John Brady's 10-book "Matt Minogue Mystery" series beings with A Stone in the Heart (1988), as DS Matthew (Matt) Minogue returns to duty and the Murder Squad after nearly being killed when the British Ambassador is assassinated.  The early books in the series are set in the late 1980s and the stories are infused with the ongoing tensions of the Northern conflict.  Brady is a native of Dublin.  He studied at Trinity College Dublin and emigrated to Canada when he was 20.  He worked there as a bank official, an RCMP clerical officer and a teacher.  He now divides his time between Ireland and Canada.  http://crimeire.blogspot.com/2015/01/john-brady.html

Paraphrases from A Stone in the Heart by John Brady   a crowd of yobboes (louts, yokels) . . .   she  preferred the condensed richness of a quick sermon--she preferred the apt word to the hyperbole . . .

“Belfast upspeak” describes the upward inflection you find in Belfast English (and perhaps Northern Irish accents generally).  In a nutshell, upspeak is the tendency to go up at the end of sentences?  So everything sounds a bit like a question?  At least to American ears?  Upspeak obviously isn’t confined to Belfast or Northern Ireland.  It also seems common in Northern English and Scottish accents (Liverpool perhaps being the most famous example of this).  And it has made headway in the US, as in the classic Valley Girl accent (“I was driving to the mall?  To buy a bikini?”)  http://dialectblog.com/2011/05/23/belfast-upspeak/

When two or more subjects are connected by “and”, the verb is plural.  He and I are good friends. 
If two singular nouns refer to the same person, the verb must be singular.  The secretary and cashier was present. (That means the same person was a secretary and cashier).  Note:  To find out whether the two words refer to the same person or two different persons, look at the article or possessive adjective.  If there are two articles or possessives, there are two different persons.  In that case, the verb must be in plural. 
If we get the word “each” and “every” before singular subjects, the verb is singular.  Every member was ready to speak. 
Two or more singular subjects connected by or, nor, either…or, neither…nor take singular verb.  Either he or his brother might have done this. 
When the subjects, connected by or, nor, either…or, neither…nor, are of different numbers.  The verb must be plural and the plural subject must be put just before the verb.  Mr. Gobi or his brothers have to do this. 
When the subjects connected by or, nor, either…or, neither…nor are of different persons.  The verb agrees in person with the subject that comes just before it.  He or I have to be there. 
When subjects which are different in person or number or both are connected by ‘and’, the verb is plural.  He and I are friends. 
For a collective noun, usually a singular verb is used, but when the individuals in the group are taken into consideration, a plural verb is used.  The committee meets tomorrow.  Find more rules and examples at http://www.english-for-students.com/Verb-and-Subject.html

The 1953 Iranian coup d'état, known in Iran as the 28 Mordad coup, was the overthrow of the democratically elected Prime Minister of Iran Mohammad Mosaddegh on 19 August 1953, orchestrated by the United Kingdom (under the name "Operation Boot") and the United States (under the name TPAJAX Project).  Mossadegh had sought to audit the books of the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company (AIOC), a British corporation (now BP) and to change the terms of the company's access to Iranian petroleum reserves.  Upon the refusal of the AIOC to co-operate with the Iranian government, the parliament (Majlis) voted to nationalize the assets of the company and expel their representatives from the country.  Following the coup in 1953, a government under General Fazlollah Zahedi was formed which allowed Mohammad-Rezā Shāh Pahlavi, the Shah of Iran (Persian for king), to rule the country more firmly as monarch.  He relied heavily on US and UK support to hold on to power until his own overthrow in February 1979.  In August 2013, 60 years after, the American Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) admitted that it was involved in both the planning and the execution of the coup, including the bribing of Iranian politicians, security and army high-ranking officials, as well as pro-coup propaganda. The CIA is quoted acknowledging the coup was carried out "under CIA direction" and "as an act of U.S. foreign policy, conceived and approved at the highest levels of government."  Iran's oil had been discovered and later controlled by the British-owned AIOC.  Popular discontent with the AIOC began in the late 1940s:  a large segment of Iran's public and a number of politicians saw the company as exploitative and a central tool of continued British imperialism in Iran.  Despite Mosaddegh's popular support, the AIOC was unwilling to allow Iranian authorities to audit the company accounts or to renegotiate the terms of its access to Iranian petroleum.  In 1951, Iran's petroleum industry was nationalized with near-unanimous support of the Majlis in a bill introduced by Mossadegh who led the Iranian nationalist party, the National Front.  In response, Britain instigated a worldwide boycott of Iranian oil to pressure Iran economically.  Initially, Britain mobilized its military to seize control of the British-built Abadan oil refinery, then the world's largest, but Prime Minister Clement Attlee opted instead to tighten the economic boycott while using Iranian agents to undermine Mosaddegh's government.  With a change to more conservative governments in both Britain and the United States, Winston Churchill and the Eisenhower administration decided to overthrow Iran's government, though the predecessor Truman administration had opposed a coup.  Classified documents show that British intelligence officials played a pivotal role in initiating and planning the coup, and that the AIOC contributed $25,000 towards the expense of bribing officials.  As a condition for restoring the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company, in 1954 the U.S. required removal of the AIOC's monopoly; five American petroleum companies, Royal Dutch Shell, and the Compagnie Française des Pétroles, were to draw Iran's petroleum after the successful coup d'état—Operation Ajax.  The Shah declared this to be a "victory" for Iranians, with the massive influx of money from this agreement resolving the economic collapse from the last three years, and allowing him to carry out his planned modernization projects.   Operation Ajax's formal leader was senior CIA officer Kermit Roosevelt, Jr., while career agent Donald Wilber was the operational leader, planner, and executor of the deposition of Mosaddegh. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1953_Iranian_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat

Gerald M. Panter on his web pages  "Atget's Paris:  Then and Now" compares Atget's 1890s photos of streets and buildings in Paris with carefully matched contemporary photos of the same scenes.  http://www.gmpanter.com/atget-s-paris.html   (See the 22 pictures he posts by clicking on the arrows underneath the picture of Église Saint-Sulpice on the first page.)  Christopher Rauschenberg has also put out a book of such comparisons.  See "Paris Changing: Revisiting Eugene Atget's Paris" on Amazon and elsewhere.  Thank you, Muse reader!

FOOD AND DRINK NEWS

The Museum of Food and Drink is opening its first permanent location, on October 28, 2015 in Williamsburg, Brooklyn.  Its debut exhibition, “Flavor:  Making It and Faking It,” is a multisensory take on what executive director Peter Kim called the little-known story of the flavor industry.  The museum has been in the works for more than a decade.  Joshua Barone  http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/09/07/museum-of-food-and-drink-to-open-permanent-space-in-brooklyn/  MOFAD is located at 62 Bayard St in Brooklyn.

October 21, 2015  A U.S. magistrate judge in Miami has ruled that Anheuser-Busch InBev falsely led American beer drinkers to believe that Beck’s was authentically German and approved an estimated $20 million settlement, according to The Wall Street Journal.  Beck’s signature green bottle is emblazoned with a label that says it “Originated in Bremen, Germany” and is “German Quality” beer, duping customers as to its true production location.  Beck’s is currently made in St. Louis after the company moved production there from Germany in 2012.  The settlement covers consumers who purchased Beck’s Light and Beck’s Dark beers since May 2011.  To get your money, you’ll have until next month to fill out an online form to claim your refund.  With all your receipts, you can claim as much as $50.  No such luck?  You can still get as much as $12 back.  Laura Lorenzetti 

http://fortune.com/2015/10/21/becks-settlement/

The 2016 Zagat Guide to New York City was released October 13, 2015, with a few surprises.  A notable addition to the top 20 restaurants is Graffiti, which received a 28 (on a scale of 1 to 30) for food.  Last year Graffiti also received a 28, but from too few voters to put it on the top 20 food list, said Evan Barbour, a spokeswoman for the guide. 

Daniel Boulud’s flagship, Daniel, has climbed back into the rarefied circle of restaurants with a 29 for food; it received that score back in 2012 but then dropped to 28.  It joins Eric Ripert’s Le Bernardin and David Bouley’s namesake restaurant, Bouley, at that highest score.  Tim and Nina Zagat, both lawyers, began the survey informally, polling friends about restaurants in Paris.  Then they added New York, and before long had a new career.  In 2011 they sold the survey to Google, which now conducts and publishes the surveys.  Florence Fabricant  http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/13/dining/zagat-guide-nyc-2016.html

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 1368  October 26, 2015  On this date in 1825, the Erie Canal opened from Albany, New York to Lake Erie.  On this date in 1861, the Pony Express officially ceased operations.