Our favourite news story this week concerned a retired US naval bod named Al Niño. This unfortunate soul is currently receiving an avalanche of hate-mail blaming him for all the meteorological phenomena being caused (or so we are told) by the El Niño global weather system. Al, it appears, is personally responsible for everything from Malaysian forest fires to crop failures in Chile. One American gent even accused him of being the reason his daughter relinquished her virtue - apparently she couldn’t get home because it was raining!

In our view Mr Niño's parents must take ultimate responsibility. They should have displayed a bit more foresight when they gave him a name. If only they’d called him Barry, for example, he wouldn’t currently find himself being woken by abusive phone calls at 2 am. A look at Irish Names - a list of first names commonly used in the Emerald Isle - would have left them better equipped to make the decision. Although mainly concerned with the meanings behind Irish Christian names and surnames, it also provides links to information about the most popular names in the UK and US.

But if naming people is fraught with uncertainly, what about the naming of things? For example, Paul is a great name for a person. It does, however, derive from a Latin word meaning small or humble and thus is probably the most inappropriate possible name for the magnificent edifice that is St Paul’s Cathedral. It was not always thus - as we discovered when we swept through their recently launched web site. The first St Paul’s church was a tiny affair built by one Bishop Mellitus in 604 AD. Ransacked by the Vikings in 962, rebuilding work began in 1087. It didn't get completed for another 300 years which proves, if proof is needed, that tardy builders are one constant in an otherwise ever-changing world.

Brand Names are another area that can prove troublesome. Some work brilliantly in one country but spell commercial death in another when it transpires that the local translation is ... shall we say ... unfortunate. Chevrolet, for example, spent millions advertising a car in Mexico before discovering the literal Spanish translation of its name was "Won’t Go". In the same vein Sir Clive Sinclair’s short-lived Zike - a kind of bicycle with an engine - meant something in Dutch sexual slang that we couldn’t possibly put down in a family column. Good brand-names, however, are worth their weight in gold. And there are none better than Rolls Royce and Bentley, bywords for automotive excellence the world over. Check-out their rather spiffy site for in-depth info on how the cars are assembled (in Crewe), along with a history of the companies.

Not even Rolls Royce, for all its pedigree, is entirely immune to unfortunate branding incidents. The Silver Shadow, launched in 1965 according to the web site, was renamed in Germany because the phonetic rendition of ‘shadow’ sounded uncomfortably close to the German word for a rather unpleasant bodily emission. Just the sort of eventuality that European Dialogue might have prevented, had it been around 33 years ago. It aims to promote the building of networks and the exchange of ideas among Europe’s decision-makers (particularly among those countries that are currently waiting to join the European Union), this online magazine is published every two months by the European Commission. The current issue includes articles on the British presidency of the EU, the importance of democracy, and how Irish companies are meeting problems posed by the single European Currency.

The challenges thrown up by European integration are, in our view, even more labyrinthine than those faced by Lara Croft, the cyber-babe star of Tomb Raider I and Tomb Raider II. Unfortunately no-one has yet been able to compile a list of cheats to help businessmen navigate the rocky shallows of monetary convergence. And we’ve looked. We spent hours grimly searching Gamespot UK, which has the biggest collection of hints, tips and giveways we’ve yet found. It tells you how to win at games we’ve never even heard of (much less played), and has an exhaustive collection of news, free downloads and interviews. In our view you cannot be serious about games and not have this site bookmarked. So there!

Oh and by the way, if you don’t like it don’t blame us. It’s all Al Niño’s fault. Tell him. See you next week.

Sites featured in Picks of the Week

• Irish Names -- the meanings behind hundreds of names is revealed.
  
• St Paul’s Cathedral - arguably the world's best known Cathedral.
  
• Rolls Royce and Bentley - according to legend, if the coin had landed the other way up we'd now be calling them Royce Rolls cars.
  
• European Dialogue - European nation shall speak unto European nation.
  
• Gamespot UK - everything you could ever want to know about computer games in one place.