least one newspaper during a recent promotional visit to Germany.

The"BILD-Frankfurt'' ran a photo of the Minister and stated: "Villa Leonhardi, high noon, in front of the door snow, but the man is here in bright yellow Bermuda shorts. Of course Jim Woolridge wants to sell us on Bermuda, not the short pants, but the island. The powerful Jim is Tourism Minister for Bermuda here on a promotional tour as Condor begins flying May 2, nonstop, to the island in the Atlantic.

*** Ask any journalist about stress, and they will tell they live with it daily.

From start to finish of any working day the pressure is relentless to gather and produce material for the ever-looming deadlines.

But journalists aren't the only ones who know about stress, of course.

Millions of people in all professions and from all walks of life suffer from the same thing.

In fact, there's so much stress about that an industry has sprung up around managing and treating it. Untold numbers of doctors, counsellors, authors and others earn a handsome living dispensing professional advice to people who are willing to pay almost anything in search of relief.

Not so at The Royal Gazette , however. Here, stress relievers come in pay packets -- for free.

Reporters recently found attached to their cheques a flyer apparently circulated by the Employee Assistance Programme. Beneath the balloon heading "Amazing Revelations'' were listed ways in which to alleviate stress. Here are some of them: Hug a bunny, talk to birds, observe tropical fish, dress up like a clown and make people laugh, go outside with a squirt gun and a garbage can lid for a shield. Take 35 steps to wherever they lead. Say your name backwards five times.

So if you see reporters walking around dressed as clowns, armed with squirt guns, hugging rabbits, talking to birds and muttering their names backwards, don't send for the men in white coats. Just be glad there are employers who take the problem seriously.

Meanwhile, reporters are wondering what the next pay packet will contain. Bird seed, perhaps? *** Tree-hee! Lord Menuhin's trip to Government House recently threw up a teasing little protocol poser, our spies inform us.

Certain minds within the Parks Department, we hear, were somewhat stumped by the problem of picking a tree for the string-stroking maestro to plant.

Custom has it that trees, where possible, have a certain bond with the VIP performing the time-honoured ritual; thus, in the past, we've had the Queen planting a Queen's palm, Princess Ann a Princess palm, and so on.

For world-famous violinist and conductor Lord Mehuhin, it wasn't quite so straightforward.

"One bright spark suggested the fiddlewood tree, but somehow it didn't seem quite right,'' confided a Parks Department source.

He resisted the temptation of adding it was a case of barking up the wrong tree.

In the event, officials finally went for the obvious...the pigeon plum tree.

Well, of course.

*** It did not capture media attention like former US vice president Mr. Dan Quale's spelling blunder before a group of school children.

But it did catch several observant eyes, including those of a Royal Gazette reporter.

As the Premier, key Cabinet ministers and other invited guests at the AGM of the Chamber of Commerce's International Companies Division sat down to digest lunch and a report by outgoing chairman Mr. Adolf Luttke at The Princess, they found beautiful pink and gold-trimmed menus at their tables.

This was not unusual, aesthetically pleasing menus are common at the hotel.

But let's hope what was inside is not.

The meal began with Minestrone "souup'', followed by the main course with garden fresh "vegetbles''.

However, unlike Mr. Quale, the menu printers managed to spell potatoes correctly.

COOL LOOK -- Tourism Minister the Hon. C.V. (Jim) Woolridge promoting Bermuda in the German newspaper "BILD-Frankfurt''.