It Occurs To Me: Maga - make aurals grow again?

 Where do I begin? Well, let’s begin with a funny Tweet/X which was doing the rounds recently:

Obviously, it’s not the Real Donald Trump, even though the account reads @realDonaldTrump. Mind you, the real Real thing is capable of this nonsense: “It took my entire ear off,” the supposed July 19 post said. 

“The whole ear. But I went to the doctor, and he said, and this is true, he said, you heal faster than anyone I’ve ever seen. Nobody is healthier than you. And the next day, my ear was growing back, and the doctor said, nobody regrows ears like that, and it's a really remarkable thing, regrowing an ear like that, most people can’t do it. And I know that, because it's not me saying this, it’s the doctor, it's everybody saying, just, you’re the best at regrowing ears.” 

What has intrigued me no end is contained in the accompanying photo…his supporters wearing similar type bandages at a rally. It got me thinking about Julie.

In Zambia in 2010, a chimpanzee named Julie stuck a piece of grass into her ear, and left it there. Although this “grass-in-ear-behaviour” appeared to serve no discernible function, after Julie did it, other chimps in her group began to follow suit. 

“Our observation is quite unique in the sense that nothing seems to be communicated by it,” said study author Edwin van Leeuwen, a primate expert at the Max Planck Institute in The Netherlands. To make sure that the ear-grass thing wasn't just a random occurrence, researchers watched four different groups in Zambia’s Chimfunshi Wildlife Orphanage Trust for a year. Only Julie’s group put grass in their ears, and the behaviour spread from one to another after one saw another doing it. The finding prompted scientists to speculate that it might be akin to some kind of chimp fashion statement. 

“Any kind of subculture fad in human culture, I'd say, could be the parallel to this grass-in-ear behaviour,” van Leeuwen concluded. 

So there it is, thank God…only Trump supporters are likely to ape their big monkey. I’ll sleep better knowing that                             

                                    Poor service for flyers!

Some twenty years ago, I was standing in line at City of Derry Airport in a queue of people heading to Prestwick, Glasgow, ‘courtesy’ of Ryanair. An elderly couple ahead of me were being shouted at by a very rude employee, reminding them that if their bags didn’t fit the baggage sizer, they would have to put them in the hold and pay quite a bit extra. The couple were in their 80s, and while the man was distraught at his efforts to put his bag in, his wife burst into tears. Simultaneously, myself and another passenger objected to the bullying treatment, to which the Ryanair employee responded: “One more word from you two, and I’ll call security…you won’t board this plane!” I kept the memory alive…I was never impressed with their ‘customer service’ - and lo and behold, two years ago, in a queue in Lanzarote, a woman was picked out of the group arbitrarily and told: “Your bag is too big to go as hand baggage! You must pay 50 euro and it will be treated as hold luggage!” The passenger said that she had purchased the bag years before to meet Ryanair requirements, had used it umpteen times, and there was no problem with it coming from Dublin.

Nanny McPhee at the desk was having none of it, and to the gasps of horror from fellow passengers, the hapless passenger was frogmarched to the said desk, and forced to pay 50 euro. She returned to our group in tears, swearing never to use Ryanair again. The chap behind me was an employee in a different airport and said: “They randomly do this…it’s a money earner, and you can’t do a thing about it!” I looked around, and there were a number of bags much bigger than the lady who was humiliated, and I too vowed never to use Ryanair again. 

                        The pregnant mother experience 

The week before last, again in Lanzarote, a pregnant woman who had to sleep outside a Spanish airport after being told her cabin baggage was too large to go on a Ryanair flight has said it was 'the worst experience of her life'. 

Shauna Fox was one of a number of people in the queue while boarding the flight from Lanzarote to Dublin on Friday, July 19.

Again, a number of people were taken out of the same queue and Ms Fox, who is seven months pregnant, told Lunchtime Live on Newstalk that she believed her bag was compliant with Ryanair’s cabin baggage policy. “We got up to the gates and they told us that we couldn't board the flight because our bags were too big,” she said.

"I measured it; my bag fitted perfectly fine." She then asked for a measuring tape and was asked to wait. "We were told to wait, which we were made to believe was for this measuring tape as they let other passengers in,” she added. “By the time the other passengers were on the plane your woman came up to us and says, 'No measuring tape'... and she told us we can't get on the plane.

“We'll pay then if that's the issue, we just want to go home'," but she said “...,the gate is closed and we were all panicking then.!” "I said, ‘I'm seven months pregnant, I need to go home’ and [I was told] 'That's not my problem’".

Ms Fox said the stranded passengers were then told they would have to sleep outside the building as the airport was closing.

“We had to sleep outside the airport on the concrete ground, where we felt so unsafe and so scared that we had to move into a car park and build a wall with all our luggage,” she said.

"We were outside, we were terrified - it was so cold as well that night. We were given no access to water, there was no toilets. I had to pee at the side of the airport down a street with no toilet roll, no way to wash my hands, no facilities whatsoever.

“It was so dehumanising; it was so embarrassing – it was the worst experience of my life.”

A pregnant woman who had to sleep outside a Spanish airport after being told her cabin baggage was too large to go on a Ryanair flight has said it was 'the worst experience of her life'

She said they got into the airport at around 4am and had to pay for another flight to Dublin with Aer Lingus. She added that the airline had no problem carrying them from Ireland to Spain in the first place .Also on the same radio show, caller Fiona said she and her 12-year-old son were also removed from the queue. She said she has previously travelled with the same bag on several airlines.

"I tripled-checked my luggage size before I left my home and it was 100% perfect," she said.

"I have used the same suitcase on many different flights [to] different destinations with no problem. At Dublin, my suitcase was the perfect size and I even have a thing for weighing it.

"I weighed it just to make sure it was under 10kg and it was - I had no problem.

"[The airport worker in Lanzarote] pulled me aside and said, ‘No, it won't fit in’".

Fiona said she and her son slept in-between cars outside the airport. "Myself and my 12-year-old son had to sleep outside in-between cars to keep warm because the wind in Lanzarote at night time would cut through you.”

In a statement to Newstalk, Ryanair said the passengers were not denied boarding.

“These passengers were not ‘denied’ from boarding the flight," the carrier said.

"These passengers’ cabin bags exceeded the permitted dimensions, and therefore they were required to pay a standard gate baggage fee," it said.

"These passengers refused to pay the standard fee at the gate and missed this flight.

"The gate agent advised these passengers that boarding for this flight was closing four times before it closed, after which time these passengers requested to pay for their oversized bags.

"When boarding is closed, a legal report of the manifest is signed and sent to the captain, therefore boarding cannot be reopened," it added.

Well you would say that, wouldn’t you?  Thank God for Aer Lingus and a wee bit of manners.  

                                         Veggies ate the carnivores!

Well done to Geezer and Armagh…they more than deserved winning the Sam Maguire. Interesting that their sponsors are Simply Fruit while Galway have Supermacs. Indeed, a lot of Tribesmen have been wondering since the loss at Croke Park…”Where’s the beef?” 

What a year for Ulster!

As well as Armagh winning the All-Ireland, Tyrone defeated Kerry in May to land the All-Ireland U20FC crown before Derry overcame Armagh to retain the All-Ireland minor football championship. Down were crowned Tailteann Cup champions, Derry defeated Dublin for the Allianz League Division 1 title and Donegal won Division 2. 

All three All-Ireland club finals were won by Ulster sides with Glen (Derry) taking the senior title, Cullyhanna (Armagh) crowned intermediate winners and Arva (Cavan) winning the honours. Ulster University (UU) recorded their sixth Sigerson Cup success in February and Omagh CBS landed the Hogan Cup a month later.