Next weekend is momentous for two reasons. First, school breaks up for half term on Friday, providing most children with a welcome break from the routine of lessons and a chance to chill out with their friends. And second? It's Valentine's Day next Saturday! Corny, I know, but still of significant importance to thousands of young people for whom love and romance - or the dreams of it - matter like nothing else. Actually it's a very good thing that the V-day falls on a Saturday as when it falls during the week, the pressure for youngsters to be seen to be "loved" by their peers is huge, even from the age of nine or 10. Ashington teenagers Karl Peart and Gemma Dimmick were both loved - by their parents, families and friends. But they still decided to end their lives by taking overdoses of painkillers, leaving their mums and dads bereft and trying to make sense of it all. Both sets of parents said their youngsters had been bullied at school and yet the notes they left never mentioned the word. Their school, too, was completely exonerated with anti-bullying programmes in place and working efficiently. Yet I have no doubt that there will be bullies in and around the school because every working environment has them, at every level. Yet I daresay that when school breaks up this Friday, dozens of youngsters will heave a sigh of relief that they can escape the bullies and at least for a few days avoid those who make every school day such a loveless experience. A young friend of mine was telling me the other day of a boy he knows who has no friends. He goes to school and never speaks to a soul. He stands alone at break times and during lunch hour. He stands out in the crowd but will never be part of it. As a parent, I could cry at that story. I wonder if his mum knows the anguish that her son goes through every day just to survive. I want to go to find him and make someone talk to him, to become his friend. We all know, though, that you can't make kids like one another. You can't fight all their battles for them. You can't protect them every minute or make everything right all the time. But you can make them feel special next Saturday. If you're in any doubt that they'll be feeling sad go out and send them a card `from a secret admirer.' If life is all about making a difference, it might do just that. ********** Legend's lasting love of game Bob Stokoe was a lovely man - kind, revered, respected and well-liked in every sphere of the game. No one can forget his loopy victory jig when Sunderland won the FA Cup more than 30 years ago and yet it was his passion for Newcastle United that first made him a local hero. He played more than 280 games in black and white and was a member of the 1955 FA Cup winning team back in the glory days. His love of the game, though, was legendary. A regular Sunday League footballer I know from Mickley, the very place where miner's son Bob Stokoe was born, recalls the team's surprise and pleasure at seeing the legendary figure appear on the touchline just a few years ago on Sunday mornings at Allendale - then hearing him loud and clear as he grew more and more involved in the football match. "It wasn't so much him yelling encouragement as venting his total frustration at how bad we were," said my friend. "We didn't get any better but he kept coming back for more. "It was always good to see him because he was such a great man." And so say all of us. ********** Show's boob Apparently most of America is up in arms about Justin Timberlake and Janet Jackson's routine at the half-time Superbowl show on Sunday night in which one of her breasts was accidentally-on-purpose exposed in a raunchy dance routine. Now there's talk of banning them from the Grammy Awards and having to make apologies to all and sundry for their "offensive" behaviour. And all this from a country that counts the Jerry Springer Show and Sex in the City among its most celebrated exports and lets Britney Spears appear barely covered. All right, so the world and his wife and children were watching, but if it had been Britney instead of a member of the Jackson family, I wonder if the outrage would have been quite as loud. Double standards, certainly, and a great example of making a mountain out of a molehill. ********** I realise that there are some people who haven't watched any of I'm a Celebrity... and who think Britain has gone insane over the antics of a few nobodies in the Australian jungle. I have loved it, however, and feel our Ant and Dec are surely poised to be the next Morecambe and Wise. ********** Sammy tribute simply hilarious The one thing better than watching Auf Wiedersehen, Pet on Sunday night was being at the City Hall to see Jimmy Nail, Tim Healy and Kevin Whatley play Oz, Dennis and Neville in the flesh as part of the tribute to their late friend, North-East actor Sammy Johnson. Their little sketches as workmen on the Roman Wall were simply hilarious - a couple of gems in an evening studded with diamond performances. Jimmy Nail - who has surely had a nose job since all the talk near me was how different his profile was - had clearly worked his socks off to ensure the two shows went well and his song with his sister Val McLane called Canny Tyneside struck an emotional chord with everyone in the place. Star man for me, though, was Brendan Healy, who proved once again what an all-round talent he is. If you've never seen him before, you can catch him on February 27, again at the City Hall, when he comperes another major North-East charity evening featuring Haley's Comets. Organised by David Haley from Ponteland, the evening evolved from his dream to perform, with his friends - all accomplished musicians - at the City Hall. With their great reputation for raising the roof whenever they take to the stage, it should be quite a night. ********** We've seen some names disappear over the years - Tilley's, the Cloth Market Café, The Grapes Vaults, the Turks Head Hotel. But nothing has made the blood boil more than the decision of a Birmingham pub chain to dispense with the name Balmbra's in Newcastle's Cloth Market and replace it with Reflex, to fit in with its Eighties-themed bars. Balmbra's is famous not just in the North-East but all over the world thanks to the Blaydon Races. It may have changed inside over the years - and I well remember lovely lunches in there sitting on the red plush seats. But the outside, and the name, should surely be protected. It's as much of a landmark in this region of ours as Grey's Monument - and we wouldn't let anything happen to that, now, would we? ********** This week's story about packaging that doesn't work must have struck a chord with everyone. I spent five minutes the other night trying to peel the cellophane wrapper off a video, CDs are even worse and ring-pull cans must be the most hated invention ever as it's nearly impossible to get your finger under the ring without tearing your thumbnail. I was amused, however, by The Journal's "natural" packaging' award for the banana - break stalk, peel back skin and eat. I once had lunch in a very posh restaurant where the guest of honour ate his banana with a knife and fork. This, I was told, was the proper way... | 
