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Update – Secular (patroness of the arts etc.)

1 July, 2025 5 Comments
Posted in: Dublin, Family, Ireland, Mr. Waffle, Princess

In rapid succession I went to the following events at an arts festival: David O’Doherty (covered earlier, try to keep up), Paul Murray (rather earnest but interesting author of, inter alia, “The Bee Sting”) and Louise Lowe. I found the last the most interesting (Mr. Waffle accompanied me – he was supposed to come to the other two as well but pressure of work prevented him and having run into loads of people I knew at both earlier events who were wondering why I was there on my own – not to mention the expense of getting two tickets when only one turned out to be needed – I was pretty pleased to have him there but I remain mildly resentful about his previous unavoidable absences, as you can possibly tell from this lengthy aside).

Louise Lowe is a director of a theatre company called ANU and I have been to loads of their productions and they are always interesting and usually good. I found her absolutely fascinating. She has a really unusual way of looking at things and she is intrigued by the audience and uses all kinds of different approaches to bring them closer to the production. So enthused am I that I have become a supporter – so far all this has got me is an opportunity for early access to tickets to a play I saw already last Christmas but I remain optimistic.

I have been to see the Mainie Jellett & Evie Hone exhibition in the National Gallery a couple of times. Interesting, but I did not love a lot of the art. Much like the Irish Times in the 1920s, it appears I am not ready for modernism in Irish art.

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Like the curate’s egg though, good in parts.

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Nice to see an old friend from the Crawford Gallery on tour anyhow.

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My brother got me a voucher for an “art afternoon tea” in the Merrion hotel for Christmas. They have an amazing art collection and you get to look at it; get a brochure on it; and eat cakes inspired by it. Not cheap (though free to me) and quite difficult to get a booking but I would recommend. Herself accompanied me. We enjoyed our experience.

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I was listening to the German classical music radio that Mr. Waffle favours when I heard this number I have not heard in over 40 years. We learnt it in school for choir. To be honest I thought it was a bit mawkish but hearing it really brought me back. It’s by Handel, apparently, who knew? I have to say, you’ve got to applaud Mrs. O’Shea’s vaulting ambition for the 14 year old girls in her charge.

Mr. Waffle and I went to tenth anniversary celebratory drinks for the Dublin Inquirer to which we subscribe. It’s run on a complete shoestring but I like their enthusiasm and I like getting a print edition delivered. The drinks were upstairs in a pub and a bit primitive but we got to meet all the journalists and the editor. We also met the mother of one of the journalists. It was that kind of evening. The journalist was American but her mother was Irish (though she had lived in America for many years) and had just that morning arrived in from the States to show support (“I’m here as a subscriber,” she said enthusiastically but she was the only subscriber who had travelled 5,000 kms to be upstairs in a pub). She told us that on arrival that morning, she had discovered through the inevitable channels that her old headmistress’s funeral was that very day so she and her mother (the journalist’s grandmother – are you still with me?) went to the funeral and had lunch in the convent with the nuns which she very much enjoyed. I enjoyed this exchange myself as it confirmed all my beloved stereotypes about Irish people and funerals.

Our media subscriptions may yet beggar us. We subscribe to the Inquirer, the Irish Times, the Guardian and the Canard Enchaîné which you might have thought was plenty. The other day Mr. Waffle said to me “According to Haaretz…” “Sorry, what?” I said. He said, “I’m a subscriber. I felt they needed some support.” I mean yes, but that’s a lot of news organisations to keep afloat.

We went to the Dalkey book festival. Dalkey is a lovely little village beside the sea near Dublin. Our hopes for a lovely day were dashed by the bucketing rain. We went on our bikes and although our rain gear is good it wasn’t exactly the pleasant cycling experience I had envisaged. Also Dalkey is full of electric SUVs. I mean it’s good that they are electric, I guess, but they steal up behind you and unnerve you as you cycle along, like a snowboarder swooshing down the mountain after you as you are attempting a tricky turn.

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We went to a panel talk on the manosphere. I was very underwhelmed. No new insights and I have decided that a panel with four people and a host is never going to give you any depth. I bought this book all the same, I had heard the author on a couple of podcasts and the book sounded interesting, though like everyone else, she had no real chance to shine on the panel. Not a triumph.

What was a triumph was that I had booked a restaurant for dinner and despite the literature loving hordes who had descended on the town we got our dinner and a window seat from whence we could see the crowd at the pub across the road, come out, get driven in by the rain and come out again.

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As we were sitting watching the crowds surge in and out of the pub we saw Mr. Waffle’s brother and his wife locking their bikes to the pole across the road so we rushed out to say hello. Then another friend came up and we all had a nice chat until the rain started again and we all scuttled back to our various locations.

After dinner we went to see Paul Howard talk about Ross O’Carroll Kelly. Wouldn’t be a massive fan myself but Mr. Waffle enjoys the books. Mr. Howard packed out the ballroom of the hotel and the local crowd loved him (technically, I think Ross may be from Foxrock but Dalkey appears to be close enough). It was grand but I spent much of the evening in shock as Mr. Waffle pointed out an apparently very elderly gent whom I did not recognise at all but turns out to have been one of my (younger) lecturers from college. Disturbing.

To recover, we had a drink in the town with the friend we had run into earlier and his wife who was one of the volunteers shepherding literature enthusiasts from venue to venue.

As you will be no doubt aware, Bloomsday was June 16. I’m not a huge Joyce fan but a friend of the Princess’s who is doing a PhD on Joycean stuff was over from England to give a lecture so we went along to show support. Mr. Waffle found it interesting; I thought it was quite hard going myself but we both agreed that it was better than the Dalkey panel, so there was that.

And finally in cultural news, Mr. Waffle and I saw “Jane Austen Ruined my Life”. Grand but nothing to write home about. A bilingual film about a French woman who loves Jane Austen. It is supposed to be set in a big English Georgian house but it is a quite obviously entirely French big house so I found that amusing. We get our thrills where we can.

How have your own cultural outings been going?

Update – Religious

29 June, 2025 2 Comments
Posted in: Boys, Daniel, Family, Hodge, Michael, Mr. Waffle

I went to see the comedian David O’Doherty. I would recommend. Quite funny. He is the product of what used to be called in Ireland a “mixed marriage”. In other words, his mother’s a Protestant and his father’s a Catholic. This is not really an expression in common currency any longer but I had explained it previously to the children as I sometimes humorously refer to myself and Mr. Waffle as having a mixed marriage (I’m from Cork, he’s from Dublin, I know, I’m hilarious). Anyway it transpired that the children thought I was joking about the expression and did not believe it was actually a thing which led one of them to say to a college classmate who said he had a Protestant mother and Catholic father – “Ah mixed marriage” to which the friend put jazz hands in the air and said, “That’s me.” My mortified child then said, “What, that’s actually a real thing?” Truly the past is another country.

Anyhow David O’Doherty covered this extensively in his gig including the line that his mother played tennis (or possibly hockey) for Ireland, “It’s not as impressive as it sounds, all the Protestants got a go then.” Got a good laugh for him.

I know I am going back a bit here but we had a two hour mass for the Easter Saturday vigil and I am still not the better of it. For the first time that I ever remember there were actual baptisms during the mass. There were real converts; three of them. I was astounded. One of these was a Spanish man called Jesus and I am really baffled by this development. I mean how did a Spaniard called Jesus not get brought up Catholic almost by default? A mystery. The service contains this line, “This is our faith and we are proud to profess it.” Honestly, I’d never really thought about this line one way or another before but it was surprisingly moving in the context of the converts. I guess it’s a bit like when you see how pleased people are to become Irish citizens at the citizenship ceremonies and you think, “Maybe it is kind of good to be Irish.”

As we entered the church at the start of what was going to be the longest mass any of us had ever attended (giving the Orthodox Catholics a run for their money), the trainee deacon fell upon us like the wolf on the fold and said he needed someone to do a reading. On the one hand, this is a very reading rich service, on the other hand it is the highlight of the liturgical year and you’d think someone would already have been selected. Herself nobly volunteered to fill the gap. She was told to go and find Joan who was organising. She could not find Joan; one of the choir said, “Tch, Joan, she’s very disorganised.” Not words to inspire confidence. We never did find Joan and herself went off to join the other readers with some trepidation.

We ended up sitting behind a pillar which was annoying as I did not get to see herself reading to the unusually full church but I did get to hear her so there’s that. Afterwards she said that there had been a very nice Mauritian woman who had explained everything to her and stayed with her throughout. We went up to thank this heroine and it turned out that she was one of the nurses from Mr. Waffle’s mother’s nursing home so that was nice.

On Easter Sunday we had Mr. Waffle’s sister and her husband and daughter for lunch which was broadly successful though we had far too much food. My husband’s family have bird like appetites. For the occasion, I was wearing a dress which I got in Cos; a shop much loved by middle aged women. It’s the home of the shapeless garment and like the rest of my tribe, I love it. My lovely green dress is sort of a-line in shape and my heartless family promptly nicknamed it “the sail”. As I was rushing from one room to the next on Easter Sunday morning, it caught on the door handle, “Sail caught in the rigging?” asked one of the family wags instantly. I truly have a lot to put up with.

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Our cat’s water and food bowl live in the utility room. Keeping us all on our toes, they move about the room. The water bowl is always full of water and I have overturned it more times than I can say. In rushing around on Easter Sunday morning, needless to say, I kicked it over soaking myself and the floor. As I cursed in the utility room, I heard sniggering in the kitchen. “What?” I said grumpily. “Your nemesis is a bowl of water on the floor.”

We push on through further religious services. We had the feast of the Holy Trinity. The priest repeated what he described as an old joke but it was new to me. Stay with me here. Back in the day, the bishop would come and examine you on your catechism before you were cleared to make your confirmation. In retrospect, I am unsure that anyone was barred from the ceremony on the basis of ignorance but our primary teachers had us drilled in the Bishop Lucey catechism. My strong memory is that the catechism was written by Bishop Lucey and I distinctly remember a yellow and brown book but the internet seems unaware of this. Maybe the force of his grace’s personality was such that I believed that he had drafted the catechism although he had not. Anyway, we learnt it off by heart, he examined us with much less thoroughness than our teachers had led us to expect and that was that. Ok the joke is coming now: A bishop went into a school to examine the confirmation candidates and he asked one boy what the Holy Trinity was. The child, having learnt off the answer responded at great speed. The bishop was unable to follow his answer and said politely, “I’m sorry, I don’t understand.” The child replied smartly, “You’re not supposed to understand, it’s a mystery.” I enjoyed; you may feel that it was not worth the build up.

Last Sunday was Corpus Christi except the priest called it the festival of the body and blood of Christ and I was genuinely sitting there thinking, “What is this? I’ve never heard of this in my life.” Which just proves how ancient I am. Also does not reflect well on my general intelligence levels. I got there in the end. Slightly related, would you like to see a medal from the Eucharistic congress in Dublin in 1932 which I found in my jewellery box earlier today; I have literally no idea where on earth it came from. A mystery as the young man said to the bishop.

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A final religious news item: I found my father’s (I think it must be but how did it get here?) missal in the great shelf reoganisation. I expressed some surprise. “Look your grandad’s missal,” said I to middle child. “Oh,” light dawning over rugged country, “I’ve never heard the word missal before, is that why the leaflet in mass is called the missalette?”

The Eye of the Beholder

29 April, 2025
Posted in: Cork, Family, Ireland, Mr. Waffle, Reading etc., Siblings

I was at the Hugh Lane Gallery recently. Francis Bacon’s studio has been reconstructed in the Gallery; and has been a big attraction there for many years. It was brought piece by piece from his London attic and re-instated in the Hugh Lane. I am not a big Francis Bacon fan but it is interesting. I took a photo and sent it in to the family group chat captioning it “My worst nightmare”. A hilarious line reflecting on the artist’s studio and my own slight obsession with tidiness. Like many of these hilarious lines of mine, it went unread in the family group chat except by my saintly husband who, on first glance thought it was actually my parents’ attic in its glory days (it has now been tamed by my sister in a project stretching over many months). I have to say, actually, it does resemble the attic except there is marginally more floor space in the studio.

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Arts etc.

30 March, 2025
Posted in: Boys, Cork, Daniel, Family, Ireland, Michael, Mr. Waffle, Princess, Reading etc., Siblings

Mr. Waffle and I went to see “Dr. Strangelove” at the Bord Gáis Energy Theatre. It’s where all the big shows that come to Dublin go. I find it unsatisfactory as a theatre as it is ginormous and a bit lacking in atmosphere. The sets were amazing but the play only alright. I don’t mind Steve Coogan but I don’t love, love, love him. However, the rest of the audience were apparently only there to see him and when he appeared on stage he had to break character to acknowledge the rapturous applause. I only went because Armando Ianucci was involved and I love him and had heard him interviewed about the play on “This American Life”. Honestly, I wouldn’t say it was his best work but I may have been prejudiced by the fact that everyone else found it hilarious and it only occasionally made me smile. I thought the woman beside me was going to have to be stretchered out such was her hilarity while I smiled thinly at the very odd joke that appealed.

Michael went to see “And Juliet” which was recommended by a commenter. His friend got tickets for her birthday and invited him along. He found it reasonably enjoyable. I am coming to the conclusion that my family may be hard to please.

I took a half day from work to see Michael in a lunchtime performance of a college play. It is doubtless his mother’s prejudice but I thought he was really excellent.

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Mr. Waffle and I investigated an Argentinian Bakery in the Liberties. It is called Bakeology and I would recommend. Our empanada needs are met for the foreseeable.

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There has been plenty of cinema in my life since I was here last. I enjoyed “A Real Pain” as did the Oscar voters. “Bridget Jones” did not trouble the Oscars but I must say I really enjoyed it. A friend and I went for dinner after work and then saw it in the Stella in Rathmines which I would recommend for a little treat.

Mr. Waffle and I went to see another Iranian film – “Seed of the Sacred Fig”. You would want to be in the whole of your health for these Iranian films, I will say that. Very worthy and good and all but I was a bit wrung by the end.

As part of the festival of the Francophonie we went to a Moroccan film (and international buffet – can I deny that this was the major temptation? I can not). The film was “Animalia” and it’s about a girl who marries into a rich family and struggles to adapt; she stays at home one day while they are all out and – plot twist – gets cut off from the family by an alien invasion. The budget doesn’t really stretch to aliens so it’s just lights in the sky and fog. It was ok, I would say. Buffet was great – lots of Moroccan specialties. We met the Moroccan ambassador (who had introduced the film) having a cigarette outside afterwards. “What did you think?” he asked. “It was delicious,” said Mr. Waffle. “No, the film,” I hissed. “Um, very thought provoking,” he said politely. “It was a bit strange alright,” said the ambassador “and what a time to screen it early evening during Ramadan.” Not something that had occurred to me, I must confess, but it certainly made me think that he had performed his part admirably for someone who hadn’t had anything to eat or drink since before dawn.

I saw Edmund de Waal give a talk in the Chester Beatty library. I found him an amazing, fascinating, heart warming speaker. If you ever get a chance you should definitely go and see him. This was all the more amazing as it was online (only the elect got in person tickets and I was consumed with envy as he passed around netsuke for people to hold) and online things are, as we all know, not as good as in person, and it was still absolutely amazing.

I went to a talk on the Flying Dutchman in art which appeared to be largely a plug for the Flying Dutchman which the Irish National Opera are running in the Bord Gáis theatre. My guess is that they may have overestimated the appetite of the Irish public for opera (it’s a big, big venue) but who knows? I once saw “Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg” from the gods of the Brussels opera house and it has effectively extinguished any desire I might have to ever see another Wagner opera so it’s a no from me. I was chatting to the INO people afterwards and told them how the Princess had done a project with them during Covid and it had saved her sanity. Like many another thing the Princess does, her application to take part in this project took her parents by surprise as we are not particularly in opera and she had certainly never seemed interested before but then she is a constant series of surprises to her parents.* This lovely woman Sharon Carty put in loads of time online one on one with her and she has an abiding enthusiasm for and interest in opera. So, it’s not like I’m not grateful to the INO, just not grateful enough.

I also went to a talk on Mazzolino and the renaissance in Ferrara. I mean, alright. Can’t say that I now love Mazzolino of whom I was entirely ignorant previously but interesting enough. I went to a talk on Sarah Cecilia Harrison whose portraits I really liked and who seems, in life, to have been a very interesting and extremely contrary person. Finally, in visual arts news did I mention that I went to a talk on Eileen Gray? I will say this, the more I hear about Le Corbusier the less I like him. While I was there I had a look at the Harry Clarke stained glass which is temporarily in Dublin as Cork’s Crawford museum is closed for renovations. It was strange to see these old friends in new surroundings. I think the detail below is a self-portrait of the artist. A handsome man whose private life was, I believe, complex.

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Let me throw in some more pictures of his glass from Bewley’s cafe in Grafton street. Because I can.

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As I mentioned above, the Crawford Gallery is closed for renovations. Alas, alack. It’s not open again until 2027. It is being extended. Here is the text about the extension.

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Here is the artist’s impression of the extension.

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Really, the glass box on the roof will ensure that the character of the gallery is “maintained and enhanced with great sensitivity”? It’s appalling. I mean, I feel you King Charles. I’m sure it will be lovely from the inside but it’s quite dreadful from the outside.

My sister is still cleaning out my parents’ house and I am generally pretty ruthless about saying I don’t want things but books are my Achilles heel. My grandmother bought a large mahogany book case and its contents from Canon Mulcahy in Kilmallock at some point – maybe in the 40s. The bookcase and all its contents made their way to my parents’ house probably in about 1970. This means that my parents’ house had a fine collection of 19th and early 20th century books with a strong focus on theology, if that was your thing, but also other books: Thom’s directories, etiquette books, (worthy) novels etc. My sister pulled from this range of books a physics primer from 1874 and asked whether I would like it. Well, as you can imagine, I should have said no but we have a physics student in the house and I was weak and said yes. I showed it to my physics student who said a lot has changed in physics since 1874 but whose eye was caught by the name on the flyleaf. We found our man – JJ Joyce – in the census. He was a Jeremiah Joyce son of James W Joyce who was a successful businessman in Kilmallock and who was very active in the land league. Kilmallock (which has a great deal of local history for such a small place) has an active local history society and we were able to find out much more about James W. He was gaoled for his activities in the land league and kept a diary – it mostly seems a bit dull about managing his business back in Kilmallock – but look, look at this entry, what did he get sent to himself in Limerick gaol? Yes indeed, the physics primer which we now held in our little paws.

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So that was pretty cool. I rang my sister to tell her and she thought I had discovered that the book was valuable. Alas, no. But still, my physics student brought it in to college where it was an object of fascination to the young people. One of them had an uncle in Kilmallock so he got to keep it. This seems a much better fate for it than any other I can imagine although I do wish I’d taken a photo.

Yesterday Mr. Waffle and I went on a nearly 3 hour walking tour of the city – v good, I recommend Arran Henderson for all your walking tour needs; I always learn something new and I have lived here a long time. As we were looking at a Dominican church he said how intellectual and clever the Dominicans were. As though reading the minds of his audience, he said, “Have you heard the joke about the Dominicans and the Jesuits? As you know the Dominicans dealt with the Cathars and the Albigensian heresy and the Jesuits were set up as a counter reformation force. Have you ever met a Cathar?” The poor old Cathars. As we walked on Mr. Waffle murmured to me, “Just brute force, no subtlety or intelligence.”

In the afternoon, we went to a talk by fantastic author Jan Carson who I nearly saw in 2022 and have been keen to see since. The French literature festival put together an excellent programme – all free, you’ve got to love the French – and who was on it? No prizes. The links to French literature were a bit tenuous, I mean Jan Carson’s French publisher was there? I think Jan Carson is an extraordinarily talented writer and I loath magical realism which, honestly, is a big feature of her work but somehow it’s ok when she does it. But, you know, being a great writer does not necessarily translate to being a great speaker so I wasn’t quite sure what to expect. As they say, I need not have worried.

I found her really interesting. She comes from a very strict religious background. She’s from Ballymena in the North and when she was a little girl there was a sign on the roundabout saying “Ballymena still says no” and she thought it meant to line dancing as she had heard so much against it from the pulpit. Her family seem to have been very strict: no cinema, no theatre and the Bible as, if not the only book, certainly the main book available for reading at home. She attributes her interest in magical realism to hearing sermons on the Book of Revelation every Sunday between ages 10 and 12. When asked about her family and community’s attitude to her work she said that that was the first question she was always asked. She told a very moving story about a children’s play which she wrote which is currently on in the Lyric theatre in Belfast. Her mother a woman of 70 who had never been inside a theatre before, came to see it and sat and cried throughout the show. The mother said, “All these people are here, and they’re enjoying themselves and you wrote this.”

After this very touching reply, the next question came from an older gent with a booming voice and apparently unshakeable self-confidence. “Which lady writers have influenced you?” he said. “Do you like Simone de Beauvoir?” There was some hilarious confusion as she had just not heard the word “lady” and thought he meant French writers but the interviewer clarified. “I like Flannery O’Connor,” Jan Carson offered helpfully. “Is he an American?” our patrician gentleman boomed back slightly disapprovingly. He seemed not one whit discomfited by the information that Flannery O’Connor was a woman and it was poor old Jan Carson who seemed momentarily discombobulated.

Anyway recommended and not as well attended as it should have been. A win for me I guess as I got her to sign a book for me and there was almost no queue. She mentioned that she has another new book out next year. Bound to be worth a read.

Any cultural outings of your own?

*Text received last Monday: “I’m on a plane on my way to Warsaw. Did I mention I was doing this???” Reader, she did not.

Tick Tock Post: Unlikely to go Viral

17 February, 2025
Posted in: Cork, Family, Ireland

I got the mantlepiece clock that my grandparents got for their wedding (in 1922 or 23) repaired. I remember it from my Granny’s house. It put in a good few years in the attic in my parents’ house after she died and eventually made it to my house where it has been sitting on the mantlepiece silently for many years.

Fixing it has been on my to do list for some considerable time. Recently, I took it to the (elderly, grumpy) clock repair man. It was pricey enough to get it fixed and, as the repairman unhelpfully, but honestly I concede, pointed out, the investment in repair in no way added to the commercial value of the clock (approximately zero). However, I am enjoying the full Westminster chime and the bongs on the hour and the more modest quarter hour chimes. I must confess though that there is some consumer resistance from other family members.

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O Canada

17 January, 2025
Posted in: Family, Princess

Due to the very generous citizenship policy of Canada my husband (who was born in Canada but left aged 2) and all three of my children (who haven’t even been to Canada) are Canadian citizens. Herself went through the hoops required (I mean, fair enough, hoops are appropriate given her tenuous link to the motherland) and her Canadian passport arrived today. A nice passport, I must say, they’ve gone for navy with a certain amount of maple leaf and a very elaborate gold crest. If she moves to Canada, it will make London seem next door. Let’s hope she doesn’t move to Canada, shall we?

I told her it arrived and after preliminary excitement I said I would put it in her room. These were my instructions:

Thank you! Put all in white box under bed, side nearest window (my filing system). There should be a piece of paper on top saying “do not throw away”: reaffix.

There are times when she reminds me vividly of my father. Can I say again that my reputation for throwing things out has been very much exaggerated?

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