Drapier: An Insider's Guide to Politics: Micheál Martin must have had a miserable Christmas. Sharing the anteroom to political doom with Martin Cullen can't have been much fun.
True, Micheál has greater call on solidarity from colleagues than our little friend, but all the good wishes in the world are precious little use if you're dead; politically dead, that is.
Once upon a time senior civil servants, even senior ex-civil servants, could have been relied upon to do the decent thing.
But then Jim Mitchell insulted a swathe of the most senior civil servants in the country on one bright day of the Dirt inquiry, and ever since they look at us with a more critical eye.
In the event, all was well. Travers fairly disembowelled the Department of Health but provided little ammunition to the opposition in its efforts to land a few punches on Micheál.
But try they did, nonetheless.
Liam Twomey was worthy but boring. Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin was pertinent but pompous. Finian McGrath was just pompous.
John Perry, Liz McManus and John Gormley all had a decent go, but were met with a wall of detail, all expressed in that soft Cork accent which just reeks of sincerity.
Only Pat Rabbitte managed to get under the skin of the guy whom he described as "Steve Silvermint" earlier in the week.
For a brief moment it looked like Micheál might lose the rag. The pitch soared by an octave or two and he slurred a few words, but in the end order was restored and Pat was left to look on in anger as the debate fizzled out.
Throughout the inquisition Micheál's two erstwhile juniors, Ivor and Tim, sat behind him in silence, looking for all the world like naughty schoolboys.
Ivor, in particular, had all the appearance of a man who had had a near-death experience and escaped with a fool's pardon.
Tim seems to have been the only one of the trio who actually copped on to what was happening back in 2003, but he has escaped because it wasn't strictly speaking his job.
Time will tell whether Micheál has shipped water, but Drapier thinks probably not.
Cullen well nigh sank as a result of sins of commission. Micheál's sin, if any, was one of omission, ultimately less serious because it leads us to "There but for the grace of God . . ."
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No doubt who the big winner is in all of this. Mary Harney finishes the week smelling of roses, her reputation for straight dealing much enhanced.
It's clear that she intends to spend some of her newly acquired capital in severely curtailing the cost of the whole debacle.
She hinted several times on Thursday that the Government might well decide not to compensate the estates of deceased former residents of the care institutions, thereby greatly reducing the overall cost of the compo.
No doubt there will be hell to pay if this is what she decides to do. Drapier can all too easily imagine the whingeing complaints of people looking to recover the pensions of relatives who died in the 1970s.
It's all just a little bit grubby, and Drapier, for one, will silently applaud if Mary and Brian Cowen do the right thing.
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It is an indisputable fact of political life that byelections are utterly useless in terms of foretelling the next general election. Tom Hayes won big for Fine Gael in 2002, and FG went on to be wiped a few months later.
That said, we will scramble for our radios come lunchtime and spend the rest of the week analysing the results to death.
There is really only one story that counts - the performance of the Mullingar parties.
The eponymous accord could sink or swim depending on the relative performances of Fine Gael and Labour.
The dream scenario for Enda and Pat is a Fine Gael win in Meath and a Labour win in Kildare. The nightmare scenario is a good day for Fine Gael and a bad day for Labour.
The byelections have thrown up a few decent candidates, none more so than JJ Power, the Green guy in Kildare. He has all the looks and the earthiness of a quintessential Green, and Drapier suspects that the Power name will do him no harm either.
All will be revealed before sunset, but come what may Drapier suspects that there will be little to put Bertie off his few pints of Bass come nightfall in Drumcondra.
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Like almost everybody else in Leinster House, Drapier believes that Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness are close friends of P O'Neill. That said, it is difficult to believe that either man could possibly have approved the latest Provo statement about the McCartney murder.
No doubt the statement was intended to play to the people of the Short Strand in the first instance, but it must surely have occurred to some bright spark in the Shinners that the casual mention of shooting people would do little for their claims not to be involved in crime.
It all goes to point up the real dilemma for the Shinners. The dual strategy of ballot box and Armalite has just about run its course.
If the peace process is to succeed then the IRA must be closed down. Senior Shinners have known this for years now, and Adams and McGuinness have both said so publicly.
The real danger is that the Shinners could take the easier option and split from the military wing. This is what most people in the Republic claim they would like to see. Drapier is not one of those people. Far from it.
The peace process is about putting an end to the tradition of armed struggle once and for all. It is not about providing an exit strategy for those Shinners who have tired of using their guns and who fancy the idea of a big office in Stormont.