Not ‘who says?’ silly. WHO says! The World Health Organisation are set to raise the level of threat of swine lfu/H1N1/ NuFlu to Pandemic some time today after an emergency meeting and teleconference was called in Geneva to discuss the climbing infection rates.

So if you have packed away your face masks and strepsils go ahead and dig ‘em out again. Looks like you may be needing them after all.

Two years ago the shopkeepers and townsfolk of Stone in Staffordshire were right fed up with the local tearaways that rampaged about the place breaking windows and getting out of order.

Local policeman Andy Whitehall was familiar with the young troublemakers as he had arrested most of them at one time or another. He came up with the idea of keeping them out of trouble by starting up a boxing club. But the Right Stuff Boxing Club was to be a club with a catch. In order to be a member of it, each kid had to sign a contract to participate in socially beneficial activities like picking up litter, gardening and helping the elderly.

Andy Whitehall’s brilliant scheme was not only to teach the kids to be better community members but it also kept them visibly involved in beneficial projects which earned them the respect of the very people that once would happily have lynched them from the nearest lamppost.

Now the businesses and shopkeepers of Stone are so pleased with Andy’s little army that they clubbed together to raise the £8,000 to send them off on a reward trip to Tenerife.

You can read the full story and see videos of the youngsters preparing for and enjoying their trip to Tenerife on the BBC website. Check it out. It’s absolutely fabulous to see some positive news about Britains’ youngsters for a change and Andy Whitehall deserves a medal as much as those kids deserved a break.

Nikki Attree is a talented photographer and digital artist who lives and works in Tenerife (when she’s not surfing). She’s also spokesman for Tenerife’s many abandoned and stray dogs via the website Tenerife Dogs which she set up on behalf of the island’s dog and pet charities.

Nikki has donated her latest digital artwork to Live Arico to sell in the Live Arico Shop in Coral Mar Square, Costa Del Silencio. The small reproduction here does not do the picture justice and you have to admit it is not often you get the chance to get your paws on such a striking and original piece of art.

Proceeds of the sale go to feed and shelter some of the island’s throwaway ‘best friends’.

(That’s two down as in two players missing not two games lost).

The Globe Bar is Costa Del Silencio’s most openly gay-friendly bar but two of the darts team (I suspect perhaps not the brightest of the bunch) were so horrified to discover that openly gay hosts Chris and Adam were actually homoseckshul that they backed out tout suite and scuttled off elsewhere to throw their arrows.

Hopefully they found somewhere where they can throw their arrows straight and narrow without fear of rubbing shoulders with anyone … you know.. like that. Meanwhile back at the Globe, the darts team are two men (or women down) and are looking for some volunteers.

You can find the Globe Bar next to Mr. Booze in Tre Bol and by all accounts Chris and Adam are doing a brilliant job as hosts. The bar is open from 2pm to 2am and serves food and topical entertainment (Big Brother, big football games, etc.) and all at reasonable prices too.

Pool players are also needed for next season so if interested in darts, pool or contacting the Globe, call Chris or Adam on: 637569770 or 617963814.

 
In my previous post I mentioned having kittens in the sense of having a bad day ( I don’t think that translates to Spanish at all. At least I’ve never heard anyone say ‘Aaaagh! Tengo gatitos!’) and talking about kittens, I had another kind entirely to deal with this week. The nice fluffy kind this time. Meet Mia.
 

First day home.

Eeek! There's a dog here!

Kitten Cacciatore

Oh, what a flaming nightmare I have had for the last week. It started with a couple of emails refusing to send on OUTLOOK and snowballed into no ftp, an unstable and dead slow internet connection and culminated in no internet whatsoever and me having kittens about my inability to get my work done on the internet.

I’ve been back and forth with a lovely lady in the US where my sites are hosted. I’m sure if she was within striking distance she would have given me a cuddle and a cup of tea she was so sympathetic (thank you Sheila of FQ) but unfortunately there was nothing she could do.

John of Sorted Sites lent me a sympathetic ear too and recommended I call ‘his computer guy’, Col, who talked me into getting a grip and pointed me in the direction of how to properly do a full system scan (get off the internet for a start).

After scanning and scouring the pc with assorted anti-virus and bug killers all weekend I was sure that the computer was clean and would now run like a well oiled racehorse (or something like that) but to my great frustration the damn thing still sat there like a fat slug, refusing to do more than creep on to one page of the internet before keeling over in exhaustion once again.

Telefonica were useless. I knew it was their router that was at fault. I tried to tell them that. First call resulted in me being sent packing to the English department. The lady there must have a hot link to the technical depatment though because she bounced me back to the techies quicker than I could say ‘Then what’s the bloody use having an English Department?’

To cut a long (long, long, long) story short about three days and a million calls to Telefonica later we were still no further forward. George at The Tenerife Property Guide had had an earful of my plight when he called me mid-week and kindly offered me the use of an extra router he had lying about.

I cantered down to get it yesterday full of hope and pondered for a moment or two over the odd bits and bobs that are to be found in George’s store room. I knew better than to try and plug and play the router myself because by now I was beginning to suspect that aliens were emitting a magnetic frequency through me that were frying any computer equipment that I came within five feet off. That turned out to be a clever move because then I couldn’t get the blame when His Nibs tried to install it and it didn’t work. (heh!)

But before the abortive attempt to get the replacement router installed there was an added little twist to the day. Our car had just been brought out of the garage that morning having had repairs to the driver side door. It had gone through the car wash and was sitting there in the car park looking all shiny when three little yobos came along and stoved in the passenger side window! My neighbour saw them do it. Thankfully she did not intervene as I would rather have a stoved in window than a duffed up neighbout but can you imagine!

Anyway, George’s router did not work last night and by this morning there was no choice but to call in the cavalry. Cue Ackie who arrived at 9.00 am to find me clucking over the computer like a worried old hen and left at 10 having changed the router and got my pc singing like a lark again. Thank you Ackie and Hello World!