A glance at the week that was
Puppet Master
While the rest of the planet was watching Barack Obama's historic presidential victory, Fianna Fáil Senator Jim Walsh finally discovered that Podge and Rodge are on the telly. Their guest was ex-footballer Lee Sharpe. "I heard the most crass, sexually implicit [sic] points put to him," says Walsh, who wonders if this is what he pays his licence fee for.
Fine Gael TD Michael D'Arcy suggested he just turn it off. When Senator Walsh said he had spoken to young people who agreed with him, D'Arcy quipped, "They must be as conservative as you".
We now know
All the players on the Ireland rugby league team (right) have had the team's motto tattooed on their bodies. "Ní neart go cur le cheile" translates as "there is no strength without unity".
Bones found near a plane wreck in the Californian desert are those of millionaire Steve Fossett, who disappeared in 2007.
Voters have banned gay marriagein California, Arizona and Florida
Quote
"Sharon is in my opinion one of the nicest people you could ever have been fortunate to know" - PJ Howard on Sharon Collins, jailed for six years for conspiring to murder him and his sons
Frozen Cloning
In the week that Jurassic Park creator Michael Crichton passed away, it is apt that hopes were raised that ancient species could be resurrected.
Japanese scientists have cloned a mouse that had been frozen for 16 years, and the big question is whether they could do the same with frozen mammoths. Most scientists have urged people not to get carried away, but there are a lot of kids who won't be happy unless they get a woolly elephant for Christmas this year.
The Numbers
60% The jump in the number signing on the Live Register in the past year
€2,540 The retail price of the world's largest atlas. 3,000 copies have been printed
188,018 The number of US troops who passed through Shannon in the first nine months of 2008