Today is Easter Sunday

To all my Christian friends, I wish them all a very Happy Easter Day.

To all my friends from other faiths (and no faiths), I wish them all a safe, and fulfilling Easter Day.

Perfume Squirting!

If you suffer from asthma or other respiratory problems, or have a "cold" and your nose is all snuffly and stuff, what do you do when you walk through the perfume department of your favourite store and wham, you get a squirt of perfume in your face?

Most people complain. Not to the store management, but among themselves. A lot of people become ill from this squirting. I've known of one woman who actually collapsed right there and then.

But these people within the perfume departments are doing what they're trained to do - to convince you to buy a product. They're sales people!

But look at it from another angle. They're being discriminatory. They're not giving a person the right to say "yes" or "no" to being squirted.

Everyone who is confronted with this sort of thing has the option of saying nothing and accepting the behaviour (and the squirt), or complaining (not only to their friends or to themselves, but to management).

In Australia now, perfume squirting is no longer allowed - whether it be in a perfume store or a shopping mall. (Some stores don't follow this rule though - there's always exceptions and those who think they know better!)

The reason is that so many thousands have respiratory troubles and asthma that being caught with a squirt of perfume can disable them on the spot. Researchers have been looking at the reasons why these numbers have increased over recent years, and yes, perfume squirting sits among the culprits.

Having experienced this behaviour and taking it up with the CEO of as large shopping mall in Melbourne, they quickly instigated immediate policy changes. Now, if you want a squirt you can ask for one! (That's a squirt of perfume not a squirt, as in a person!!

Sometimes it pays to "stand up for yourself".

I saw this advertisement in a women's magazine

Inside I'm a free spirited gypsy
- an explorer who discovers new things everyday

a chocolate MONSTER

a QUEEN and a drama queen

inside I'm steel and marshmallow

a GODDESS, a Belly Dancer,
a BALLERINA and a sexy tango.

wanna dance?

Sorry, but I can't recall the name of the advertiser. Can anyone help?

Gosh, I've done it now!

I've been reprimanded by two of my girl friends for leaving out two of their
favourite "attractive" men. So without any delay I'll include them right now.

Steven Seagal and David Suchet. OK, girls?

What makes a man attractive?

I couldn't help but include another actor following my earlier post. Robson Green. Have you any favourites?

There's a lot of pain!

Discrimination takes many forms. Verbal, visual, physical, emotional, psychological, and sexual. There are most probably more.

But in recent times, as a consequence of modern technology, another form of discrimination and a most insidious one at that is "cyber bullying". And it's not just a new word in our vocabulary; it's a word that brings with it fear and terror. School children, teenagers and adults are being pursued by known and unknown persons; it's a frightening situation. For syber bullying quite often leads to physical bullying as well.

Stories of a number of young people who have suicided over the past 12 months as a result of cyber bullying are becoming more frequent; parents are left to wonder what they could have done to prevent the situation occurring. They're in a Catch 22 situation. They tell themselves and others that they "should have sat with their son/daughter at the computer to make sure what sites they were visiting and who they were talking to". But at a parent it becomes obvious that this problem is much much bigger than at first imagined.

For how can a parent sit with a teenager for as many hours as he/she sits at their computer, monitoring what they're are doing in cuber space. Lives have to be lived; parents have to be parents to their other children; they have to manage a home; if they have jobs they have to go to work. Their children may appear to allow their parents to monitor or block certain aspects of their technology, but kids don't always tell their parents the truth about what they're doing and who they're speaking to - especially on the internet. And especially at night when their parents are sleep!

As one couple said, "our son had three lives. One with us, and his siblings and our entire family, and neighbours. The second with his friends. We know all his friends and were comfortable with him spending time with them. We knew he was safe with us and he was safe with his friends. But it was the third life that literally took him from us. And one that we knew nothing about. Cyber-space and some people who knew him and who bullied him until he took his own life. We failed him. We failed him, terribly."

This is a most dreadful situation for any parent to find themselves in. They most likely couldn't have done any more to keep him safe. They are taking upon themselves the full blame for what has happened. But someone has to share the blame.

The perpetrators of the bullying showed no remorse whatsoever, in fact the young man involved in the majority of the bullying took the attitude of "well, everybody does it." And he smiled. In no way would he accept the fact that what he had done was wrong.

For governments to say they are bringing in policies and "blocks" to protect people using the internet, is a bit late in the day. These protections should have been in place at least ten years ago. Furthermore the latest "block" and filters can be broken through - that's for certain. A young 17 year old recently broke through the filters of the entire federal governments computer system. So much for today's filters.

Meanwhile we have a problem on our hands. And someone, somewhere, has to take some responsibility and get the best possible advice and technology into gear, to protect us from the "invisible threat" that is very real.

(This was submitted to me by Ben Warwickshire.)

What is it that makes a man attractive?

It's not only the women of today - films, theatre and the like - who have to be seen as "beautiful" (what is beauty anyway?), but it's the men too! Honestly, they're all so "cutesy" and pretty. What's happened to rustic, craggy, raspy voiced, unhandsomeness men(boy that's a new word for you, I bet.) Not always young, sometimes grey haired with wrinkles no less. A broken nose perhaps. Even a cross-eye in there somewhere.

Look at some of the movie stars particularly of years gone by. You couldn't mix them up with their peers, because they had distinctive looks and everyone recognised them. Today for some people it's a matter of getting a magnifying glass out to see who everyone is talking about - Brad Pitt, Orlando Bloom, Johnny Depp and of course the prettiest of them all Tom Cruise. Isn't this guy interested in aging and doing so gracefully?

Take for instance. Charles Bronson. Then what about Chips Rafferty, Michael Pate (both Australian actors from the 40s and 50s)?

What about - Edward G Robinson, Humphrey Bogart, Paul Henreid? Claude Rains, Telly Savalas?













But wait a minute. I'm getting ahead of myself here. We do have "attractive" actors today. We don't necessarily call them "heart-throbs", but they certainly do have "it". (Whatever "it" is - then they've certainly got lots!). Who am I talking about?

For instance. Ken Stott. (The actor who plays Rebus for those who don't know this character or show. Even Ian Rankin has suggested that Rebus has come to life with the help of Stott, Ken Stott can melt your heart with a softening of his deep brown eyes and little boy smile, or just as quickly make you dislike him intensely by his change in moods. But this is the part of Rebus, so what is Ken Stott like - in reality? Who knows? But then, who really knows what all these actors as like - for that matter, who really knows us?