The clownish police squad comes to mind when watching the government's bungling progress
? I suspect that, like me, habitual Labour voters deep down fear that, while the Tories might be horrible, hard-faced exploiters of decent working people, they are reasonably competent at what they do. Labour has its heart in the right place, it believes in fairness and equality, but somehow it gets things wrong in the end. Look at the last government.
And now look at this one. Competent? It is a bit like watching the Keystone Kops effecting an arrest. This week's cack-handed rescue operation in Libya. The privatised forest debacle. The coming catastrophe of NHS reform. The complete failure to do anything about bank bonuses except whinge. Almost everything they touch comes to pieces in their hands. As I've probably said before, it's like watching Edward Scissorhands trying to make balloon animals.
? The sudden, awful, unexpected death of the former Guardian journalist Derek Brown this week set me thinking hard about the nature of friendship. For a spell Derek was my deputy in Northern Ireland, though it didn't feel like that ? we were a pair of equals. After he and his wife, Eileen, had been posted to Brussels, Delhi and Jerusalem for the Guardian, they returned to Britain, winding up in Leominster, because they thought Herefordshire the most beautiful county in England. We met up two or three times a year, for lunch in London, or in a country pub they'd discovered, or with mutual friends in the same neck of the woods. There was never time for the boring stuff ? we had to get on with the fun.
Asked to help with his obituary, I found I knew very few details about his life: his parents' names, his education, even his exact age. But my memories of his friendship are utterly vivid.
Derek sleeping through the bomb alarm at the Europa hotel, then towelling himself by the window and spotting all the guests and staff evacuated down the road. A wonderful blow-out lunch in Bruges, where we had the nine-course meal and kindly waiters brought little snacks for our wives so that they wouldn't feel left out. His wonderful collection of old boys' adventure yarns, the kind with a coloured illustration actually on the cloth cover. Discovering in Belfast that Mundy's South African wine was not exactly Ch�teau Latour and throwing it on the fire, where it burned in the dazzling colours of the rainbow. Writing a piece together about cliches ? "Not a bad little bus, gets me from A to B" etc ? and seeing it plagiarised whole by a certain radio presenter who knows who he is. So many jokes, so much delight, so much good cheer. He leaves a huge hole in all our lives.
? On to my doormat plops the new Oxford Modern English Grammar by Bas Aarts and, yippee, he approves of the split infinitive. At last. Classical grammarians wanted English to fall into line with Latin, which has single-word infinitives, so they condemned us to centuries of this particular nonsense. Even Star Trek's "to boldly go" may sound clunky but it lets the stress fall on "boldly". Or take this report ? "a doctor who installed a camera secretly to film a woman in his bathroom" ? what was secret, the installation or the filming? Now at last we can say "I'm going to happily potter about in the garden" without being denounced by fusspots.
This isn't an attempt to promote bad English, but just to get rid of nit-picking England. Thank you, Professor Aarts.
? I keep thinking I should drop the wacky labels spot, except that the ones you keep sending are so terrific. Take the kettle Mike Pim-Keirle found in a French hotel. It was labelled: "Contents may cause baby to cry when poured on baby due to hotness." Meta Dunn saw in the window of a shoe shop in Chichester: "Buy one, get one half-price." Barbara Walters bought a tube of E45 itch relief cream in Boots, which said: "Side-effects may include itching."
Boots also sell their Complete Man supplement, packed with vitamins and minerals for real men. The warnings include: "During pregnancy or breastfeeding, or if trying to become pregnant, consult with your doctor."
Ron Brewer bought a pair of scissors in one of those impenetrable plastic packs. "How to open: cut with a pair of scissors," it unhelpfully suggested. Margaret Faith acquired some "extra-strong bone china" and was relieved to discover that it was "dishwasher safe, microwave safe, food safe".
And Susan Treagus got some Tesco seasonal four-leaf salad. "Allergy advice. Recipe: no nuts. Ingredients: cannot guarantee nut-free. Factory: no nuts."
That one seems to cover everything. This neurotic labelling of the most obvious facts is clearly to protect everyone from any conceivable court action. It also gave me an idea for a TV show: The Legally Watertight Chef. This week the LWC prepares a mouth-watering kedgeree for family and friends. "You're going to need eggs, smoked fish, rice and curry powder. Look at these gorgeous new-laid, free-range eggs! I'd say you need to hard-boil them, but these beauties could cause mucho anguish to anyone with an egg allergy. So throw them away while you can!
"What a great, silky, fresh piece of flaky smoked haddock we have here! Yum! Just simmer it gently in a little milk till the skin comes away easily, and toss the whole lot in the bin. Invite someone round with a fish allergy, and you could be looking down the wrong end of a nasty writ and loads of grief from a brief! So be on the safe side, and put that jar back on the shelf!
"So you're left with this plain boiled rice, which might taste of nothing at all, but remember ? it's legally watertight!"
Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/theguardian/2011/feb/25/simon-hoggart-week-comment
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