Other events of note include the finding of a big lump of cannabis worth a few hundred thousand euro (maybe a very big lump!) in a field at Cappantymore in Meelick on the outskirts of the city.
But all of this pales into signifance with the big event of the week, yes you guessed it, the truck that ground the city to a halt last Tuesday morning. In another sure sign that the road network is badly fecked if anything goes wrong around town, most of the city ground to a halt because the shannon bridge was closed from just after half six in the morning until after 3pm. A man driving a cement truck had a bit of a wobble and the truck overturned, thankfully it didnt land on anyone. The truck which contained dry cement had to have the powder vacuumed out of it before it could be turned upright and then the roads had to be cleaned.. much bitching by irate drivers later, things returned to normal!!
Friday, April 29, 2005
jim mcdaid eat your heart out
...or skull pints until you drive around a roundabout the wrong way!! but just be thankful that the garda helicopter which apart from keeping loads of people and children awake any time it comes to town isnt yet being used to enforce traffic laws like in england....read on
The fictional police spy helicopter from the movie Blue Thunder is taking a big step toward becoming a reality. Police in the UK have successfully tested a 160 MPH helicopter that can read license plates from as much as 2,000 feet in the air. The Eurocopter EC135 is equipped with a camera capable of scanning 5 cars every second. Essex Police Inspector Paul Moor told the Daily Star newspaper: "This is all about denying criminals the use of the road. Using a number plate recognition camera from the air means crooks will have nowhere to hide."
The use of Automated Plate Number Recognition (ANPR) is growing. ANPR devices photograph vehicles and then use optical character recognition to extract license plate numbers and match them with any selected databases. The devices use infrared sensors to avoid the need for a flash and to operate in all weather conditions.
Within the U.S., two cities are using the technology in a device called "Bootfinder" to identify and tow vehicles with unpaid parking tickets or even overdue library books. One woman's car in Connecticut was towed out of her driveway because she had $85 in unpaid parking tickets. Legislation is pending in Texas to allow the use of RFID to scan and ticket passing motorists who have expired automobile insurance.
Originally intended to detect stolen vehicles and cloned cars, ANPR is increasingly being used in the UK to issue tickets. For instance, drivers who have expired insurance face a £200 fine or if they haven't paid their car tax, they face a £60 fine. In 2004, ANPR teams stopped 180,543 vehicles and issued 51,000 tickets for offenses including failure to wear a seatbelt, use of a mobile phone while driving, and various insurance and road tax infractions.
Jaysus, what would happen the poor boys in the local traffic corps- i dont know are there any ditches up in the sky that they could hide behind with their magic hairdryers, but theyre a crafty bunch so i am sure they could come up with something!!
The fictional police spy helicopter from the movie Blue Thunder is taking a big step toward becoming a reality. Police in the UK have successfully tested a 160 MPH helicopter that can read license plates from as much as 2,000 feet in the air. The Eurocopter EC135 is equipped with a camera capable of scanning 5 cars every second. Essex Police Inspector Paul Moor told the Daily Star newspaper: "This is all about denying criminals the use of the road. Using a number plate recognition camera from the air means crooks will have nowhere to hide."
The use of Automated Plate Number Recognition (ANPR) is growing. ANPR devices photograph vehicles and then use optical character recognition to extract license plate numbers and match them with any selected databases. The devices use infrared sensors to avoid the need for a flash and to operate in all weather conditions.
Within the U.S., two cities are using the technology in a device called "Bootfinder" to identify and tow vehicles with unpaid parking tickets or even overdue library books. One woman's car in Connecticut was towed out of her driveway because she had $85 in unpaid parking tickets. Legislation is pending in Texas to allow the use of RFID to scan and ticket passing motorists who have expired automobile insurance.
Originally intended to detect stolen vehicles and cloned cars, ANPR is increasingly being used in the UK to issue tickets. For instance, drivers who have expired insurance face a £200 fine or if they haven't paid their car tax, they face a £60 fine. In 2004, ANPR teams stopped 180,543 vehicles and issued 51,000 tickets for offenses including failure to wear a seatbelt, use of a mobile phone while driving, and various insurance and road tax infractions.
Jaysus, what would happen the poor boys in the local traffic corps- i dont know are there any ditches up in the sky that they could hide behind with their magic hairdryers, but theyre a crafty bunch so i am sure they could come up with something!!
da bould Michael
just catching up on a few things...
seeing as this blog is all new and shiny, there are a couple of events from recent times that need to be discussed.. one of which are a few quotes from someone never short of a word or two, the one and only boss of ryanair - otherwise known as "the vomet comet" Michael O'Leary. Da bould Michael was invited by some of the intelligent life forms that inhabit UL these days to pass on a few words of wisdom, and one of his favoured topics was the Shannon stopover.. In a form of words that surely would not really delight SOS (save our stopover) and all those orther organisations down the years camapaigning for it to be kept ,the Ryanir boss believes that Shannon Airport should abandon the stopover and instead concentrate on winning business from mainland Europe and Britain.
"Tell them you don't want it," said Mr O'Leary. "Transatlantic will never be a large market for Ireland or for Shannon because it takes about eight hours to get here."
Good one Michael- but it only takes five if you're coming from the states and the wind is behind ya!! He also hasnt much regard to History and Shannons proud record of the past.......
"I don't give a s**t if they invented Irish coffee in Rineanna or if Maureen O'Hara flew through here 50 years ago. What I care about is the loss of tourism business," he said.
Always good for a quoteis Michael, meanwhile reports that Irish Coffee was indeed invented in Rineanna have not been yet confirmed!! And just to prove that he does know what he's doing, he also pointed out that since Ryanair's 14 new routes to Europe went on sale on the airline's website three months ago, there have been 350,000 bookings made, a large proportion of which have been from Europe and Britain.
"Tell them you don't want it," said Mr O'Leary. "Transatlantic will never be a large market for Ireland or for Shannon because it takes about eight hours to get here."
Good one Michael- but it only takes five if you're coming from the states and the wind is behind ya!! He also hasnt much regard to History and Shannons proud record of the past.......
"I don't give a s**t if they invented Irish coffee in Rineanna or if Maureen O'Hara flew through here 50 years ago. What I care about is the loss of tourism business," he said.
Always good for a quoteis Michael, meanwhile reports that Irish Coffee was indeed invented in Rineanna have not been yet confirmed!! And just to prove that he does know what he's doing, he also pointed out that since Ryanair's 14 new routes to Europe went on sale on the airline's website three months ago, there have been 350,000 bookings made, a large proportion of which have been from Europe and Britain.
Thursday, April 28, 2005
welcome
Welcome to limerick.... and the surrounding areas.... this blog will take in tales of woe, humour and stuff that has about as much relavance to limerick as is deserved.... all comments, insults and donations welcome
