Morning,

It was with both a sense of relief and delight yesterday that my neighbours welcomed the crew from Dublin City Council, who worked late into the night to restore our water supply. Five days is a long time with little or no water, turning on the taps this morning felt like a minor miracle. Irish Water is asking people to continue to conserve water as services are restored after the big freeze.

Elsewhere, improving the image of GPs and getting more working-class students to study medicine are the solutions to the growing shortage of doctors, while young people’s concerns about the potential impact of Brexit on education, healthcare and minorities are highlighted in a report published today.

Meanwhile, Minister for Finance Paschal Donohoe will meet senior figures in the British Labour Party today to discuss its new policy of remaining in a customs union with the EU after Brexit.

Expect some debate on this one, as it's reported that universities have expressed alarm that their reputation could be damaged due to the “dumbing down” of criteria required for institutes of technology to secure new technological university status.

European election news over the weekend saw a new government formed in Germany, and a likely hung parliament in Italy.

In the aftermath of the raid on Lidl in Jobstown on Friday night, and the Twitter storm that followed, Jack Power from the Irish Times talked to people in the community.

Today's Zen is for those of you who survived the blizzard with a movie binge (rumour has it it was the survival strategy of choice). This cat was watching Hitchcock's classic Psycho.

Your bonus zen is a hot tip for next week's St Patrick's Festival. Thisispopbaby is staging a new work by writer and actor Peter Daly called Money, as part of its Where We Live series, "a kaleidoscope of stories about what it feels like to live in Dublin and Ireland today, told by some of the best storytellers on the island." Well worth checking out.