Tag: Ireland
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What the Drung?
While we’re speaking of street suffixes — we were just speaking of street suffixes, weren’t we — and after the stravenue encounter, 12MC stumbled upon a suffix of even more weirdness: Drung. Imagine, living not on a street, an avenue, a boulevard, a drive or even a terrace, rather a drung. Drung used in this…
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National Surnames
I received a query about surnames that were the same as nations. An example might be Captain America. Well, if indeed his first name was actually Captain and his surname was actually America instead of a pseudonym for Steve Rogers. And I guess while we’re at it, if he wasn’t a fictional character in a…
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Ireland’s Narrow Little Neck
I looked at the Emerald Isle and noticed an anomaly. Northern Ireland comes very close to separating the tip of the Republic of Ireland from the remainder of its body. The neck constricts to perhaps as few as ten kilometres at its narrowest point between the border and the sea. It’s even shorter if we…
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Oldest Town in Ireland
I don’t know why I torture myself. Nothing good can come from this, and yet I can’t resist. I noticed a place reputed to be the “oldest town in Ireland” as I investigated an unusual geographic feature. These types of claims are notoriously tenuous and probably doubly-so in a land as ancient as Ireland. At…
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It Counts but It’s Pitiful
We’ve had a lively discussion in the comments in relation to the “I’ve Barely Been There” article. I described the official 12MC Rules in the original article: if I touch the geographic area, no matter how briefly, I count it as a visit. I defined “touch” as anything more than flying over it. One doesn’t…
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Turlough
Sometimes odd geography intersects with odd geology. One particularly rare example occurs on the island of Ireland. It’s called a Turlough or Turlach. Described very simply, it’s an ephemeral lake that appears during the wetter months of autumn through springtime and dries-up during the summer. Most of the examples happen west of the River Shannon.…
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European Latitude Paradoxes
There aren’t any great research efforts or revelations today, just some interesting observations about various lines of latitude in western Europe. I spend a lot of time simply looking at maps, at the patterns, and the logical contradictions that aren’t always apparent in our conventional thoughts. These are a few that have made me smile…
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Odd Irish Border Road
New reader Ian, an Irish expat living in California, has an interest in border anomalies. He pointed out an instance in his native Ireland: the most direct road corridor between two points crosses an international border multiple times in the space of just a few miles. I am aware of a similar condition in the…