I despair. I know it’s not new, but media matters seem to have taken a distinct turn for the worse, creating stories out of nothing and spinning faster than a whirling dervish.

Take today, the dentist story. I don’t know the truth of the matter, but the line about the person “who said they had removed 14 of their own teeth with pliers” is picked up reported everywhere, mostly to make it sound as if it was happening up and down the country (Radio 4 did it straight). Why? WHY???? We know this guy is a nutter, probably working on a self-vasectomy right now. What does it add tot he story? Why has it any validity, beyond salacious titivation. How is that responsible journalism?

Take politics. (I wish you would, I am apolitical) The current mantra from the Conservatives, “Labour are stealing our policies” gleefully picked up by all the media as touted as somehow being a bad thing. What? WHAT??? Why the heck should it be seen as a bad thing if one party decided to adopt whatever policies were best for the country (and of course, themselves) no matter where they came from? As voters, we have the ability, right and duty to vote for who we belive is most able to act in our best interests at elections. Like it or not, that’s democracy., at least as practiced in this country.

Take the Middle East (I wish you would, they are all as bad as one another). It is a horribly mucky area, and there is no side that has acquited themselves well. But whatever the rights and wrongs, and there are an awful number of those, I am amazed with the current spin on reporting. Israel, we are being told, carried out a “land grab”on the Palestinians in 67 & 73. Hang on. I remember those dates. There was little doubt at the time that the arab countries were the aggressors, their stated desire at the time was to eradicate the state of Israel, as is still the intention of Hamas, and they lost. No way can one paragraph do justice to the situation, but that was no anschluss. History being rewritten before our very eyes.

Is it just me?

Dear Mr UK Payments Organization, I’ve just stayed in a Hotel in France and they wrote my name, address, card number and security code on a piece of paper with a list of lots of others. That’s wrong. What can I do?

Dear Mr Gub. Every time you give your number over the phone you have to trust that they will deal with it properly. So that’s OK.

Dear Little Ms UK PO. That’s a cop-out. I know about the regulations - this is a breach.

Dear Mr Gub, You can complain to your card issuer. But don’t expect too much because they are in the UK and the hotel was in France. Signed Senior Mr UK PO.

Dear Senior Mr PO. Thanks, that’s what I needed to know, and that’s the exact problem. Card fraud on UK holders is rising most quickly on the continent since the introduction of Chip & PIN. I know not much will happen but the only way things will improve is if people say something when there is a problem.

TO BE CONTINUED.

Lets get this straight, blogging wasn’t always a rambling quasi-diary or photo album. In its first guise it was a way of sharing what you had found on the net. Those were the days when compuserve was king (or at least, the only place you could be certain of finding the content you wanted) and out in the wild Internet frontier was all the rest of the stuff. Browsers had only got to Version 3 and hopefully the site you wanted to view was optimised to load on your brand new 9600 baud modem. Newsgroups and offline readers were the order of the day, so it made some sense to share the good stuff that you found, only not really enough for me to bother with. When I re-discovered blogging two years ago, it had changed out of all recognition.

However, it is still good to share the interesting stuff you find out there, and having just found a quirky cartoonist that makes me smile, I’ll share it with you all: The Rut.

It’s a Belgian farting pig cartoon.

And it’s a perfect accompaniment to my prediction lots of people are going to get married.

Hello World. The Pig is back.

No great secret, and very shortly I will have a reason to make it public knowledge (more of which as the days go by). The reason for the absence was that the Old Sow was a little poorly with cancer, or more specifically poorly through the breast cancer treatment and time was a bit of an issue. That, and inclination. I’m pleased to report that the treatment (2 ops, 6 months of chemo and 5 weeks of radiotherapy) is now concluded. Somewhat surprisingly there is no test for healthy, so we have to adjust to the uncertainty and just get on with life.

Time availability is not that much better than it was (actually it is worse) but the inclination is. So expect odd irregular posting. Nothing changes.

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