A baby T-rex model catches children from St Joseph’s National School, East Wall, Dublin off guard. The baby dinosaur is part of the Walking With Dinosaurs spectacular coming to the O2 in Dublin and the Odyssey Arena in Belfast this month. Image: Mark Stedman/Photocall Ireland.

HERE ARE THE things you need to know as we round off the day in three easy steps.

THINGS WE LEARNED

#PARALYMPICS: Stupendous performances by Irish athletes in London today. Over at TheScore.ie, we’ve been watching Jason Smyth smash a world record and take his second athletics gold (a repeat of Beijing), Mark Rohan take his second cycling gold and Catherine O’Neill take silver in the discus.

#SHOOTING: The gardai have said this week that they are determined to bring someone to justice for the daylight shooting of Alan Ryan in Dublin on Wednesday. Today, a man in his 40s has been arrested in relation to the murder. Ryan’s funeral is to take place tomorrow morning.

#CHINA: Two earthquakes have devastated a mountainous area of southwest China today – the death toll stands at 64 and at least 100,000 people have been made homeless.

#HEALTH: The Medical Independent shared an interesting story with us today: that the Department of Health is spending €130,000 on a six-week stint by six consultants to look at their “financial management and cost containment systems”. Presumably, they’re hoping to make that back on “cost containment”. How much will THOSE cutbacks save again?

#THAT’S (NOT) GAS: The powers that be are really heaping on the money worries for a Friday: after Bord Gáis Energy’s announcement that they will hike their prices next month, Electric Ireland customers found out today that they are facing bill increases from next month. Cheers, folks.

#MacSKYVER: The International Space Station has been (sort of) saved by a toothbrush and some MacGyver-style thinking.

THINGS WE LOVED

• It sounds like an impossible task – to create a magnificent body of photographic work by taking pictures solely inside the world of Silicon Valley – but Doug Menuez has done it. Look at this slideshow on the New York Times. In it, Menuez, who formerly covered the Ethiopian famine in 1985 for Newsweek, chronicles the digital revolution and those who drove it.

• This is one way of advertising a fundraising party: enlist the Pope in a video invite mash-up. We don’t think he knew.

via superhappyvideotimes/Youtube

THINGS WE SHARED

• Thanks for sharing: You told us that this is how you know you’re Irish. Flat 7Up and ‘going *out* out’ both feature.

• It must have been one of the most snapped and debated images in Dublin in the past few months. Now Dublin City Council has started legal proceedings against the clothing store Abercrotchy and Fitch… sorry, Abercrombie and Fitch, to take down its rather revealing giant billboard on College Green, writes Colm Keena in today’s Irish Times. At least the Irish one wasn’t as eye-to-trousers level as this one in Singapore).
• We have no idea why this heavy metal vocalist, aged about 5, is not yet a star. So we’ll do our bit and share her talent with you.  Rock on, little sis.

via wargasm123/Youtube

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