Hello again readers. This week’s anecdote also comes from my most recent trip to Gran Canaria, but holds its genesis in a previous one. It all began last Easter when my parents and I discovered the local jamonal, a specialist ham and wine shop similar to a deli. We were greeted by a highly knowledgeable staff member who knew all about the products, from the fine Rioja wines to the Pata Negra ham costing €150 per kg. The man himself was very refined and cultured. But alas, times must have gotten tougher between my visits, as on my return at Christmas what did I see? Only the same guy busking with a cello, that’s what! It was a stark contrast to what I’d seen at Easter, and he even had the same t-shirt embroidered with the logo of the jamonal. Now I know there’s the old saying about “playing your violin” but this truly took the biscuit. That’s all for this week....

We’re missing the point.    So there’s this new thing all over Facebook called “neknominations.” For the uninitiated, it’s where someone drinks a pint of alcohol (a variation being a disgusting concoction of God knows what) and sometimes performs a stunt while doing so. It’s childish and asinine, but the media are quick to blame “the Irish attitude to alcohol” and the government are quick to remind us about the upcoming minimum unit pricing system for alcohol.    We must realise that this phenomenon is not the real problem, it is but a symptom.    The real problem here is social media. People these days are valued by the numbers of likes and shares they get on Facebook, retweets on Twitter, reposts on Instagram. The “like” button has become modern society’s universal arbiter, telling us how good we are based on how many others click it. People are only doing these “neknominations” for attention, and it’s not the first time this type of idiocy has manifested itself through media like Facebook.    Does anyone remember planking? It was where someone would prostrate themself somewhere dangerous or significant.  Of course some people got hurt and one man died after falling from a seventh floor balcony. Thankfully, this fad has since petered out and neknominating will soon follow the same course, but that’s not the point here.    The point is that social networking sites are allowing these stupid stunts to continue by giving an avenue for people to broadcast their actions in the hope of gaining their fifteen seconds of fame. Until we realise that the websites rather than the alcohol is the real issue here, nothing will change. I’m not even going to get into cyberbullying or how teenage suicide rates are skyrocketing since...