The internet baffles me

AS A giant in the world of computers and social networking, my ceaseless search for perfection – or how to switch my damn computer on – recently uncovered some truly startling statistics.

Most of my friends are on Facebook but some of the figures for 2012 almost defy belief they are so gigantic.

For a start, did you know that more than 250 million photographs are uploaded to Facebook... every day?!

And you’d better not have a female Facebook friend because it appears that 85 percent of women are annoyed by their friends on the site. 

What? No, I’m not picking on you. It’s just a fact. Well there’s no need to be like that! 

Sadly, greater use means greater potential for crime and I must have received at least six heartbreaking messages via Facebook, Twitter or email, all from local councillors or council staff, pleading with me to send them large sums of money abroad.

In every case they’d sadly just been mugged in the hotel car park who hadn’t hurt a hair on their heads but had somehow stolen all their wallets and cards and could I help them in their hours of need by sending £2,000 urgently. 

I mean, do I look like a network greenhorn? So I’m appealing to you all to give as generously as you can to help me pay off my £12,000 debt, not to my credit card but to the pay day loan company I borrowed much of the money from. 

Apparently, if I can’t repay the money by next Tuesday I’ll owe them £1,097,246,583 and if I default until next Wednesday it rises to more than all those council people earn in an entire month... but that’s another story.

It’s that time of year... harvest time!

ALL has been safely gathered in or as safely as I can manage at the moment.

Yes, harvest time is here again with a rich crop of cooking onions and cooking apples. The onions were a bit of a problem because, having dug them up, I then needed a few days of fine weather to dry them off before hanging them in the shed. Yeah, like sun is going to arrive to order.

Apples are a little easier but seem to have a mind of their own, often going rotten despite being carefully laid down in a dark drawer on beds of crumpled newspaper to avoid bruising the fruit.

So this year I took a more brutal approach and didn’t just pick the apples but peeled and cooked them as well, storing the cooked apple in sealed trays in the bottom of our freezer.

There is method in my madness because the reward comes when you can conjure up delicious bowls of homemade apple pie or crumble as part of Christmas festivities.

Gives a lovely hint of summer to come and I’d far rather write about that than the incredible fact I’ve just been offered a Christmas tree for sale.

A different meaning to council cutbacks

WEYMOUTH and Portland council’s latest series of cut-backs has actually left people smiling.

Former mayor Margaret Leicester had to have her robes of office fitted to suit her.

No problem there but current mayor, Ray Banham, is even shorter and he had to ask for the length of the official robes of office to be reduced so they didn’t drag on the ground when he wore them.

And, as he pointed out to me, deputy mayor Kate Wheller is even tinier than him, although she tells me that she is trying not to get the scissors out again when she takes office in May 2014.

I’m just waiting to hear that Councillor Dominic Lonsdale has been nominated for deputy mayor next year because he’s so tall that the robes which go with his chain of office will be no more than a waistcoat for him!

No PDAs please

PUBLIC displays of affection occur everywhere and Weymouth and Portland are doing their bit to contribute towards a staggering statistic that at any given moment 58 million people globally are kissing.

Smooching in public is nothing new but passers-by raised a grin in St Mary Street recently when one couple took it to new heights by kissing for so long they nearly needed a bucket of water thrown over them!

They just could not be parted and I had enough time to do a couple of nearby jobs and they were still at it when I finished.

Good luck to them because that sort of passionate kiss is not for everybody and affection in public is much more likely to be a peck on the cheek or a gentle hug. 

Whatever the physical display, all of us have a long way to go before we beat the current world record kiss held by a Thai couple who kissed for nearly 59 hours!

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