National Abbatoir to open, thousands of jobs created

Hmmm. So no deal has been reached on our unpaid leave as yet. And time is marching relentlessly on until Budget day.

Today's planned strike was averted because of the "breakthrough agreement" on 12 or so unpaid leave days for the public sector.

But now, following dissention from backbench TDs, everything's up for grabs again. Backbench TDs, some of whom I might add, have alleged that "sure don't a couple of pints help a nervous driver to relax a bit?"

Even our revered Tanaiste, Mary Cockup... ahem, Coughlan, has agreed that nothing has been confirmed yet. This is the same person on whose behalf taxpayers, public and private, forked out €9,000 to keep a limo waiting for her at the WTO talks in Geneva last year so she wouldn't have to walk, or God forbid, use a taxi whose previous client was a cuckoo-clock maker. Not to mention John O'Donoghue's profligacy.

We all have to make sacrifices. The country is on its knees. For me and many of my colleagues, it's not the pay cut/ unpaid leave that galls us. It is the failure of our public "representatives" to set an example.

It's no wonder people are dying of swine flu. The country is being run (into the ground) by a shower of porcine individuals, all with their filthy heads in the trough.

George Orwell summed it up nicely in Animal Farm (and again, the pigs were running the show) with the quotation:

"All animals are equal, but some are more equal than others."

It's put me off sausages for life.

Disgruntled!

Now the unfortunate pig industry is fecked, what with all this dioxin shite scare that's gotten into the meat. And, as if there wasn't enough bad news, hundreds of workers in the industry have been laid off. Dismal news for yet more families. It makes me cringe lately when I read about this depressing stuff and all I can think of is my tum.

I'm one of those annoying "flexitarian" fence-sitting people, who purport to be vegetarian, but who occasionally get cravings for meat products. I live for the most part on lentils, vegetable curries, Lidl Margherita pizzas and houmus. But not always. For instance, I love traditional Christmas dinner - all but sprouts. I sometimes crave a floppy, shadow-of-its-advert Supermacs' burger after the pub. And, about once a month, a bagel filled with tomato, lettuce and... bacon. Today was a BLT craving day, but I was obliged to opt for something healthier.

A nice brown wholemeal scone. Mmmm... roughage.

And I was wondering, is it still safe to get stuff off Pigsback.com? It's just that I won a load of points (points, not pints... still, never look a gift horse in the mouth, eh??) off them last week... (Edit... good old Curly has come up trumps again!)

This recession is turning out to be apocalyptic. I'm feeling really grateful for my job right now.