• This is the time when many move to summer residences. It is also the time when people seek to earn pin money by delivering flyers and other advertising materials. The letterboxes and the front porches are at the receiving end of such deliveries, advertising to one and all that houses are not occupied.

Pitiful

• Many expatriates come to Malta for the summer and take the opportunity to visit the graves of their loved ones. The beautiful neo-gothic architecture of the Maria Addolorata cemetery at Paola, they note, is still in a pitiful state; the delicate stonework will soon be beyond repair.

Pointless

• The person whose idea it was to have bus shelters made of Perspex must have been carried away with the notion of bringing literature to the people. However, in places such as the Żwiemel stage, in Triq Manuel Dimech, Qormi, it is evident that the experiment has failed. The sun shines directly onto it, turning it into a veritable hothouse.

Passengers

• The Transport Ministry has been reported as saying that 90 per cent of the bus service was functioning as it should. Undoubtedly, a part of the 10 per cent that is not includes the changes wrought to the former 71 route. It is a well-known fact that passengers needing to go to Valletta are congregating at the bus stop near St Joseph Home in High Street, Santa Venera, to avoid having to wait at any of the stops between the old Birkirkara bus terminus and the Fleur de Lys roundabout.

Pong

• Nothing has been done to address the problems obtaining from the sewage leak right under the skate park underpass at Msida. Apart from the stench, it is obvious that anyone who passes through is inhaling pathogens, as well as stepping in potentially virulent matter. Will it take an epidemic before the situation is contained?

Passageway

• It is obvious to everyone but the management of Gozo Channel that more seating needs to be placed on the outer decks of boats plying the channel between Malta and Gozo. As it is, passengers may choose between staying in the stifling heat, standing throughout the journey, or sitting down on the decks.

Phone

• Last month, a terrible car crash damaged the Maltapost pillar box and destroyed the telephone booth, at the corner of Triq il-Kukkanja and Canon Road, Santa Venera. The former was replaced immediately; the latter still stands, in a manner of speaking. However, it is unusable because all apparatus has been removed.

Paintbox

• So soon after these columns referred to the silly, gravel-laden red paint being slathered over certain sections of the road, it was proved right. Much of the grit has been carried away in the tyre-threads of vehicles and the colour has faded to an ugly brownish hue.

Peeves

• A part of the actions Arriva bus drivers were taking in order to fix their conditions of work was to refuse to work in vehicles that did not have air-conditioning. This does not justify, however, the fact that in vehicles where this exists, it is placed at such a low temperature that people who are not in the best of health, and little children, sometimes shiver. Surely, the contrast once one goes out into the open air does the body harm!

Puzzle

• It is very difficult to understand why, after all the fuss that had been made about the introduction of a sex-offenders’ register, it has been discovered that, except for one name on the first page, the tome is still pristine. Is it possible that none of the persons who were found guilty of having committed these aberrations was “guilty enough” for his name to be jotted down for future reference?

Perplexing

• Despite all the talk that happens each summer about how karrozin horses are left to stew in the sun, by the time winter comes around all is forgotten. The regulations of the Malta Environment and Planning Authority require a cesspit in the immediate environs of every shelter and, therefore, where the construction of this is not possible, the horses that work in the area are doomed to suffer until they are taken off their graft.

Perceptions

• Before certain HSBC branches closed, clients were asked for their views about this matter. The consensus appeared to be that they prefer the service to remain as it was rather than obtaining a new, improved service elsewhere. This has meant that clients often have to catch a bus to go to their next available branch and then wait for a long time in a queue saturated with persons from the area as well as from places where the branch would have been closed. This is ridiculous.

Powers

• Some wardens are still resorting to hiding behind pillars, columns and tees so potential victims won’ be able to spot them. Should this happen? Why is it that a number of them tend to have a predilection for stopping vehicles that are the worse for wear while the high market-end cars are allowed to move along with impunity, even if the driver is using a cellular phone, and the passenger in the front seat is not wearing a seatbelt?

Peace

• When a deceased politician once said that he and his wife used to drive around the country, pen in hand, to write down the names of places where action by his ministry ought to be taken, half of the populace laughed. Yet, if today’s MPs were to emulate him, there would be less destroyed rubble walls, potholed streets, areas with dangerous buildings threatening to collapse and street lights left on all morning.