Cobh and missing Conor's Olympics

By Miriam O'Callaghan

Most of Wednesday was spent in Cobh. We left for there by train that morning from Cork Station - loved chatting to all the workers at the train station. I got the distinct impression once again (once we moved off the Late Late) that there are a lot of disgruntled people heading out to vote on June 5th.  I spoke to a very accessible and understandable local politics academic from UCC on the train on the way to Cork, Aodh Quinlivan, and he gave us a very comprehensive analysis of the upcoming elections. In Cobh, a really diverse but interesting group of women (gathered by our hard working researcher Conor) gave me a variety of views - well balanced between those who are going to be voting to register a vote as a protest against the Government and those who aren't that angry and are going to vote on local issues.

After canvassing in the lashing rain with FG new candidate Sinead Sheppard (ex-member of the pop group Six) and Labour Councillor John Mulvihill, and then terrifying shoppers in the local Supervalu looking for opinions, we headed back to our hotel. In the coming days we are looking forward to interviewing another candidate, Dr. John Sheehan, of Fianna Fáil, who is going to take us on a tour of the northside of the city to discuss local issues, so I’ll keep you posted on that. I was catatonically tired so I went straight to my room and crashed. Interesting day and we were up early in the morning to go on the local radio show presented by local star Neil Prendiville, great fun, very.

As I fall asleep on Wednesday, I have to be honest and admit, I was not contemplating the laudable nature of local politics, rather I am feeling sad and guilty that I was missing my young son’s school sports day tomorrow. Okay, it wasn't the Olympics, but it was to my seven year old Conor.

Maybe my Mum is right, I should abandon this working out of the home lark.