I was stuck in traffic in Irishtown in Kilkenny last week: a not uncommon experience, I gather, and there is currently a war raging about the purpose and efficacy of recent traffic-management changes in the city.

As you can see it was a beautiful afternoon and, initially, I was not too vexed but, as I gazed at one of Kilkenny's gems, St. Canice's Cathedral, half hidden behind an awful expression of late twentieth century street-architecture my humour disimproved as I reflected on what appalling damage we did to ourselves during the boom and greed years.