IT HAS BEEN nearly a whole week since the painful deflation suffered by Ireland’s rugby fans and well-wishers at the hands of New Zealand. 

All of the hope that swelled around Ireland’s appearance at the Rugby World Cup this autumn has dissipated. We can finally reassume the much more comfortable posture of fatalistic doom that suits us so much better when it comes to team sports.

Ahead of us there are four long years for the pessimism to freeze, harden, thaw, and blossom into the inevitably erroneous belief that this year is our year come 2027. You can sing Zombie to yourself until then.

As if on cue, the weather has also chosen this moment to resume its punishment of us for being Irish. Storm Babet battered the south coast this week, with particular devastating effects on the town of Midleton, Cork.

Midleton has experienced significant flooding in November 2000, October 2004, June 2012, July 2013, January 2014, February 2014, October 2014 and January 2016. Storm Frank in 2015 did significant damage to the town, though even that was trumped by Storm Babet. The town doesn’t just suffer when the Owenacurra bursts its banks as it did this week. It also faces flooding due to tidal events, as well as groundwater flooding and pluvial events. 

All of this is to say that Midleton is a town which is almost as well known for flooding as it is for its whiskey production. As noted in on-the-ground reporting by The Journal, residents of the town had been worrying about the affects of the uptick in rain as soon as it was first forecasted by Met Éireann two weeks ago. 

I am in Midleton, Co Cork reporting on the devastating floods here yesterday. Clean up under way but a lot of the locals I spoke to are angry that a lack of flood defences and an inadequate warning left them with little time to respond.
Follow on @thejournal_ie for more. pic.twitter.com/OS26UKuWwi

— Niall O’Connor (@NiallJournal_ie) October 19, 2023

“It’s very hard to know what to say,” said Leo Varadkar while visiting the town with Fine Gael TD Patrick O’Donovan. The oratory did not immediately inspire confidence, coming as it did amid footage of waist-high water, an evacuated hospital and business after business taking existentially-threatening flood damage. 

One video doing the rounds on social media shows those who own homes and businesses in Midleton raising the matter with Varadkar and O’Donovan in tones that could be described as admirably, and perhaps, superhumanly civil. Of the money set aside by the government to aid those affected, only €5,000 can be accessed via the first application. 

Still, what many in Midleton would rather see is preventative measures. Engineering firm Arup have been working on the Midleton Flood Relief Scheme since 2016. The project remains in Stage 1 – the stage that involves surveys and modelling – and is described by Arup as ‘nearing completion,’ which we can presumably take to mean that Midleton will keep flooding for as long as it keeps raining, until further notice. 

Watching Midleton, it’s hard not to be confronted by the suggestion that, as a country, we are not especially well-prepared for emergencies, not least because there doesn’t seem to be that many in place for things we can see coming from a mile away. Those watching from afar will likely be hoping that a more proactive tack is taken by the time the water is threatening to skirt around our ankles. 

By this point, you might be asking yourself if there is any good news to be found, anywhere on earth. Well reader, let me tell you, there is. And I’ve held my tongue on the matter more than long enough.

Dolly Parton was on Liveline this week. Dolly Parton was on Liveline.

Dolly Parton, the woman who wrote I Will Always Love You and Jolene in the same 24 hours, called in to the programme that people call because someone working at the post office was rude to them.

Dolly Parton on Liveline! Is this what we can expect from RTÉ’s post-secret payments era? Has the flip-flop budget been redirected towards cross-generationally beloved Tennesseean songbirds? 

If so, I say we should trust this Bakhurst guy for a little while longer, see how it all pans out. Now that they have Dolly Parton’s number on file, there’s really no limit to what the national broadcaster can achieve.

Maybe they can revive Celebrity Bainisteoir and put her in charge of a GAA team. Or maybe RTÉ could entice her by bringing back The Den? I’ve seen Dolly on The Muppet Show and let me tell you, she would thrive amongst Dustin and Zig and Zig and Socko and all those other grotesque little ragboys.

And let’s not even get started on the children’s literacy. Her charity, the Dollywood Foundation, has supplied over 100 million books to children around the world, including in Ireland. Those are the kind of numbers that our own most famous child literacy enthusiast Ryan Tubridy could only dream of.

Parton was actually calling in to promote her new book and speak about her connection to Sinéad O’Connor and her 1990 performance in Páidí Ó Sé’s pub in Kerry. Still, we can hope that RTÉ more fulsomely leans into this new surprise gambit. The public at large would be much more likely to listen in to Liveline if we didn’t know whether we’d be hearing from John Q Public or Don Henley telling Joe Duffy about how he’s locked himself out of his house while dressed in nothing but a towel. 

Yes, times are hard. And yet, there is hope to be had, as long as we can cling to the prospect of one day turning on RTÉ news to see Billy Joel, up to his waist in rainwater, reporting live from the next flooded Irish town.