Bournemouth Pier

I just spent a week’s holiday (vacation) staying at my best friend’s house in Bournemouth on the English south coast. I was very lucky with the weather because it was hot and sunny all day, everyday and the good weather continues still.

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Most of us cannot understand how anyone can be so evil that they would buy and sell children in the sex trade.  How paedophiles can brutalise children for their own selfish gratification is beyond any understanding and certainly any kind of forgiveness. If I had my way, they’d be castrated without anaesthesia. I’d probably have them cast out into a vast wilderness as well, to fend for themselves, far beyond any kind of help.

We can’t wave a magic wand to abolish this evil trade but we can help to fight it. Find out what you can do – read Best of Child Trafficking on Twitter and see how people on Twitter are are getting together to support the charity Born2Fly – read about it here.

Find out why 09-09-09 is an important date for your diary and for children all over the world then use your own Twitter and other social networks to spread the word.

Saffy, aged about 5 years, running as usual

Next month Saffy, my springer spaniel, will be 12 years old. Springers live for about 14 years and she’s already looking like an old dog. Her face has a lot of  grey hairs among the red-brown. She’s got arthritis in her hips and can’t jump into the car anymore. She can put her front paws on the seat and then I have to hoist up her back end.

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I was taking the dogs out for a walk this morning and met two neighbours. One of them said, “You do have a nice straight back.” The other woman said, “Yes, I’ve often noticed what good posture you have.”

I’m so sad that these  compliments gave me a real lift even though they came from two elderly women and not two hunky guys. Oh well, when you reach 60, you have to take your compliments where you can find them. The sad truth is that at my age there are very few ’suitable’ men that are attractive. Who wants a man that has to take his teeth out to clean them or needs to clip the hair in his nose and ears more often than the little that remains on his head?

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Logitech Mouse

Copyright Red, Used under the Creative Commons License

My right arm is very painful at the moment and I’m certain it’s RSI (repetitive strain injury). I had it before about 5 years ago and cured it by buying an ergonomic mouse and keyboard.

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Bournemouth Gardens in the centre of the town.

I can’t believe I haven’t posted here for so long. My excuse is that I was still fed up with all the online politics but didn’t want to write about it anymore. On a happier note, I’ve also been away for a week staying with my best friend in Bournemouth, a popular seaside town on the south coast.

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It’s a strange aspect of large organisations that members might quietly moan to each other about abuses of the systems but many of them will quickly unite against the minority of people who go out on a limb and blow the whistle in a semi-public way. By this I mean, draw attention to the abuses in a legitimate forum accessible only to members of the organisation.

Obviously, at the moment I am thinking of Squidoo but it’s not confined to this kind of network or business. It happens in hospitals, large factories and all kinds of institutions.

People are happy to gossip about problems to co-workers or other members, even sometimes to friends and family outside although they can get bored quite quickly with this kind of conversation.

Once it’s brought out in public debate or reported to a watchdog in the case of hospitals and other vital public institutions, then the whistleblower can be shunned by other members or workers.

Logically, you might expect everybody would be delighted to bring problems into the open so that management has to respond in some positive way. Or, if they don’t, at least everybody can see the abuses are tolerated and not considered serious.

I believe that the more highly you regard an organisation, the better you want it to be and will inconvenience and even embarrass yourself by reporting abuses of the system. Not many people enjoy arguing and even risking the work they have done there and so they think long and hard before acting and speaking out.

In my experience, the practice of killing the messenger (metaphorically not literally!) is something that is not universal amongst all members. Some are glad that a few people have spoken out and are relieved to be able to add their voices to the campaign for improvement. However, many are defensive and seem to take it as a personal criticism of themselves.

Obviously, in an organisation like Squidoo, abuses don’t have the potential for life or health threatening consequences that could occur in hospitals when management or medical staff are not doing their jobs properly.

A case in point is the sloppy way many contract cleaning companies were performing in UK hospitals which was implicated in growing numbers of MRSA cases, the antibiotic resistant infection. Whistleblowers and subsequent investigations have led to an overhaul of the system and far more emphasis is laid on the importance of keeping hospitals spotlessly clean. It has also led to patients being empowered to ask doctors and nurses to wash their hands when they forget to do so between touching different patients.

Even when the consequences of abuse, incompetence or sloppy working practices aren’t life threatening, reputations can suffer and, by association, this can effect members and employees as well as the organisation itself.

When you are next tempted to castigate whistleblowers for the actions they take, remember they have probably gone through a lot of soul searching before going public and that they have the good of the organisation at heart rather than malice or a wish to cause trouble.

Named after their American bald Eagle, Liberty’s Raptor and Reptile Centre is located near Ringwood, in Hampshire, UK. As it’s located on the edge of the New Forest National Park, it makes a great place to visit while you are also visiting the Park.

It has a large collection of birds of prey like eagles, owls and vultures as well as reptiles – snakes, tortoises and lizards. There are displays of the raptors flying and you can even have the experience of flying these beautiful birds yourself with the centre’s Hunting Day Flying Experiences as long as you are over 16 years of age.

Bearded Dragon, Aquarium Animal Photographic Print
Buy at AllPosters.com

The raptors include African Hooded Vulture, Bateleur Eagle also from Africa, Common Kestrel, Crested Caracara from South America, Great Gray Owl, Mackinders Eagle Owl from Africa, Rock Eagle Owl from India and Pakistan, Siberian Eagle Owl, Snowy Owl from the Arctic tundra, Southern White Faced Owl from Africa, Spectacled Owl from South and Central America, Turkey Vulture from North and South America, and the Western Screech Owl from North and Central America.

Reptiles include Bearded Dragons from Australasia, Common Green Iguanas from Central and South America, Giant Tortoise from the Galapagos, Green Water Dragons from Southeast Asia, and Leopard Geckos from Pakistan, East and Southwest Asia.

The centre is open from March to October.

I think I’m suffering from post Christmas lethargy. In the run-up to the holidays, there always seems to be so much to do. Now it’s all over and, although I still have plenty of things I should do, nothing is so urgent that I can’t leave it. I have no real incentive to get on with much. It seems my get up and go got up and went.

The carpet in the hall needs shampooing, the net curtains could do with a quick rinse through, the inside of the windows at the back need cleaning – they’re not desperate, you can still see out of them! These are not hard jobs that will take ages, just boring.

I’m going away to my best friend’s tomorrow for New Year so I think they will all have to wait till I come home. Then I’ll go into a cleaning frenzy, soap suds and fresh smells everywhere.

When I came here to write about my birthday, I was shocked to find it was almost 3 weeks since I’d last written anything. The reason was that I decided to move my other blog from Wordpress to my server under it’s own domain name. It’s called Stazjia’s Commentary and is mostly more serious than this blog. That’s why I started this one so I could write about more light hearted topics which didn’t fit there.

I’ve installed cms on websites before but never blogging software and hit some small problems which held me up. I solved them, mostly through trial and error. I then installed it in a sub domain of an long standing website I run with a friend. I definitely wanted ‘pretty URLs’ there and that gave me problems. I made such a small mistake setting them up and it took me two days and four reinstalls of Wordpress. I could have given myself such a kick when I discovered the answer.

That sub domain is called Chocolate Recipes and the clue to content is in the name! I’ve stilled got a lot more recipes to put on yet.