Ireland recently went to the polls to elect a new President as the second 7-year term of the current president, Mary McAleese, expires soon. The new President, Michael D Higgins, will be inaugurated on November 11th. Ireland’s system of government is much more like the UK’s than the USA’s, though, which means that the real head of government is the Taoiseach (pronounced something like “Tee-shuck), whose job is the same as the Prime Minister in the UK. The President does have several important responsibilities, but almost all of them require the approval of the government. Although there is very little that the President of Ireland can do on their own, they do play a significant role in representing the country and in the past were instrumental in the peace process with the UK during the so-called “troubles” in Northern Ireland.

You might have already heard in the news that there’s serious debt trouble in the Eurozone – not that Americans would be unfamiliar with nations in debt! – and that Greece in particular is struggling. The problem is that so many European nations and banks are heavily invested in the Greek economy, and if they can’t pay back their loans (which looks now like a real possibility), then it could cause real trouble for the stronger economies. Click here for an article explaining some of what’s happening, and here for a debt chart – see if you can find which country is falling off the bottom….

Last night Seth was innocently driving down the road when the car suddenly hit a flying egg. Now, since it’s pretty clear that eggs don’t fly of their own accord until they hatch and grow a bit, deduction told him that a person had probably targeted his (again, innocently) passing car for this messy disaster. He thought at least he could get some sympathy out of it, but most folks just said “oh, it must be close to halloween”.

Wait…

What does halloween have to do with flying eggs? Evidently, a lot. It seems to be well known here that you don’t drive certain places on halloween night, and even this far in advance, driving at night in Youghal carries with it eggstrodinary risks.

Yesterday’s Irish Independent reports that unemployment in Ireland is up to 14.3% and emigration is becoming more popular – rising by 45% in the last year. Click here for the full story.

The other day we went with some friends to a festival in the nearby village of Ardmore. It’s called a “Pattern Festival” because it’s built around a celebration of Ardmore’s founder and patron saint, Declan, who came to this area before St. Patrick came to Ireland. If you want to find out more about it, this is their website.

So here we are in an ancient seaside village during a religious-themed festival and what’s the first song the band plays? Sweet Home Alabama.

Here’s a quiz… What do you think this sign means?

Someone at church asked Jess to help them learn piano theory so we started looking into it and it turns out the names of music notes are different here from what we learned in America. Here’s a rundown (Irish/British and then the American terms):

Breve – Double whole note
Semibreve – Whole note
Crotchet – Quarter note
Minim – Half note
Quaver – Eighth note
Semiquaver – Sixteenth note
Demisemiquaver – Thirty-second note
Hemidemisemiquaver – Sixty-fourth note
Semitone – Half step

I especially like the “Hemidemisemiquaver”. It’s just fun to say!