A week ago, the prospect of an appearance by the Taoiseach and his shiny new Tánaiste at Tullow doubtless had the strategists salivating, writes Kathy Sheridan, in Carlow.
Imagine the headlines: "Politics exits Dublin 4 for the ploughing." Cue jolly snaps of Coalition wellies together in the mud and a kickstart to the urban-rural peace process.
A week later, no one even bothers to ask if there will be a meeting between the two. The romance is dead, lads, dead.
Bertie is choppered in, ferried straight down to "the stubble", holds up the start of the World Ploughing contest by half an hour, leans across a fence like a proper son of the soil for a chinwag with the ploughers. The day's true mission, however, is to keep well clear of the blasted Pied Pipers - who's going to tell him that it's he who is the Pied Piper and the media the rats? - and appeal directly to My People. My People respond warmly. "F**k them all, Bertie," roars a wit to robust applause.
But there's always one. This one yells: "Have ya any aul sterling?" The advisers look rattled. One of them glares at a rat who threatens to ask a question: "He won't be saying anything, Joe, so don't even think about asking."
Well, sure, we understand. Thursday was a shambolic free-for-all so today he's to zip it.
He's at the centre of a scrum to make even the Munster pack blanch, buffeted every which way in a charging media pack, a riot of idolatrous well-wishers, dozens of minders and a clatter of car-crash voyeurs. "It's like invading the pitch at Croke Park," grins one. "You never get near the cup but you get in the charge."
The armour is on, the collar is up on the big Joe Mourinho coat, despite the warm sunshine. "We know ye didn't do it, Bertie," guffaws a spotty teenager. As Bertie nears the safety of the Fianna Fáil tent, a press photographer moves in for a snap. In the tent, anarchy reigns for a few minutes and everyone struggles back out again.
"He gave the media the finger", snorts a well-wisher who had set herself up for a handshake. "That's why he walked away and wasn't he right?" The chase continues into the Teagasc tent, and on to the Department of Agriculture.
"Can the Government survive, Bertie?" bellows a rat, over a burly Garda shoulder. "Can I survive this more like?" moans the leader, in a futile zigzag move to evade the tormentors.
The advisers are close enough to see the leader's lips moving but, agonisingly, are too far behind to influence events. "What's he doing? Is he talking or what?" wails one.
Suddenly he's off, accompanied by the sound of an ambulance siren. A wag put a hand to an ear: "That's the sound of Bertie's career being carried off to intensive care."
In a neat relay, as the jeep takes off, the Tánaiste is expected up at the PD tent. Tom Parlon, perky in Parlon Country, will only say that Mary Harney's timing was "lucky They say it's better to be born lucky than rich." Word is in that MJ Nolan has broken ranks. "FF is crackingthere's a lot of discomfort," says a senior PD. The strategy, says another, is not for the PDs to open the trapdoor for FF. "We'll hang back and let them hang themselves."
An unusually relaxed and beaming Minister for Justice appears, with the giddy notion of launching the party's plan for a Rural Future. "It's a bit wet out there but politically the going is firm to soft," he grins. There's no microphone (they probably predicted an attendance of four a week ago) but no one gives a toss about the PDs' plan for a rural future. What does he plan to do about Bertie? "I've said everything I want to say on the subject The PDs are committed to government"
Afterwards, he removes the PD branded wrapper from an Offaly biscuit and nibbles contentedly, reaching out to shake a hand or two. "Go easy on Bertie now," urges one.
Outside there is only a small and orderly scrum. The media takes the Tánaiste at his word, that he will be saying nothing - which they failed to do with Bertie , interestingly - and move on. So there is time and space for such meaning-of-life pauses as gazing up at two lads on a crane doing something to a telegraph pole.
Did it conjure up happy memories of his own excursion up such a pole, we ask, but meet only silence. "Lovely doggie you have on your T-shirt", he sweetly tells a child, before adjourning to dine in the Ploughing Association tent, where he is obliged to share the VIP room with Avril Doyle. They sit in separate corners.
It was that kind of day.