Reporter’s Diary

Press, Volume CXV, Issue 33858, 2 June 1975, Page 2

Reporter’s Diary

.Vo shiners PROFESSIONAL shoeshine “boys" over the age of 16 are not welcome in Cathedral Square The City Council’s health and general committee has recommended that two applications for licences to shine shoes in the Square be rejected. All previous applications have been from children, and the only present shoe shiner with a licence to ply his trade in the Square is a boy who also ha,> a licence for New Brighton. Mr A. P. Millthorpe. the chief city health inspector, thinks the council should consider the principles involved in issuing shoe shine licences to adults as distinct from children who are helping with fundraising or earning pocket money. Rare breed SIR DAVID Scott's appearance in a black top hat at the Wigram passing out parade must have been the first opportunity to view' a genuine topper in Christchurch for many ■ ears Sir David Scott is the United Kinedom High Commissioner, and can be relied on to front up .in

the correct rig for the occasion. But the last time any Christchurch man wore a top hat — except for those grey ones hired out for weddings — is believed to have been the last Royal visit. Ballantynes used to import them, but has not had one for sale for many years. Last resort? PARODIES of the Lord’s Prayer seem to be fashionable. First on television, and now in the Paraplegic Association’s Christchurch branch newsletter: “Our Father which art in Heaven Rowling be they name Stabilisation come, or we shall be done On earth, and probably in Heaven. Give us each day our dearer bread And forgive us our devaluations As we forgive them who revalue against us. Lead us not into recession But deliver us from Unions For theirs is the Kingdom. the power and the glory. For over and over. AMIN

Xot a park

THE TRIANGLE of what used to be lawn where Armagh Street joins Park Terrace near the gates to Hagley Park is having a rough autumn. It has always been a pedestrian sanctuary and the grass has had little chance to

cover this island around a fine beech tree. Now some people are using it for a car-park in the evenings — notably when Rugby practices are held in the park and when the park gates are closed. A City Council spokesman says that the council will cast a disapproving eye at this

new and destructive habit. The Ministry of Transport says the triangle is classified as ornamental grass, and it. is an offence to park on it. Mr A. Goldsmith, the City Traffic Superintendent, says the incidence of parking on such areas is increasing this year, particularly near sports grounds. Complaints have been received, and the department is is- - suing parking offence notices. Guard fish WHERE less imaginative firms have fierce guard dogs, Panic Print, the photo-copying firm in the Square, has a tank of savage fish from the darkest upper reaches of the Amazon. “They bite, so keep your hands out,” says a warning on the tank, which is attracting quite a gallery of admirers. The orange-speckled fish are a valuable breeding pair of Astronotus Ocellatus, which is a distant relative of the tiny but deadly piranha. Now about nine inches long, they are greedy eaters (preferring live fish and snails) and will grow to 14in. Robin Locke, who owns them and loves them in spite of their nasty ways, feeds them big chunks of dog meat. One small boy became so fascinated with them in the few days they

have been on. display that he turned up one day with I his own bag of meat and ; pleaded to be. allowed to feed them. The Oscars, as j they are familiarly known, i have to be kept mostly on j their own. If ke]»t with other fish they will eat their neighbours. dig , holes, rip up plants and generally behave in a perfectly beastly manner. , Their only company on guard duty is a pair of little spiny eels, which sensibly burrow into the sandy bottom of the tank : and stay there.