• Part of the road between Zachary Street and Melita Street, in Valletta, has subsided. Thousands of people use this junction every day and there have been several minor accidents, such that passers-by occasionally warn others who appear to be oblivious to the danger.

Supple

• After all the claptrap about expansion joints in connection with the Ġużè Ellul Mercer bridge, one would have expected better than what has actually obtained. Close inspection seems to indicate that the new surface has no such expansion joints. Does this mean that no allowance has been made for the heat of summer, such that the new tarmac will become crushed and disjointed spoiling this new road surface?

Substitution

• Regulations insist that eggs be stamped with their production and expiry dates. Yet, whereas the external packaging of half a dozen eggs produced on a Maltese farm and bought from a supermarket in Msida indicated the expiry date as February 3 every single egg inside bore a different expiry date. These ranged from January 30 to February 4.

Strategic

• It would be useless to erect billboards where people, specifically drivers, cannot see them. This means that most of them are sited in the open. As has been seen, occasionally they are unstable enough in high winds to cause accidents that could have been fatal. This, apart from the fact that the words or depictions on them are already a distraction.

Speech

• It is high time that it is made mandatory for all those who aspire to be in the audio/visual media to be given diction and elocution lessons. It is not enough to have a loud voice, or, on occasion, to screech, in order to make oneself heard. Moreover, it is pathetic to note that even the word “crew” was pronounced as krew (they hired) by a newscaster on national radio. Are not news scripts read in advance?

Statistics

• Each time local or general elections approach, both the experts and those who dabble in statistics, have a field day. It would seem that projected results depend upon which medium they appear in. All this leads people who still have independent powers of reasoning to suspect that the whole exercise is nothing but one of the usual mind-games, calculated to instil discomfort, or even fear, in certain sections of the electorate who stand to lose if the status quo is disturbed.

Sewage

• This column has often referred to the rancid stench of drainage in the general area of the Lija/Balzan roundabout, just before the cemetery, which hangs in the air even when the weather is hot. However, of late, the problem is being exacerbated each time it rains. This clearly shows that there is something wrong with the sewage system of the three villages. The hue of the puddles and rivulets flowing downhill clearly proves this further.

Sorting

• Each day, at the doors of schools, government departments and certain other establishments there are huge black plastic bags filled with garbage waiting to be loaded into trucks headed for the engineered landfill. It is probably that a lot of the contents of these bags could have been sorted and readied into bags for Recycle Tuesday. It would be better for the country were someone in each place of education or work to take this in hand.

Simplification

• It is interesting to note that just a few hours before Wikipedia blacked out the English language version of its website, in protest at anti-piracy laws being considered by the US government, the Maltese government decided to announce a major overhaul of the much-criticised censorship laws affecting stage performances and films. One hopes that the three-week public consultation process will not deteriorate into the usual pathetic arguments.

Sounded

• The population never asks to be included, or not, in a national census. Therefore, the onus to turn in the return by a specific date is unfair, especially if this interferes with a person’s personal life. It would be a good idea to come up with a system whereby people will be able to hand in the filled forms at the local council offices, against a receipt. That way, no one has to wait at home for the official to collect the form or travel anywhere to hand it in.

Simplification

• These days, when communication is often equivalent to the click of a mouse, certain practices on broadcast media are outdated. Why publicise cultural or social events without being specific on the venue. Describing something as taking place in, say, a hotel in St Julians is neither here nor there. Are people expected to traipse all over the town, from hotel to hotel, to discover the location of the happening? The irony is that news coverage of the event on television would certainly include a speakers’ podium with the name of the place emblazoned on it for all to see.

Streetwise

• A quick trip around Malta would indicate that outside the doors of several bakeries, well-wishing friends and neighbours would have left material for combustion in wood-fired furnaces. Some of these items are old pieces of furniture, some of which are varnished, and some of which are probably coated with paint containing lead and put together with toxic glues as well as nails. Are we to believe that the paint is stripped off the broken chairs and sideboards before they are broken down and used as fuel?

Sprinkle

• The only reason that many householders complain about stray cats and dogs is that, when garbage bags are left outside for more than one hour before collection times, they are gnawed open and the contents dispersed on the pavement. The simple ruse of covering the outside of the bags with any type of scented spray or sprinkling some talcum powder on them ought to be enough to deter strays.