Our columnist Frank Brandon chats about topics raised with him by readers, the upcoming Creggs Harvest Festival, recent local events, and more!
Now I am the first to admit that I hardly ever get to see the Today Show on RTÉ, which goes out in the mid-afternoon/early evening of all the weekdays, and is hosted by Dáithí Ó Sé and Maura Derrane (Sinead Kennedy stands in for Maura a couple of days a week).
Anyway, my regular reader (the one I know of) is a regular watcher of the Today Show, and he rang me to complain about the changed format of the daily quiz.
Apparently a contestant can get one of the hosts to spin a wheel after correctly answering a question, and they can win whatever prize the wheel stops at. According to my man, some of the questions are ridiculous and some of the prizes are rubbish, but there can also be decent enough prizes to be won; among the rubbish ones are mugs, aprons, and breadboards, while among the better ones are prizes such as a weekend away at a nice hotel.
However, there is a catch – and in my opinion, with such middling prizes, there should be no catch – because if your spin stops on the X, you lose all you have won.
What upset my reader was the fact that a young woman, who among other things had won a two-night break for two in a nice hotel, lost the lot when, on the last question, the wheel stopped on the dreaded X. I wondered could she have refused the last question and therefore kept the three prizes she had won, but at time of writing this I don’t know the answer.
The other thing that annoyed him was the fact that last year, if you stopped on a prize of a mug, apron, or breadboard, you got an extra spin and could win one of the half-decent prizes – this year it seems if you land on a mug, you get a mug! (Unless you lose it altogether).
Anyway, I feel that the X should be removed from the board, or if it stays, give the contestant the option of keeping whatever he or she has won and not risk losing everything on a final spin. He also said, and it’s very understandable, that the presenters absolutely hate when someone lands on the X – surely everyone would be better off if the X disappeared for good?
As I am writing this I still haven’t seen the show, but hopefully this afternoon I will see what the fuss is all
about. Quiz shows are huge on modern TV and some of them can change the lives of the contestants.
Recently, on Who Wants to be a Millionaire?, a contestant who had already won half a million went for the big one and lost nearly everything. However, he had a choice and he went for it – the person on the Today show would almost certainly have not bothered with the last question if she had a choice.
My reader also had something else that was bothering him, and I am glad that he did, because for quite some time I have had similar reservations – and that is how powerful and blinding the LED lights on modern motor vehicles have become.
He told me that last week he met a jeep on a local road, and the lights were so strong that he assumed the driver hadn’t dimmed – so he flashed his own lights and got the full heads back in return, which dazzled him so much he had to pull in and wait for his eyes to refocus.
I can’t deny that I hate night-driving for that very reason, and even though my glasses are supposed to be anti-glare, the truth is that when one of these new-style lights come against me, my anti-glare is pretty much good for nothing. I know nothing can or will be done about it, but if you have one of these vehicles with very powerful lights, please dim on time and try not to blind whoever you are meeting.
Sticking with road safety, I want to return to something that I raised here before. I got a video from a reader showing a recent cavalcade of cars celebrating an underage county final win, and the reader was horrified at the actions of almost every driver. Most of the cars, which were travelling at fairly high speeds, had their side windows wide open with children hanging out of them. In some cases, there were two children hanging out of single windows –God help any of them if they lost their grip and fell out.
I witnessed something similar myself live a year or so ago and I was completely shell-shocked at what I saw. I know it’s great to win a county final, but surely there is no need to risk the life and limbs of some of the players by such astoundingly stupid and reckless conduct. There must be a better and safer way!
Sip and Style
sparks smiles!
It’s Friday night, and out here in Creggs the first ever Sip and Style Creggs Style promotion has just taken place. We were all wondering if the hard work Sheila Beirne and others put in would pay off – well, the good news is that it was a massive success!
Almost 250 ladies turned up, and by all accounts they had a memorable night. The whole event was a fundraiser for the local Rural Development, and Sheila wants to thank all of you ladies who supported it and herself and the committee – thank you all for your generosity, friendship and loyalty.
I’m told the craic was simply brilliant, and afterwards a large crowd of happy ladies headed up to Mikeen’s to finish the night off.
I have no more information about the future of this exciting event, but I will be very surprised if we don’t see it all again next year. So well done to all who participated in any way, and particularly to the ladies who made sure there was no wine left over – good on ye!
A quizzical
night at Mikeen’s
Back to quizzes: In recent weeks, we have had a dummy quiz in Mikeen’s, a real quiz for the lip sync ladies, and on Friday night gone by we had another real quiz, put together by Paul Browne (the joint reigning Coddle champion with Kevin Bradley), which was all about music and films and theme tunes for famous programmes and all that kind of stuff.
I took part in a team called the Noel Purcell Quartet (over-70s only will know where the name came from!), which featured Michael and Mary Keany, my brother Duff (the captain), and myself. Now I have to admit that the Keanys more or less carried the team and that Duff and myself contributed very little. That would be okay for me as just an ordinary team member, but as captain, Duff’s position must be under threat!
Ange Postecoglou got only 39 days as manager of Nottingham Forest… watch this space for news of our captain’s future!
Out of the 100 questions that Paul had for us I think I only got three right, so maybe my position could also be under threat.
Anyway, I have to say it was a great night’s fun, and fair play to Paul and his helpers for putting it on. Not the usual run of the mill quiz, but certainly very entertaining!
And finally…
Out here in Creggs, we are looking forward to the 44th annual Harvest Festival, which features a fantastic range of events, with something for everyone from the oldest to the youngest.
Now, last week’s Roscommon People had a full four-page feature documenting all of the many activities so I won’t go into all the details, but the big thing to remember is it all kicks off on Thursday night and carries all the way through to Monday evening.
There will be many highlights, with the Lip Sync on Saturday night being most eagerly awaited. For rock fans in particular, Crow Black Chicken on Sunday night are a must!
Creggs Harvest Festival is the place to be this Bank Holiday weekend, so don’t miss it!
‘Til next week,
bye for now!
