“Is Gen X actually the greatest generation?” The New York Times asks this week. The New York Times goes on to mention cultural markers such as Friends, Pulp Fiction and ER. I come to praise Amanda Fortini, author of the New York Times piece, not to harangue her. “President Obama is arguably the United States’ first president who is a member of Generation X,” Harvard Business Review noted in 2010. After Gen X came the Millennials, Generation Z and (the Latin alphabet now exhausted) Generation Alpha.

The shell of Birch by Romeo Lane club in the west Indian state of Goa stands bare following a fire that broke out overnight, killing 25 people. “Today is a very painful day for all of us in Goa,” said the chief minister of Goa, Pramod Sawant. Indian prime minister Narendra Modi said he had spoken to Sawant ‌and ​offered ‍condolences to the bereaved families. According to government data, about 5.5 million tourists visited Goa in the first half of this year, with 270,000 visiting from abroad. In 2024 at least 24 people died after a fire broke out at a packed amusement park arcade in the western state of Gujarat.

The average waiting time for a driving test has been creeping up in the past three months and now stands at 12.22 weeksDriving test waiting times are increasing once again, having just hit the 10-week target in September after years of continuously rising. The average waiting time has been creeping up in the past three months and now stands at 12.22 weeks, up from 11.44 at the end of November and 9.57 in September. A total of 35 of 57 car driving test centres across the State have longer waiting times than the 10-week standard. Dún Laoghaire, Co Dublin has the second-longest waiting time, at 21 weeks, followed by Raheny at 20 weeks. Fine Gael Dublin West TD Emer Currie, who raised the issue via parliamentary questions, said that, while the official waiting time in Mulhuddart is 22 weeks, “I have constituents now waiting 36 weeks.

Many potential investors would have learned of the opportunity on a podcast called Path to Power, hosted by Matt Cooper and Ivan Yates. As recently as March of this year, he told People magazine that he has “maybe a thousand pigeons” across a number of lofts. Michael Dell, chairman and chief executive officer of Dell, with his wife Susan and US president Donald Trump at the White House. The goal is suitably capitalist: to give a stake in the economy and a feel for investment to the masses. “You think about the compounding effect of a programme like this in 10, 20, 30 years on millions of children.

These questions were sparked when an internet storm was triggered by an American substack post calling into question the metrics underpinning the poverty line in the US. For a household of two adults and one child, the official poverty line is around €645 a week, or €33,643 a year. Cross that income line, and by our definitions you’re not poor. Now, think back to that official poverty line: €33,600 for this household type. In Ireland, this group, “the working poor”, will determine future elections.

But when you have a toddler who has just discovered Christmas, it promises to be even more fun. When Ola and Mark Jordan moved into their new home in Castlebar, Co Mayo in August, she was already looking forward to decorating the house for Christmas. “We’re so excited to be spending our first Christmas in this house,” she says. “Oh, I love Christmas. When I grew up, Christmas was very colourful with the reds, greens and golds but throughout the years the trends changed.

Mr Moore, appearing via video-link, said he understands he could go to prison but he will not give evidence or answer questions. Mr Moore has had “serious mental health concerns” in the past two weeks, she said. Ms Justice O’Connor asked Garnet Orange SC, for the DPP, to explore the possibility of holding Mr Moore in protective custody. During the alleged assault, counsel said, the group accused Mr Moore of giving information to people with whom the accused were “not friendly”. He said they heated a “branding” object with the letters “rat” on it to brand Mr Moore’s face and body.

It means Irish swimmers have now won freestyle medals in the 200m (bronze for Evan Bailey), 400m, 800m and 1,500m. Walshe was superb in adding to Ireland’s medal tally, storming through in the penultimate stroke, the breaststroke, to win silver in 2:04.78, just .03 off her Irish record. Dutch star Marrit Steenbergen won another gold medal in a European record of 2:01.83. Bailey was the best of a trio of Irish swimmers in the 50m freestyle heats, the 200m freestyle bronze medallist clocking 22.11. USA’s Alex Walshe won gold in 1:06.55.

Six people have been arrested following an attack on Irish peacekeepers in Lebanon on Thursday, the Lebanese army has said. The United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (Unifil) came under small fire from militants near the village of Bint Jbeil in the Irish area of operations. A group of Defence Forces soldiers were patrolling in armoured utility vehicles (AUVs) when they were approached by six men on three mopeds. In a statement in Arabic on Saturday, the Lebanese military said it immediately followed up on the incident and has arrested six people. “We will continue to enact the Unifil mandate by monitoring and reporting on the situation in southern Lebanon and condemn any attacks on peacekeepers,” the Defence Forces said.

To say good morning and good evening, and to connect with people. When I’m writing, I’m writing 100 per cent. And when I’m not writing, I’m still writing in my head.”She regularly receives a number of letters and cards, particularly after the publication of a new book. Life happens, things go wrong, but it is an awful lot to do with your attitude. Stop questioning it, just do it.”Weathering Storms by Alice Taylor with photography by Emma Byrne, is published by O’Brien Press.

Rebecca Price and Patrick Kiely outside the Four Courts after the settlement of their High Court action for damages in 2021. Photograph: Collins CourtsHSE chief executive Bernard Gloster has provided an “unequivocal” apology on behalf of the health service to a couple who agreed to a termination after being wrongfully advised their healthy baby boy had a fatal foetal abnormality. In 2019 Rebecca Price and Pat Kiely from Phibsborough in Dublin received a misdiagnosis in the National Maternity Hospital. In a HSE statement on Saturday, Mr Gloster said he recently had the opportunity to meet Ms Price and Mr Kiely. A week later she was advised a non-invasive prenatal test, known as a harmony test, was positive for Trisomy 18.

The green light has been given to a large-scale 436 apartment development in Walkinstown, Dublin, after the withdrawal of a third-party appeal against the planning permission, planning documents revealThe green light has been given to a large-scale 436 apartment development in Walkinstown, Dublin, after the withdrawal of a third-party appeal against the planning permission, planning documents reveal. The planning permission was sought by Watfore Ltd – a development and property management subsidiary of Dairygold Co-op – to demolish the existing site before building four apartment blocks ranging between six and 10 storeys in height. The development is set to be built in the Parkmore Industrial Estate on the Long Mile Road in Walkinstown. They had raised concerns that locating residential properties in an industrial estate would “lead to conflicts” between the homeowners aspirations and the “day-to-day realities of operations within a live industrial estate” among other concerns. Following the initial rejection of planning permission by the council, an appeal was taken to An Coimisiún Pleanála.

Only people from the outer reaches of homelessness – those who are sleeping rough – come to us at the Alice Leahy Trust. For those coming to my team and myself at the Alice Leahy Trust, on Bride Road in Dublin’s Liberties, the grinding reality of life could hardly be further from the glittering Yuletide fantasy. There is no judgment at The Alice Leahy Trust. Alice Leahy is director of services at the Alice Leahy Trust which she founded 50 years ago to help the homeless. A commemorative book, “Outsiders – 50 Years of the Alice Leahy Trust” is available at Alan Hanna’s Bookshop on Rathmines Road Lower in Dublin.

Champions Cup: Bath 40 Munster 14Munster won’t seek out excuses, and there were several in weighing up the impact of the prematch disruption and instead will reflect on the controllables as a lingering source of frustration in a Champions Cup match initially shaped by torrential rain. Tries by Edogbo and Casey allowed Munster to mitigate the shock of trailing 28-0 to an interval deficit 35-14. Tom de Glanville’s clever line and powerful carry inside the Munster 22, provided the preamble to a try for number eight Miles Reid. Munster kept plugging away, gutsy and honest, but just lacking accuracy, composure and the elevated quality required to breach the Bath defence. Scoring sequence: 5 mins: Penalty try, 7-0; 9: Reid try, Russell conversion, 14-0; 11: Arundel try, Russell conversion, 21-0; 18: Dunn try, Russell conversion, 28-0; 22: Edogbo try, Hanrahan conversion, 28-7; 37: Obano try, Russell conversion, 35-7; 40 (+1): Casey try, Hanrahan conversion, 35-14.

But today the garden dreamer is sobbing because he’s been toldto carry his garden elsewhere again and he is too tiredbecause he has been everywhere and nowhere in this placethat is everywhere and nowhere and there is nowhere to gobetween the wall and the sea except to the end of this poemthat ends by the wall on one side and the sea on the otherwith nothing but wreckage between them. Why can’t he have a garden, no matter how small,the size of a bed, a flag or even a poem with roomfor ten-year-old dreamers of paradise gardens,with room for heavenly tomatoes, mint, cilantro, dill, basil? Eva Bourke is a poet and translator who has published eight collections, the most recent of which is Tattoos, (Dedalus 2024). Seeing Yellow was nominated for the Irish Times/Poetry Now Award in 2019. She was awarded the Michael Hartnett Prize in 2020 and is a member of Aosdána.