By the way, do you remember the alternative local version? "Last night I saw the Provos making a bomb/Ooh, wee chirpy chirpy cheep cheep/Woke up this morning and the barracks was gone/Ooh, wee chirpy chirpy cheap cheap".

On second thoughts, don't answer that. You could only have heard it if you frequented certain hostelries where patrons provided their own entertainment. They often did this by making up populist versions of pop songs for well-oiled choral singing, otherwise known as "rebel" songs. And there you were thinking I'd led a sheltered life!
The point I'm trying to get to is that the original version made even less sense. Someone described it as "beautifully baffling". It was from a "rag tag Scottish quartet". But people of my generation learned to cope with post-modernist songs that didn't make sense. (Remember Procol Harum's 1967 hit, A Whiter Shade of Pale?)

Right now a lot of us are struggling to understand other things that don't seem to make sense either. It seems rising generations like change that older generations have to struggle with. But has the pace of 'progress' finally accelerated so much that we old fogies are losing the plot?

It's just that we've had so much to cope with. No sooner had we grasped computerised word-processing (a gigantic boon for journalists) than we had to get the hang of getting and sending e-mails and instant picture processing. Then along came mobile phones. What a revolution that was! No sooner had we mastered text messages than mobile phones got even more complicated.

Ok, so many of the technological advances are wonderful but is change going too far? What's the point of social networking sites that allow you to tell the world instantly what you're doing right this moment? Now it's more chirpy chirpy tweet tweet than chirpy chirpy cheap cheap. (For research purposes, I managed to negotiate access to a site although I had to promise anonymity).

What I'm wondering is why people bother? Why post the most utterly mundane personal messages? You know the sort of thing. Norman Hamill is taking a 'comfort' break right now (going to the toilet) – back in a moment.

I'm back now. Where was I? Oh, yes, trying to understand the point of mundane personal messages on sites such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. Even married couples have told me they're into communicating with each other on Facebook instead of just talking to each other across the living room. Still, I suppose, for some married couples it might be an advance.

Actually the individual who allowed me to use her comments on Facebook includes some marginally interesting pronouncements. She even has aspirations, thoughts and social messages that tend to contradict the case I'm trying to make. Ah well, she's a relatively intellectual tecchie.

Here's a selection from her recent entries, so you can make up your own mind. "Allez les Irlandais". (An intellectual with a populist touch?) Actually this one is in good company. "The Republic of Ireland soccer team will provide stiff opposition to anybody who comes to Dublin," wrote An Taoiseach Brian Cowen, according to The Irish Times.

(Immigrants better look out then, as the team will provide opposition to "anybody" and not just other soccer teams!) "X can't wait to get her hair cut this evening, goodbye frizzy, crappy mop". "Why, thank u Crunchie, let the madness commence". "X can't wait to meet the Highland Hunk of her dreams this weekend LOL" (This one was before a week-end trip to Aberdeen.)

So what do you think? Is there any point in it? As I say, access to this was negotiated on a strict confidentiality basis. But the writer may be known to a few readers of this paper. Sorry yet again G! Just consider that at least you're taking the pressure off other members of the family.