LowerTheTone.com

Upon readying the always excellent blog by the Irish Times Conor Pope, his article today linked here, prompted me to write this article.

So we are in a recession, people are losing jobs, the government is increasing taxes, house prices are plummeting and its cheaper to buy a second hand car than a bicycle. Sign of the times? Well perhaps not.

As you can read from Conor’s article there are some questions to be asked about Tesco seemingly raising prices on some goods. However their spokesperson, Paul Cullen reminded Conor that Tesco has lowered over 9,000 prices instore this year alone. Wow says you! Maybe. How many products do Tesco sell? According to Tesco’s website, they provide in Ireland “an average of over 10,000 grocery product lines and almost 15,000 product lines in total”. However that seems quite a small number. Conor Pope commented on a figure somewhere between 35,000 but I have been unable to confirm it anywhere. So while 9,000 reductions may be good, it must be viewed in terms of total number of products and contrasted against value of increases.

Today brings another reason why business in Ireland is taking a hit. VAT. The higher VAT rate in Ireland now rises half a percent to 21.5%. However in the UK, the VAT rate has reduced to 15% leaving a whopping 6.5% difference. Time to jump in the car and drive to Northern Ireland to do the shopping? Of course, but bare in mind there is no VAT charged on many groceries in Ireland anyway! However you dont have to do much googling to see what savings can be made by going over the, um, border or whatever we call it now, and shopping in Newry etc. This thread here taken from our friends over at boards.ie highlights a large number of savings people made by shopping “abroad”. And abroad in this case, Newry is only about 60 miles from Dublin. I know personally, I will be doing most of my Christmas shopping, grocery and gifts, in Newry this week.

Is it unpatriotic? Well you could argue it on one hand, but feck it. I’m a big supporter of Irish business but when some large price variances can be seen, that loyalty all goes out the window. Even our government, in their brazen hypocritical tones and trying to push the unpatriotic card on everyone. Yet when it suits them they talk about the United Ireland when it comes to jobs, road deaths and politics.

One thing this VAT issue has demonstrated is how a concerned government deals with a recession. Gordon Brown and his crew knew what to do. In a time of sinking consumer confidence and dropping tax receipts, rather than put up VAT, which can only serve to makes consumer confidence worse, they saw the simplest solution from the get go. Decrease tax. Get people back in the shop. The British government is now benefitting from the bonus tax receipts from us Paddies traveling to a different county in “United Ireland” to reap the benefit. Perhaps Lenihan and Cowen are kicking themselves that they didnt think of it sooner. But then again they are probably too busy getting $410 haircut to give a toss.

But it doesn’t end there. We have some good news?! The LVA and VFI have come together and announced a freeze for the next 12 months on the price of alcohol. Considering many pubs already put their prices up in recent weeks, it means feck all really. If anything it is nothing more than a PR stunt. If the price of drink is already too high, freezing it for 12 months is nothing more than kicking the ghoulies off an already dead tiger. Pub trade is at the lowest is has ever been and while the LVA VFI are quick to blame everyone else they never once stop to think that the prices they charge have anything to do with it. Now I dont expect them to accept 100% responsibility but come on lads, keep off the sauce the night before you prepare your radio interviews. Take a leaf out of our friends in Northern Ireland’s book or you risk your pubs looking something like this on a Saturday night…

I could go on and give more examples, of which there are many, of where savings can be made, who is cheaper than who etc etc. But its not that cloak and dagger anymore. So here are my 3 simple tips for the Christmas:

1. Use the internet
2. Travel to Northern Ireland
3. Use your common sense!

Happy shopping.

Unfortunately Dara Ó BriaIn was too expensive to hire to do an ad for my blog so here is a picture of Santa Clause instead.

You may have noticed that ad in the top right corner of the page for the boards.ie Photography yearbook which is on sale on blurb.com. (Click the link for a preview)

You can see from the original thread here that part of the cost of the book will be donated to the boards.ie annual charity, Santa Strike Force. With SSF, basically boards.ie users, mods and admins collect as much dosh as they can by organising charity events, and the proceeds are used to buy presents for less fortunate kids in hospital over Christmas. More details on the SSF can be found here.

My book arrived during the week and I have to say some of the photos are fantastic. As I understand it all photo contributors are amateur photographers. Well done to all concerned!

So last night I joined the other brave souls and was brought for a paranormal adventure in Blarney Castle after dark with the guys from P.I.G.S. After packing my Long Johns, Pringles, Twix and naggin of whiskey, at 8:30pm things got under way. It was a cold night, but fortunately it was a dry one.

In total there was a group of about 30 people, so we were split up into 3 groups, myself, I joined the high spirited (no pun intended!) boards.ie crew! Eight of us in total. The boards.ie group were a great crowd and were able to have a giggle along the way.

After the introduction and safety spiel from the PIGS, we went on our way. Our first stop was the castle’s cave and dungeon. Not for anyone with a fear of tight spaces or for overweight American tourists… Despite the grim sounding nature of our first stop, it was actually quite pleasant and warm. Even when the lights went out. A brief EVP session was held. EVP, Electronic Voice Phenomenon, is essentially letting your recording device record and you ask questions of the ghosties in the hope that something is picked up on the tape.

Its when we moved into the next location that things got a bit more interesting, well for me anyway! We held another EVP session but it wasn’t until we were in the “family room” in the castle that things got interesting. The room had an eerie feel to it as it was open top and overlooked from the ledge where the Blarney Stone is seated.

I moved into the centre of the room to take a photo of some of the group at back wall. As I posed to take the photo, I felt something brush against my right shoulder, as if gently pulling down on my shoulder. Very creepy, yet not unthreatening. However it took me a few moments to announce it to the group, mainly due to the embarrassment of saying someone touched me but there was no one there!

We all had a feeling of being watched from the upper level however when we moved up there, despite one guy trying to kiss the Blarney Stone, nothing spooky happened and my camera battery died. I cant credit this to the spirit world, sometimes we’re just to thick to check before we leave!

Our final location to go to was the creepiest of all. The grounds. Before we entered the grounds, we held a brief EVP session. Our group medium and PIGS guide had the feeling of being watched from one of the tunnel. I was the opposite, I really felt like a woman was watching us from the other end! However I didn’t mention this to the group until one of the group mentioned feeling the exact at breakfast today!

Although nothing specific happened in the grounds, we all had the feeling of being watched. Although walking around Dolmens, “Witches Kitchens” and “Druid’s Circles” would make anyone uneasy!

The night drew to a close about 3am and despite our tired and cold faces, everyone seemed to enjoy the night. The guys from PIGS are a decent bunch. They add a nice touch of not taking it all too serious while maintaining their professional at all times.

What could have been a very nerdy event, was a very enjoyable one. More photos to follow in the coming days!

A big thanks to the PIGS team (Mark, Niall, Gavin, Graham and Colum) for making the event possible and bringing me along! You can visit their official site at www.thepigs.org