The launch of the An Bord Snip report was perfectly balanced, at least in Galway, on Saturday, as British comedian/political activist Mark Thomas rode into town with his idea for a People's Manifesto. As people recovered from the shock of the Special Group on Public Service Numbers and Expenditure Programmes report, with its proposal for €5.3 billion in savings, which if implemented will make most of our lives hell, Mr Thomas set about looking for ideas that will improve our lives.

With Galway Arts Festival in full swing, and the Galway Summer Race Festival nipping at its heels, a new campaign to remind frontline tourism workers of four simple behaviours is very timely. As part of its 'Shine' campaign in association with Fáilte Ireland, Tourism Ireland is calling on service providers to first show a lively interest in customers, saying it is this additional engagement that distinguishes their experience here from that of many other countries.

Ah silly season, how we'd forgotten about you. You crept up on us there some time just after the froth on Galway Bay settled following the Volvo Ocean Race and the dust thrown up by the local and European Elections dispersed. And so, as we wait for festival season to begin (again) in earnest, for the kids to go back to school and the traffic to go back to the normal bedlam, we scramble for ways to make stories go further and last longer.

A series of letters in the Irish Times recently has readers bemoaning the origins of vegetables on Irish shelves and asking where all the Irish vegetables are. While one reader has suggested looking in the Oireachtas, it would seem there is also good call to weed out more than a few people vegetating in the public service sector.

The opening of a new unit at University Hospital Galway to fast-track patients through the Accident and Emergency Department comes at a curious time for the local health service considering the staff cuts and ward closures announced last week.

The latest phrase in the lexicon of the PR people who run the HSE is "opinion former". "Opinion former". Say it out loud to yourself, there. Ignore the funny looks you're getting from passers-by. What, precisely, do you think it means? Up to now, we've had authorities, experts, buffs, intellectuals, savants, scholars, thinkers, gurus, pros, commentators, pundits, analysts, expositors, critics and evaluators.

It had all the criteria of a nail biting finish. Two top candidates, one job. A robotic candidate accused of showing no personality versus the Armageddon faced enterprising maverick. Who would come out on top? Everyone had an opinion. But, while Sir Alan Sugar's apprentice was named as restaurant owner Yasmina Siadatan, the Irish nation showed that this time around they favoured the person whose only vice seemed to be that they couldn't put a foot wrong.

Your political party driving you around the bend? Tired of the same old pre election promises with very little return? Why not try a completely different party and see what real change can do for you? As election fever reaches its climax this week, it seems that every party is trying to get disillusioned Fianna Fail voters to get into bed with their party. While an Taoiseach Brian Cowen has been busy making the rounds, trying to convince his party faithful to stay faithful to him, it seems everyone is out to poach his vote.

It's bloody typical. You are one of the first to announce that the Volvo Ocean Race is coming to Galway, you follow the story relentlessly over the course of nearly two years, documenting every new development, charting its course around the globe, you carry feature after feature reminding people how great the event is for the city and highlight the key dates so your readers know when and where and then you go and spoil it all by missing the boats' arrival yourself.

It's been a long time coming but it's finally here. The Volvo Ocean Race Fleet arrives in Galway this weekend, seven months after it left its starting port in Alicante, over a year since Galway was named as a stopover port and 36 years after it was first initiated. And, while there are those amongst us who would not have been able to tell our starboard from our port side this time last week, or this time in two weeks when the yachts pull anchor again, there are few people in the city who aren't revved up for this Formula 1 of yacht racing events.