For the past year I noticed that my facial complexion was peeling constantly. It was very irritating. I put it down to Melbourne weather as one does. Finally, I went to a beautician and asked her why my skin was peeling all the time. She asked me what I use on my skin and I told her “mineral makeup”. Her eyebrows shot up, her eyes widened in horror as if she’d just been offered treatment from Michael Jackson’s personal physician.

It turns out that mineral makeup is only suitable for teenagers with oily skin. I am not a teenager. According to her, mineral makeup should be avoided by anyone over the age of 20 as it is very drying. I am well over the age of 20 and until I used mineral makeup had never had a problem with peeling skin.

So I decided to read up on it on the internet. Here is a hyperlink to a health site about mineral makeup.

I wonder how many women out there are suffering dry skin problems because they fell for the hype.

Since giving up mineral makeup a few days ago my skin has stopped peeling. There’s definite improvement there. Can’t say the same for Melbourne weather, though.

I can’t be the only person in the world who is utterly and totally and completely bored with discussions about climate change and ETS. I’m so fed up with it all that I’m actually looking forward to the world running out of everything and exploding in one big bang so that’s it’s over and done with already.

This gloom and doom is making me switch off–if only. So it was with great joy that I heard about an orchestra in Scotland which is lousy. It knows it is lousy and it likes it that way. You can hear the Really Terrible Orchestra on You Tube and believe me they are more entertaining than the bleating about global warming and carbon balloons and giant footprints and all that rot.

The orchestra website describes its mission as follows:

“The Really Terrible Orchestra exists to encourage those who have been prevented from playing music, either through lack of talent or some other factor, to play music in the company of similarly afflicted players. The policy of the orchestra is to make no distinction between the various grades of ability and the various forms of music, or time signature. The RTO looks forward to a further lowering of standards, in order to underline its commitment to accessibility and relevance.”

Now isn’t that refreshing! We need a laugh in this miserable world or we will get to the stage of not giving a damn if the world boils over. I’m already at the stage where I feel aversion when politicians talk. I bristle when I hear the words Afghanistan or Iraq. Africa is a basket case which will not be solved in our lifetime. Nor will the Middle East be at peace in the foreseeable future. So thank goodness for the Really Terrible Orchestra and what it stands or does not stand for.

Now that the law has permitted Christian Rossiter’s nursing home to stop feeding him through a tube against his wishes, I hope he will not linger too long.

He has declared that he wants to die and was even trying to travel to Switzerland for help.

My sick father starved to death and it was a horrible way to go. I have personally witnessed the failure of palliative care. Now that the court has conceded, Rossiter has asked that painkillers be administered through the feeding tube instead so that his suffering will not be prolonged.

Mr Rossiter is only 49 and became a spastic quadriplegic as a result of a car accident. He has no quality of life and no hope of recovery and so his nursing home has asked for legal permission to stop feeding him through a tube. Artificial feeding is considered to be a medical procedure and so Rossiter has the right to refuse such a procedure, the court said.

The nursing home was naturally concerned that it could be charged with murder or euthanasia so it went to the law. Thank goodness that the court has seen reason.

I wish Mr Rossiter a peaceful and speedy departure. He has suffered enough. In my opinion, he should be helped to leave this life with more dignity than a slow and painful death by starvation. There is something very callous in a world that condones such cruelty.

When a convicted criminal is sentenced to jail for life, a sentence which is usually reserved for criminals who have committed a very serious offence, he or she should serve out the sentence.

I question the ethical validity of releasing life-term prisoners just because they are terminally ill.

Take Ronald Biggs, for example, who took part in a train robbery in which a guard was killed. He escaped from jail, lived many years in South America, thumbed his nose at British law and then returned to the U.K when he was ill and needed free medical treatment. Now that he is mortally ill, he has been released on compassionate grounds.

The question I ask is what has he done to deserve compassion?

Today we hear that the Lybian bomber convicted of blowing up Pan Am 103 over Lockerbie may be released from prison because he has terminal prostate cancer. The question I ask once again is why should a terrorist who claimed the lives of 259 passengers plus 11 residents of Lockerbie be given any compassion at all?

He is not in pain and he will probably survive for many years according to the Scottish Lord Justice, Lord Hamilton. But even if he were in pain, so what?

While doubts have been raised about al-Megrahi’s guilt, this is a separate issue since he has been convicted. While his conviction stands, he should die in prison.

Many years ago, I spent a very solemn afternoon in the Lockerbie Memorial Garden. It was a small unassuming place but very poignant. I could not help but think of the thwarted lives of the innocent victims on Pan Am Flight 103 and those who died in the quiet village which will always be associated with one of the world’s most heinous crimes. The memory of this tragic event is as vivid in my mind as it was 21 years ago.

That’s when I felt true compassion.

First of all, I will preface my outrage by stating that “The Australian” is a newspaper that I respect and subscribe to. But what it did regarding the disclosure of yesterday’s roundup of alleged terrorists was a betrayal of the Australian security system. Continue reading →

If it weren’t so tragic for Mr Grech this whole incident over a fake email could be the plot of a Restoration Comedy of Errors.

We have two ambitious political foes out to stab one another in the back or the front or anywhere else as long as the blow is fatal. Continue reading →

So the government is going to do something positive about the binge drinking problem. What is that something, you may well ask… Continue reading →

When I was a little girl our family only talked of the past. How it had been during World War II. How you had to be wary of some people because of how they had treated the Jews during the war. How you had to be on your guard about world events.

That feeling has remained with me. I do not trust easily. Continue reading →