Thomil's Random Ramblings

I’ll be the first to admit that I’m not the sharpest knife in the drawer. I’ve got some basic knowledge across many fields, but I’m not an expert in any of them by any stretch of the imagination. Hell, I even flunked out of school! Still, I’m not completely braindead. Moreover, I’m aware of my deficiencies, try to read up on things that I’m not up to speed with, and am not above changing my opinions on  topics, an approach that has served me pretty well so far. I mean, it has gotten me out of long-term employment and into a job that is generally reserved for college graduates. Yet, for some reason, I find that this approach of always learning, always wanting to improve yourself, more seems to be becoming more and more of a rarity. Indeed, the very concept of intelligence, the very idea that being smart is something desirable, something positive, appears to be becoming more and more of an object of scorn and ridicule, something to demonize rather than a goal to thrive for. For an...

Public Transport in Cork – A contentious topic to say the least, and certainly one that I apparently can’t escape as a blogger. A few months ago, the rather ambitious Cork Metropolitan Area Transport Strategy was released in draft form. I never got around to writing a post about that as I had some rather more pressing issues to deal with, namely a new job that wasn‘t running smoothly at the time. Still, it was almost impossible to escape the talk about one of the core components of this draft strategy: A light rail line running from Ovens in the west of the city to Mahon in the east. It was an audacious move, and I‘m convinced that it will never see the light of day.  I‘ll admit, I was absolutely thrilled by the idea at first, but after spending some time thinking about it, it became clear to me that not only would this project never see the light of day, it would be a spectacularly bad fit for Cork. Now, don‘t get me wrong, I‘m a fan of any type of rail transport, and would absol...