Here’s a picture of the sun:

Photo owned by robertpaulyoung (cc)

This is an object that used to appear in the sky some times. Find out more about the sun.

• Darragh Doyle, once again soars above the rest of Irish blogging with a post about his evening spent at Failte Towers.
• Ryanair orders 400 new planes. Heroes.
• Speaking of insanely good Irish blogs, Positive Boredom is up there too.
• Off her Rocker has a Hardworking Class Heroes 2008 super post up.
• The Dublin Horseshow in the RDS opens today. Want to see one of the camps for the still-opulent? Eww.
• There’s a guy in Gorey with a lot of superhero tattoos.
• Where’s this street sign? Is it just street-art or is it outside somewhere to eat?
• Analogue magazine has launched nationwide and they’re having a party to celebrate.

We mentioned this briefly. But it deserves a closer look. AND to go to number one*

Let’s fly, let’s fly, fly, fly Ryanair, We’re gonna take you there, fly, fly Ryanair,

Let’s fly, let’s fly, fly fly Ryanair, We’re gonna take you there, fly, fly Ryanair,

Sit down, relax, time to step in, Buy a juice for Little Johnny and get yourself a Gin,

We got sweets, treats, lots of goodies on the trolley for you,

Whatever it is that you need, ask the friendly cabin crew,

Let’s fly, let’s fly, fly, fly Ryanair, We’re gonna take you there, fly, fly Ryanair,

Let’s fly, let’s fly, fly, fly Ryan-air,

We’re gonna take you there, fly, fly Ryanair…

The Daily mail had an article on it last week.

The company said: “We’ve had a great response from our passengers and have even heard news of conga lines forming in the aisles.”

Note to terrorists: Just form a congo line when this song plays, everyone will just think you’re ryanair crazy in a good way.

I love the way Ryanair push the boundaries between marketing and sales into actual mind fuck psychosis. It’s pure genius. Imagine hearing this on the red eye into Stansted? Any time I fly red eyes I’m basically in a semi-conscious state, barely able to cope with reality. (And quite happy to pay airport prices for breakfast.) Then this little jangle, spawned by the most psychotic (genius?) marketing department (click this link for a rundown of their recent exploits) in the world, plays, implanting itself into my brain. The little bastard jangle stays with you all day and then just as you are shaking it you make the return flight. And thus the brain injection is complete. And so we all become slaves to the O’Leary.

Oh, if all you are interested in is the “Girls of Ryanair” 2008 Calendar featured in the youtube, (which was done in aid of the Angels Quest Irish childrens charity last year) the daily mail has you covered for that too.

And just to round off the post, don’t forget that O’Leary is threatening to launch a long-haul airline under different branding next year. Strap in and bring on RyanAtlantic !

*Number one thing to play on repeat in hell that is.

• A Sunday Independent front page story on Limerick was “wild speculation” according to Superintendent Willie Keane.
• COMEDY=TRAGEDY+TIME at the awesome Green Ink
• Has the chancer found the Greatest. Irish. YouTube. Clip. EVER? Oldie but a goodie.
• The Ryanair song. It burns.
• Stopping the Silence on Abortion in Ireland

Photo owned by curran.kelleher

In a bizarre move, Ryanair are going to shut off their entire booking system for a whole weekend. From the site itself:

From 22:00 hrs on the 22nd February until 23:00hrs on the 25th February 2008 the Ryanair internet and reservation centre booking system will be unavailable due to an essential system upgrade

Complete madness. The amount that’ll cost them is unreal. It better be one hell of an upgrade. Maybe they’re moving from obnoxious shite yellow graphics to obnoxious shite yellow graphics with shite web 2.0 style reflections under everything?

More: Breakingnews.ie story.