I've just been watching BBC NEWS 24 and noticed on one of the reports a microphone with the words 'BBC Brazil' emblazoned on it. Why on earth should this be; don't they have any radio services in Brazil; and more pertinently, who's paying for it?

On pain of imprisonment I'm compelled to pay a licence fee of £126 per year to the BBC (an organisation that denegrates and denies everything that I am and believe in) yet people in Brazil get to watch for free...and they aren't abused in the way that we are in Britain.

I've finally received some post this morning; a collection of poetry from T.. in Harrogate, a fellow student on the Writer development Programme. Haven't looked at the poems, but they should keep me away from the computer screen for a few hours.

SAFETY FIRST

Light the litmus paper
Step back to a safe distance:
If passion still fails to ignite
Phone home for a refund.

There's no need to return
To point of purchase -
Your money-back guarantee
Is included in the smallprint
Spoken on your lover's breath.

I'm planning to spend today volunteering, but I'm not very enthusiastic. On Wednesday, S....(one of the other volunteers, female, 62) was nearly crying because she was physically knackered - for the past week she's been going in every day helping with the renovation; somedays starting at 6:30 in the morning and not finishing until
after ten o'clock at night.

Like myself, she wants to get the new premises ready in time for the first training session next week; but she's making herself ill!

NOTICEBOARD

Border meeting
Dormitory town
Sleeping dogs
Lying around.

Time and tide
Kinky sex
Head over heals
Mum knows best.