Dublin, Ireland. Ryan Air profits dive by E118M - that must be why they delayed my flight to Dublin, changed the gates for two other flights, and are generally as crap as the crappiest low cost airline can be. I beleive the whole “target market” for low cost airlines are those teenagers with no clothes and are not coming back - anybody else has to pay about £25 to check a bag in, and then get ripped off on the retrun fair on the way back. Michael O’Leary - please read the next bit - “A low cost airline does NOT have to mean crap service”. Mike - did you read it? Now go back and read it again - and do something about it! I’m flying back on Friday so no buggering about with planes etc!

Dublin is a lovely city. It’s very cosmopolitan - “Yeah, watch out for those fe*kin R*manian beggars - they storm around the drunks coming out of nightclubs and pick their pockets” - so my very talkative taxi driver told me this morning on the way to werk. Romania 1 - 0 Drunks, that’s what I say. But I ate Italian last night. “Itsa very ‘ard making a livin’ in Dublin” said the Italian restaurant owner to some friends who came in. Counting his two friends, him and the chef - that made five of us in there… during “Happy Hour” as well. I guess he was right. But then there’s probably more Italian restaurants than Romanain beggars around the Temple Bar district.

Tonight I ate Mexican, at the very aptly named - “The Alamo”. No Jim Bowie or John Wayne. Just some French guy, a Chinese girl and an Eastern European, (quite possibly Romanian), chef. I kept my wallet close to me every time I heard the kitchen coral doors creak…. But the food was great, which was the main thing. I slipped an English 5p in the tip. I wonder if they’ve worked out what country it’s from.

The Dublin people are extremely nice folk. In many ways they are much like the Londonderry, (or Derry, depending on your age and political view point), folk, in that they all seem to be natural comedians. Listening to an office full of Dubliners having a chat is like being back stage at a comedy improv night. Of course the “English guy” was smiling for “no reason at all” - that’s because he’s an eediot. :)

But spare a thought for the visitors who have to stay in the nonair-conditioned hotel rooms. There are some of us who also might like to open their fe*kin windows a bit to let a draft in - but can’t because the windows are bolted so that you can only open them a few centimetres. Well let me tell you - if I was going to commite suicide, it’d be from a damned sight better looking hotel window than this!

Anyway - visit Dublin. It’s got plenty to offer - tourists, beggars, opinionated taxi drivers… wait, that’s pretty much like London, Manchester, Liverpool, Glasgow. Just stay at home and drink Guiness - it’ll have the same effect without the hassle from Ryan Air :)