• Many people have suggested keeping the old buses as curios, to ferry tourists around on specialised tours. One owner who has taken this advice to heart was on February 24 driving a red and grey Gozo bus along Regional Road towards the Coast Road, filling the St Andrews tunnel with acrid smoke. If such vehicles are to be allowed to use the roads they must be up to modern standards.

Specifications

• A similar problem seems to be occurring with sightseeing double-decker buses. Driving behind them, especially uphill, is no joke. There is sometimes an all-pervading smell of kerosene or paraffin and dark or silvery exhaust that is not present when petrol or diesel is used in vehicles.

Simple

• There recently was a great to-do about whether two patients in a single room at Mater Dei Hospital are “better”, for want of a suitable word, than having the second patient in a corridor. Now someone has hit on the brilliant idea of building an ancillary ward to take care of the problem... that ought never to have arisen in the first place.

Something

• Many parents think they are doing their children a favour by “disguising” the water they are supposed to take to school by adding something to it to make it “less boring”. Unfortunately, some people do not know the difference between soft drinks, sports drinks and energy drinks. The latter can cause nausea, dizziness, palpitations and shakiness in young children. No one is being fooled, except the children themselves, who are also learning how to thumb their noses at authority.

Safety

• In Fra Diego Street, Ħamrun, to the right, as one walks toward High Street, is a unique building with interesting architecture. Sadly, it has been allowed to fall into a state of disrepair. It is not so much that the paint is flaking off; the major problem is that one of the supporting columns (to the left as one looks at the façade) is cracked and crumbling. If it collapses the consequences could be catastrophic.

Smokeless

• It was a wise decision to make hospital and playing fields smoke-free zones as both places are supposed to be geared towards a healthy life. However, smokers will surely try and get around this ban and even the slightest breeze will be enough to carry cigarette smoke towards smoke-free zones. This comment also applies to people standing at the doors of offices and restaurants, where smoke wafts indoors immediately.

Support

• We may not have a World Cup level national football squad and very often its performance leaves a lot to be desired. But how sad it is to see so many empty seats on the stands during an international football match as was the case on Wednesday. One wonders what can be done to attract more fans.

Sports

• This column has long been advocating that youth be allowed to use state school playgrounds – although not necessarily gymnasia – after hours to have a safe place to congregate and to avoid their taking over playing fields that could then still be used by children. However, it is advisable that there be responsible adults present at all times to avoid the temptation of committing vandalism or abuse.

Specials

• In places where this is not possible or feasible, it would be a good idea to allow public gardens to open until a reasonably late hour, provided there is a curator or other person on duty. This is another area where local volunteers can help out because they would be familiar with the area and the children and teenagers using the facilities.

Sounds

• We are informed that just as we can report instances of cars that are polluting the air, quite soon we will be able to do likewise about excessive noise. This will be possible through a 24-hour hotline and will be based on the guidelines established by the World Health Organisation. A White Paper entitled Neighbourhood Noise Prevention, Abatement And Control, has been issued for public consultation until April 15. Sounds interesting.

Supplements

• Planting acacia was said to have increased the incidence of asthma in local children. One wonders whether the statistics show an improvement now that they have been removed. In any case, it makes sense to plant indigenous trees on roadways, in public gardens and other suitable places. Otherwise, the younger generation is in danger of forgetting what żnuber, żebbuġ, għargħar, ħarrub and ballut are.

Suspicious

• Some e-mails that are obviously scam, because they refer to bank accounts or other savings systems to which the recipient has no connection, contain a “warning” about phishing scams. This is usually on the lines of “Please be aware that there are current reports of phishing e-mails, phone text messages and vishing phone calls, intended to obtain personal and/or card information. Phishing and vishing are scams designed to steal your personal information…” This, in itself, is calculated to give a false sense of security.

Scrutiny

• Another scam doing the rounds involves the invitation to print an airline ticket “attached to the letter as a scan document (internet explorer file)”. A flight number, a date and time of arrival, an airport name and the price that is supposed to have been paid for the ticket are all included in the mail. This, of course, panders to the recipient’s sense of acquisitiveness. However, one ought to realise that just as there is no such thing as a free lunch, there is also no such thing as a free airway ticket.